First Looks// EGX First Looks: Ether One, Even the Stars_, Futuridium

As the player zips around the universe they have no direction as to what coordinates they need to punch in to reach anywhere. The player is forced to punch in random numbers in the hope they encounter something interesting.

When a planet is discovered it can have a variety of things on it, from a street lamp to a fun fair. All of these things can be experienced and logged into a diary, which is then kept at the end when the player's character expires and the map of the universe they discovered is displayed along with their log entries; thus creating a legacy of the life their character experienced.

Even the Stars_ can be played now for free on your Windows PC or Mac. The developers encourage players to upload the pictures of the pocket universe they discover to share with others. Even the Stars_ does a wonderful job of exploring a very difficult and potentially dark topic of existence and I would implore anyone experiencing it for the first time to simply let go and enjoy it for what it is.


Futuridium by Mixed Bag Games

One of the most defining games of the Commodore 64 was Uridium. A top-down lefty-righty shooter game, it had the player flying a fighter craft at low altitude over a large dreadnaught spaceship. The aim of Uridium was to take down the defences of the dreadnaught and then set off a chain reaction that causes it to explode. A deeply challenging game, it still remains one of the most celebrated titles for the C64 and was even ported to other formats including the ZX Spectrum and Amstrad CPC.

But why the look back at a 30-year-old game? Well, Futuridium is an update to Uridium that is has just been released on the PS4, PS Vita, Windows PC, Mac and iOS. I played the PS4 version at EGX 2014 and found it to be just as much fun and just as challenging as the original.

The major difference being that Futuridium does away with the top-down view and instead replaces it with a 3D environment that the player must flit across, still at low altitude, in order to take down all of the dreadnaught's energy cubes before a core singularity can appear, causing the behemoth ship to explode once the core is destroyed.

The presentation of Futuridium is very clean and simplistic with low polygonal models and one colour textures being the order of the day. This creates a very uncluttered view of the action, which is beneficial to the gameplay as Futuridium nips along at a very fast rate. The sound is where Futuridium really shines, however, as the soundtrack is extremely rich, with 60 minutes of tunes which are an absolute joy to listen to.

At its heart Futuridium is very much an arcade game and therefore requires a great deal of practice to master. It is very frustrating initially, especially to those not familiar with the original or other games that take great delight to challenging the player. But there are rewards in the form of point chasing and a sense of accomplishment to those who persevere with it.

Futuridium is currently out on the PS4, PS Vita and iOS. It is also available as a free demo on PC and Mac via Desura.