Nova-111

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIT9PMFZFB4 [quote]Follow my Curator page, [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/41363546-Fruit-N-Doggie-Reviews/]Fruit N Doggie Reviews,[/url] so you can be updated whenever I post a new review.[/quote] [h1]Overall Rating - Seriously Flawed ★★☆☆☆[/h1] [h1]First Impressions[/h1] I've had Nova-111 (N1) in my library since April 2016, and until this point I'd never gotten around to playing it. Wanting to knock out some older titles, I went ahead and installed the game. It's hard to remember after a few years, but I believe what made me want it in the first place was its adequate reviews, and the general sense that it'd be a good puzzle game. [h1]Gameplay[/h1] N1 is a bit atypical as far as puzzle games go. You control a spaceship that moves on a grid system, with the general goal of finding stray scientists, but primarily to get to the warp at the end of each area. Instead of being able to see the entire environment and having complicated puzzles based on a strict turn number, it's more exploratory and open-ended. Instead of facing confounding obstacles, you have to face off a certain amount of enemies in each stage. As you obtain new abilities, the enemies get some new tricks of their own. One of the key dynamics of N1 is that each movement you take progresses one turn, with enemies taking their actions after you do. This essentially means you indirectly control their actions, as their behavior is based on how close you are and whether they can attack or not. Some enemies though are time-based instead, so you'll have to respond quickly, regardless of how many turns it takes, or else you'll be damaged. As you face situations where both enemy types are in the same area, you have to think on your feet to figure out the best way of handling the problem. Unfortunately, there's not enough variance in the types of enemies and situations you encounter for this not to feel a bit stale by the game's end. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2147175849 [h1]Controls[/h1] You can play N1 with either a keyboard or controller, and I went with a controller myself. Due to the game's mechanics, you can remain in place and advance a turn in order to manipulate enemy behavior. There's a few abilities you'll unlock over time, and they're all easy enough to activate when you need them. FYI, if you hit the 'select' button, it'll bring up a map. I wasn't aware of that at all during my playthrough. [h1]Story[/h1] Although there's quite a bit of dialogue in the game, the story of N1 isn't that clear. There was some kind of experiment involving space-time that went predictably awry, it led to all of these strange circumstances occurring, and you are piloting a ship to save a bunch of scientists. However, it doesn't indicate who you are, as you're completely unnamed or unspecified, so it's not clear how you fall into the big picture, in spite of your incredibly vital role. Even when it's all over, there's no indication that things returned to normal, so I have no idea how it all turned out in the end. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2147175326 [h1]Graphics[/h1] Even though the game is composed of a grid-based system, the tiles you move around on aren't just a repeating pattern of the same blocks over and over. Instead, these seem to be translucent, as you see a background with different gradients based on which part of the game you're in. This creates a much more interesting environment to look at, which worked just fine as it was always clear where the tiles I could move around were. I never got confused by the dimensions of how much space the next square would take up or mistook a wall for a place to move. [h1]Sound Design[/h1] Most of the music in N1 is mellow, which is appropriate for a puzzle game. I'd say it has somewhat of a unique flair, as it doesn't seem to use typical instruments for its basis, though I wouldn't be able to pinpoint what was used to compose the songs. Either way, I find the track enjoyable and relaxing. The sound effects are fairly straightforward, as there's only a few actions that require a sound effect, such as smacking into walls and enemies. [h1]Pros[/h1] 🌟 After beating the game, you unlock [b]New Game +[/b] which opens up several options you can toggle on or off. For instance, having unlimited polygel and science, so this would be a good opportunity to aim for achievements. However, you'd have to play the game over again from scratch. 🌟 With new abilities and health upgrades to unlock, there is a sense of progression in the game. 🌟 I found the audio/visual design of N1 to be a strong point of the game. [h1]Cons[/h1] ❌ Most of the game is too simple to be that interesting. The situations and puzzles you encounter usually aren't that difficult to figure out, they're just time consuming. The most fun I had was with the last two bosses, which actually made me pay more attention and think out what to do. Otherwise, I basically went on auto-pilot. ❌ Each stage is made up of multiple sections, which makes replaying them a huge pain. I don't want to slog through so many areas just to find one missing scientist. There's no reason stages shouldn't have been broken up more. ❌ I understand the point of an idiot sidekick, but I found Dr. Science to be utterly pathetic. I really have to wonder how he got involved with this matter to begin with. [h1]Tips[/h1] 🔍 Unless you're trying to get a high ranking on the leaderboard, there's no rush in approaching the obstacles you encounter. Slow and steady is usually the best policy, except in a few instances where enemies rush you, or you have to flee from waves of fire. 🔍 Enemies behave very consistently, so once you figure out appropriate ways to handle them, you'll always know how to address them again. [h1]Final Thoughts[/h1] N1 didn't play quite how I expected it to from the trailer, but it still had an interesting control scheme and mechanics. Based on how long it took to complete, I was surprised when I saw that there were only 18 stages in total, across 3 worlds. This is misleading though, as each stage is comprised of multiple areas, so it really plays out more like there's around 30-40 stages. However, due to some of the design choices, I find that N1 was a let down and more of a game to grind through than enjoy. Having shorter levels with more involved and interesting obstacles to navigate would make for a better experience. It would also make replaying stages quicker and easier. Though I find the options available in [b]New Game +[/b] interesting, by this point I have no desire to test them out and keep playing. With everything in mind, I can't recommend this game. [table] [tr] [th]PC Specs[/th] [th]Performance[/th] [/tr] [tr] [td]Ryzen 2700 RTX 2070 16GB RAM ADATA SSD 1920x1080 [/td] [td]The game ran without incident on default settings. 💖 - N1 is healthy [/td] [/tr] [/table]

An unamusing game with better-than-average visuals for a platformer. You play some sort of ship that bumps into objects in order to remove them from the playing field and occasionally you rescue scientists, which really doesn't do anything other than give you a short piece of text. There are different types of enemies and environmental dangers you must work around. You'll be graded at the end of each map and your grade will depend on how many tuns you've used to complete the map. Nice visuals, repetitive gameplay.

