Airscape: The Fall of Gravity Review

TRY OUT THE DEMO HERE.

Airscape: The Fall of Gravity is an adorable game. However, underneath is a little evil creature that enjoys watching you suffer, as you slam your head into a wall though its process of trial and error gameplay. It is like if you take I wanna be the guy, then turn the character into a freaking cute as hell octopus. But before I get ahead of myself I will try to place together what seemingly is the story. You are Ecco… I mean an Octopus who is swimming around a little cavern with a few other octopuses (octopi?) that seem like your friends or family. Then, some probe drill comes into your house and wrecks the place. You are pushed on to land wearing a helmet permitting you to breathe without being in water. I know this story is a toss back to other games, like yes Ecco: the dolphin. But seemingly they use the abduction thing as more or less a plot set up, for what is really going on.

Speaking of stories here is a brief history of how this project came into reality as described by the developer which I found pretty interesting because of the passion that went behind the scenes:

“Daniel, a first year university student from Wollongong, Australia, started work on the first Airscape back in early 2012. The initial prototype won a competition run by the company behind Construct 2, the game creation software used to make Airscape. Winning the contest and receiving lots of good feedback led Daniel to continue work on Airscape. To help with the new and improved Airscape, he recruited Claudia Starke, a university student from Germany as the game’s artist, and Sam Gossner, a freshman in college in New England, U.S.A, to create the game’s original orchestral soundtrack. Dieter Theuns was later roped in to create the game’s new logo and UI design, as well as additional artwork. “ – Cross-Product

GAMEPLAY: Basically. With your orange little guy or lady (Ladypus?) the octopus will flip to other planes of land or into water and swim around with some awkward game pad controls. Oh yes, game pad controls. If you are not into using your xbox controller on the pc or your new flashy video card, that perhaps drained your pockets? You are going to have a weird time playing this game with a keyboard and mouse. You navigate through water with the left analog stick and X(blue) or A(green) to ascend or descend. On land it is your standard controls like most platformers eg: Mario bros, or Cheetaman. But off the bat as I suggested before, I wanna be the guy comes into play.

One.. hit.. kills.

Level structure is like Mario, basic Level 1-1, 1-2, 1-3 etc. You do get check points but there at places that make you say “awwww!! I gotta do all that crap again?!” After a while you move to some block structure of a level, looks like some kinda giant sugar cube. This is your first new octopus. The stage to grant it was pretty challenging but it made sense to prepare you for what is ahead. The next one octopus I received was a purple one (Purplepus?) That had floating powers that can be handy for dodging bullets or traps that are move. The nifty thing is you can swap between the octopuses by tapping X when you are on the entrance portal. One of the downsides to this game is that the gravity might be too good, or too responsive. You then tell me “That’s a freaking good thing you darn whining journalist neckbeard!!!” It is but this games level design would leave you disorientated as it switched from water to land levels. There was a time for example: Like how water is giving the impression its scenery and then you might just touch it and it would switch back to swim mode again. Being all over the place kept it interesting at least. Sadly at points free movement and platforming restricted left to right movement are not a one hundred present good combo. You find your self more frustrated with just lightly grazing water making you flop back into the water parts of the levels then just dying in this game.

Graphically the game is incredibility pretty. Full of color and movement. However it does suffer a bit if folks happen to own a computer less then perfect with good enough specs. Most PC Gamers will range from decent to advanced rigs for games. So you might have to adjust the graphics or a few settings down to make the game optimal whenever something in the game gets intense. Due to slow downs. This is a game about quick reflexes after all. This is not entirely to blame on the game however, just be advised you will just need a good computer to really make this game shine. Not anything beyond a 550ti video card. Just a good processor.

In Closing:

Airscape: The Fall of Gravity is a fun, creative and adorable platforming death trap. I say Deathtrap in the most positive of ways I might add. Its cute texture may seem open for kids but if your kids do not like very challenging games you might loose a gamepad/keyboard or a mouse as it smashes into a local wall. I would strongly advise using a Xbox360, or XboxOne gamepad for the best possible experience. It felt pretty lackluster trying to move with just the keyboard. You will have others argue their point saying with their monocles in their eyes while sitting at a park bench. While sipping from their glass of “Simply counter-point lemonade” like it was their turn or something. Anyway, If you enjoy a good challenge as well as support the indies that are sharp creators of great games such as this. Then hey boy or girl this game is for you!