Overview
You’re a lonely astronaut who’s lost his ship and is stranded 100 light years from Earth. You’re all alone and all you want to do is make it back, but its A Long Way Home… That’s the premise behind a great new Indie game called A Long Way Home from Jonathan Mulcahy. After spending some time with the game I can tell you that it’s quite the journey and I’m glad it’s a long one because the game is a blast to play.
Gameplay
When you first crank up the game you’re given the back-story of our stranded astronaut which unfortunately ends with you being stranded on a piece of floating rock. You’ll need to jump from asteroid to asteroid and collect all the Dark Matter you see so you can open a portal to the next level. Basically, you’ll need to line yourself up with a nearby asteroid, jump and let gravity do the rest. There’s a little room for error, but if you’re off by much you’ll miss your landing and drift off into space. Once you’ve collected enough Dark Matter you’ll open a portal that you can jump through which leads to the next level.
Features
As the name might imply A Long Way Home takes gamers on a journey that covers a lot of ground with 100 levels spread out across 10 different galaxies. It starts out fairly easy but gets tougher when you start dealing with things like comets and exploding asteroids. The game has two different control setups; I used the simple on-screen control setup, but you can use the accelerometer if you want a little extra difficulty. There aren’t any extras to speak of, but a game like this doesn’t need them as the gameplay, graphics and atmosphere are the stars of the show.
Verdict
From the opening scene and conversation with Eddie I was sucked into the game and have had a hard time putting it down since. The gameplay is easy to pull off but challenging to master and the game as a whole is really top-notch. There are a few minor things need to be fixed (back button), but overall it’s a great effort and an Indie hit in the making. Not many games make you “feel” something, but A Long Way Home seems to hit just the right chord with me as I’m sure it will with others. It’s a great game and an Indie I think everyone should check out. You can pick up A Long Way Home for $0.99 cents in the Android market.