[h1] It plays similar to old school roguelike games mixed with Boulder Dash but a bit and a tad more simplified. Just press arrows to navigate and attack. Save humanz. Some elements are weird though, when stumbling upon stalactites they fall after short time despite gameplay being turn based. Visuals are ok, have some nice artistic organic like scenery. As you move reveal rest of map. Later levels introduce more stuff. Soundtrack is good. Overall hard to recommend because gameplay is boring. [/h1]

I'm going through and playing some games from my backlog. This game isn't bad, but I can't recommend it. After dying my last run I felt little desire to continue and wanted to just move onto something else. The game is a mix of turn based and real time. For some enemies there is a technique to counter them, and for others it seems like perhaps it's more like a game of retreat and recharge the guns/shields, or lure them under stalactites to drop on them. It is possible to use enemies against each other in crossfire. Sometimes you'll walk into a bad situation blindly and that will kill you which is frustrating require a level restart. It also seems at a certain point several different enemies get introduced at once before I've learned their mechanics. Also, you have to complete several levels in a row before reaching a save point, so be prepared to replay several in a row in that event. That discourages me from continuing also because it means replaying levels again unless I always stop at the end of a world. Anyhow, it's not a bad game, but it's not calling me back, especially to replay the last few levels again before I get to something new.

Starting with this opening alone I found Nova-111 a difficult topic to broach. Not because it's bad, far from it actually, but more because it seems like such an interesting shape-defying title to be pigeon holed the way many games get today. What at first seems like a turn-based roguelike meets strategy quickly introduces real-time elements you're forced to react to. Result is this anomaly where two different schools of thought interact while you only have turn-based tools to respond and it can get quite tense at times. You're slowly eased from “take your time, enemies react to your moves” to “oh god, why is everything on fire?” as you approach the finale and it's a well executed build-up. Getting into specifics – you control this small utility machine and quickly surmise, from what your Dr. Science mentor keeps telling you, that something has gone horribly wrong and it's up to you to fix space time or whatnot. I found the entire thing to air on more humorous side of things with every scientist you rescue sharing a funny quote with you or outright delving into reference and meme territory. Game still retains sense of gravitas to convey the notion this is, in fact, serious as you see everything going crazy whether you're in ruins of your lab or nowhere in time. While three worlds each with six levels may seem short the looks between them are definitely unique visually to stand apart and game settles into gradually introducing new enemy types and powers for you to play with. Approach to treating bosses as half-puzzles, half-fights was also the correct way to go considering you're navigating around enemies as much as levels throughout the entire game as you wait for cooldowns and Science meter to refill so you can unleash attacks. Soft colors and pleasing 2D visuals were a correct decision in this case and game is extremely inviting as a result. Three tilesets employed look otherworldly and go well with oddly ethereal soundtrack, which does admittedly get overwhelmed by all the sound effects when things heat up.

eu achei muito divertido, mas não tem tanta coisa. se você curte esse estilo de jogo, vai ser uma boa opção

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I think this is possibly the most underrated game in my Steam library. The gimmick of fusing turn-based and real time play is an excellent one, and I think they did a really good job of exploring ways to mix the two. Often it can be played akin to a turn based dungeon crawler, but the enemies, bullets and environmental hazards that move in real time add a bit of pressure and force you to move quickly. It's not dissimilar to Crypt of the NecroDancer in that sense; enemies have attack patterns that aren't too hard to learn, but the gimmick means you can't always take your time and can be forced into mistakes. The time pressure is lower here though and combat is quite tactical as you use the environment or other enemies' attacks against your foes. Individual enemies are easy to handle once you know how, but in varied combinations they're more interesting to fight. There are also plenty of puzzles to solve, which aren't too challenging but still pleasant and imaginative. If you want a little more challenge, there are secret collectables hidden throughout. I also enjoyed trying to beat the levels in as few moves as possible, and there are leaderboards for that. The game is at its weakest in the later levels. Where a game more confident in itself and the player would have continued to explore its established mechanics in harder configurations, Nova-111 seems to want to keep introducing new mechanics. The third and final world throws in a new twist[spoiler] where regions of the grid are frozen in time[/spoiler]. It's an interesting idea, but I didn't feel it was utilised as well as earlier mechanics. It doesn't stop being enjoyable here, it's just that the level design isn't as strong as it was earlier in the game. Even the art style is worse. There's also the fact that levels are broken into blocks of three that you're forced to play together, an odd decision that becomes quite annoying when you're replaying to find collectables. Those two issues aside, this is a great game that I'd heartily recommend.

https://youtu.be/5pJOZ_RLkVs Mixing turn based and real time reactions into a light puzzle experience works well and keeps players on their toes shifting gears between each mindset.

Weird mix of turnbased grid movement with real time attacking and moving enemies. The game really deserves more attention.