AMAZING STORIES OF THE SPACE AGE FREE

AMAZING STORIES OF THE SPACE AGE FREE

With Space Age, Mrgan and Comi had to switch from the two-dimensional panes of The Incident to a top-down perspective with free exploration, and the result is a perhaps less dense but equally impressive set of areas with a lot of personality. Designed by Panic’s Neven Mrgan, Space Age features a delightfully retro pixel-driven aesthetic that’s reminiscent of classic NES games as well as modern takes on the retro-styled genre such as Fez or the upcoming Hyperlight Drifter. In pure Big Bucket style, what’s immediately noticeable about Space Age is its pixel art. Without spoiling too much, there’s a bit of Avatar in Space Age, plenty of references to the American dream of space exploration, and a lot of funny lines. There’s life on Kepler–16, and Private – aided by a variety of teammates and especially science officer Archer – will end up discovering the secrets of the planet and his connection to other characters on Kepler–16. The purpose of the mission is to investigate the planet and collect resources – primarily the planet’s native ore/energy source, called Nucleum – but it soon becomes clear that there’s more to Kepler–16 than strange metals and a resemblance to Earth’s landscapes (including water and apple trees). Space Age tells the story of Private, a young soldier who, in 1976, lands with his team on alien planet Kepler–16. I’ll try to avoid spoilers in this review as much as possible. Note: I played and finished a pre-release version of Space Age on an iPad Air 2.

Space Age looks great, sounds fantastic, and is filled with witty dialog that powers an intriguing story of space exploration and distant memories. Space Age – first teased over two years ago – joins Monument Valley in my list of best iOS games of 2014, and it is the kind of game that I believe anyone with an iOS device should play. Space Age is an adventure game from Big Bucket, the indie dev studio by Matt Comi and Neven Mrgan, who previously brought us the exquisite (and addictive) The Incident in 2010.

Amazing stories of the space age