Developer: Over The Moon
Publisher: Over The Moon
Rrp: £6.99
Released: 30th May 2014
Available on Steam
Played using: A Xbox 360 Controller
Hurtling toward the ground you brace for impact, your shields envelop you enough to absorb most of the damage but the trauma causes you to black out. You awaken many meters below the surface with only minor damage sustained… But the pilot inside you is unresponsive. You must find them medical assistance, quickly!
Quite the compelling start, I’m sure most would agree. In The Fall you play as A.R.I.D, a artificial intelligence inside a space suit who’s only goal is the preservation of the pilot inside.
The Fall is a platformer, at least in look anyway, but it is more than that. There are puzzles to solve, the likes of which would not be out of place in a point and click adventure, and even dialog that you can choose like in a rpg… Although sometimes there is no right answer.
You find out information about your surroundings by finding and highlighting ‘nodes’ you find around the world. This will cause a piece of text to appear describing the area or object. Highlighting occurs when you hold your light in the direction of a node, which is controlled by the left analogue stick.
While a node is highlighted you can them interact with it by holding the right shoulder button. This will give you two options ‘interact’ and ‘network’, interacting is pushing buttons, picking items up, using other items ion the object etc where as networking is essentially interacting with a electrical object from a distance.
There is some combat in this title but it’s an easy to understand affair as you aim with the right analogue stick and fire using the right trigger. Of course the weapon takes a little while to fire and you have to make sure you have changed the light your using to the laser pointer (this is done by clicking the right analogue stick in while aiming).
Your shield will slowly recharge when you’re out of combat.
A.R.I.D can also perform stealth takedowns by sneaking up behind an enemy and pressing the Y button, if you do this some of the enemy’s energy will be used to replenish your own. The cover system for the combat is basic, simply pressing the left shoulder button will bring you in and out of cover and moving the analogue stick will bring you out of it.
The thing is, the combat is the weakest part of the game, it’s functional, does the job and it doesn’t overstay it’s welcome but when compared to what else is on offer? I just feels… Tacked on almost. As I said, functional but not amazing…. At least it doesn’t actually detract from the experience like so many others have.
The visual style of the game is quite striking. Yes, many other games have used the ‘silhouette’ in a dark world aesthetic before. But this one is a bit different, you aren’t truly a silhouette as the faceplate of your character has a light blue glow. As you wander the world your torch will illuminate objects showing much greater detail and colour that causes the object to stand out in he dark world your in.
The clever aesthetic choices don’t stop there, as the starting screen and pause menu is made to look like a boot loader, and has the nice effect of giving certain parts of the text a scrambled look. Not enough to be unreadable but enough to signify damage even before the game is started.
Regarding the pause menu… Pausing the game (using the traditional start button) allows you to access your operating systems and see logs that you collect, as well as the settings and exiting options. At the start of the game you only start with one system active but as you progress more and more systems will be reactivated. Unlike many games these systems aren’t unlocked because you’ve levelled up or anything like that. The Fall is much more clever than that, these systems are directly tied to the story and your main objective, preserving the life of the pilot.
The thing that makes this game truly shine though isn’t the puzzles, the combat (as I mentioned) or its visual design… No, what truly makes this game something unique is the story, the way A.R.I.D handles the situation it’s been flung into. You want to cheer it on but there’s also something quite off-putting about the conclusions reached.
Since The Fall is the first part in a planned trilogy I think I most certainly will be playing the next part! I need to know what happens next, and at £6.99 I won’t quibble about the price. If I have anything I would ask of the developers change it would be to make the combat feel more responsive, or at least not to make it any worse.
The game is a little short I suppose, some people have finished it in a few hours but I found myself scratching my head for quite some time in a number of places. Honestly if you like a story with characters that actually develop before you, play this title, it’s worth every penny.
