Whilst most games boast high octane action and realistic AI, it’s often the overlooked indie style games which provide the ingenuity and uniqueness that can help drive the industry forward. 0rbitalis, developed by Alan Zucconi and published by Mastertronic is a physics based puzzler based upon the notion of having only one shot to succeed.
The premise is simple, with one click, and after attempting to gauge all the discerning factors, you’ll futilely launch a satellite onto a 2D plane, hoping to keep it in orbit for as long as possible. Gravitational pull is your enemy and your friend here, as the ‘maps’ often house many objects with which to gravitate towards. Helpful indicators give guidance on the directions and headings of stray meteors and will also outline your current flight path before and during your launch. Whilst you might assume this would whittle away the game’s challenge, it’s almost necessary after the first dozen or so levels when things start to get interesting.
As you may well have already suspected, objects don’t stay stationary for long; whilst you are be able to see the direction and path of your satellite, its path can dramatically change by the second. The first half an hour of space puzzling will teach you to minutely alter your trajectories, whereas the latter parts of the game will impose the importance of how to also combine timing to your methods. As is gratefully the case in games such as this, new scenarios often rear their complicated heads and force you to accommodate to their varying styles. Not only will you have to deal with the usual motionless stars, but their gravitational fields will pulse, asteroids will orbit in taxing ways and new ‘repelling’ stars will appear.
Despite the game, for the most part, not being incredibly challenging due to the excellent difficulty curve, there’s always the leaderboard to contend with too, as on seldom few occasions was I able to break into the top 50 regardless of how well I thought I’d done! With most levels taking fewer than 20 seconds to complete, if done right the first time that is, the inevitable ‘one more go’ syndrome soon starts to kick in. Never more so than when the alignment of the stars look feasible and teasing enough to offer an infinite loop to chase after!
Whilst it may try to encourage intelligent and progressive thought, at times, playing 0rbitalis can occasionally devolve into an exercise of trial and error until you find the optimum approach. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, but the levels are better when prior to your launch, you vaguely plan where the path will take you and then fine tune your concept. One thing that 0rbitalis seemingly would certainly take advantage of, would be a port to mobile devices, as it seems to be one of the few games where touch controls could actually be beneficial and not just a hindrance. I would also imagine that I would be prepared to sink some more hours in, had it been on my phone; not my computer. It’s also worth making a note of that due to it still being early access, there are some minor niggles such as it being in 4:3 when in full screen, but aside from that, it could almost be released now; still have less bugs than most games.
Of course it’s not just the concepts of indie games that often reap our attention, it’s also the unique looks that some posses; 0rbitalis is no different. The silent beauty of space draws itself and simply adding delicate trails, projections and subtle celestial stars twinkling in the background is an understated but most effective touch. Alongside, the audio track mirrors this approach, composed by Doseone, it emits static noise and ambient effects to create an enveloping, calming aura.
It may not be the longest game out there, but if you’re into leaderboards, subtle good looks and addictive, ‘easy to play, hard to master’ puzzle games, you’ll get your money’s worth out of 0rbitalis.
