Scale is an element in Heart Machine’s work, something Preston instinctively returns to. It’s an echo of Hyper Light Drifter, which had vast Titans as a backdrop. It’s like a giant rodeo, where you’re chipping off the armor to expose the flesh beneath, crawling all over their writhing form to get that final, winning strike. Rei can grapple small enemies, or anchor points on the giant bosses, and pull herself in to attack, never skipping a beat as she strikes and moves. Cleverly, whether it’s against a small goon or a giant boss, fighting is still mostly about movement. It’s a boss fight against creatures that would give Godzilla pause for thought. Branching out, seeing what we can do with actual text and VO was a wild experience, and we hope, successful.”Īs you progress, you’ll eventually awaken the attention of that level’s Massive Anomaly. Drifter was a great experiment in visual story-telling only as an approach. According to Preston: “We wanted to push into dialogue and deeper character development at the outset. It was another change for Heart Machine to embrace. Hyper Light Drifter told its story visually, and Solar Ash’s small moments of interaction are positively chatty in comparison. Secreted about the map are notes and people. Is that building angled just enough to let someone leap across the gap to the other, equally teetering building? Apparently unconnected rooftops become secret roadways to the level's goals or hidden areas. You’ll spot a rail you hadn’t seen before, snaking around a teetering building. Sometimes, you have to take a step back and look at the level as a whole to work out your route. Because we switched to making this 3D more open world game, we wanted to focus on creating incentive and joy for the player to explore in multiple dimensions, so they can get a sense of being small yet impactful in this massive world.” With the vast levels and slick movement, it feels like the player should never stop moving, something Game Director Alx Preston agrees with: “That’s very true. You can scale buildings in a few seconds. The buildings frozen mid-tumble cracked, broken walls twisted together with train rails, areas covered in a sticky goo that lets you cling to sheer surfaces. The tools at her disposal will allow her to explore, say, a broken capital city at high speed. Rei can skate at speed across the pillowy ground, slow time and jump or grapple across gaps, and grind rails. It’s like Jet Set Radio meets Shadow of the Colossus, with a little bit of Super Mario Galaxy mixed in. Completing their various challenges unleashes a giant boss that you have to ride and kill. The levels are built from the crushed, warped worlds that the void swallows, turning them into huge platforms for Rei to explore. Voidrunners are skillful skaters, who can traverse the twisted world that the Ultravoid creates. You play Rei, a Voidrunner trying to save her home planet from being swallowed by a black hole called the “Ultravoid”. That lets them build on the tent poles of the previous game-exploration, action-while leaping right off them and grinding along a rail into the vast, unexplored territory of 3D! It’s not a sequel, though it shares the same universe as their first game. Solar Ash is developer Heart Machine’s follow-up to Hyper Light Drifter.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |