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NightSky
PC (Steam)
I Found My Marbles!
4.5/5 stars
“NightSky,” as an Indie project by lone Swedish developer, Nicklas Nygren (better known for the ‘Knytt’ series of Indie games), had a rather long and troubled development cycle. Starting as a Wii exclusive before receiving a PC port, the game’s original release was cancelled and switched to the 3DS. The four-year development cycle of the game, lasting from 2007-2011 when it was finally released on Steam, likely took the wind out of the sails of many folks who were keeping an eye on it, either as fans of Nygren’s own work or – as in my case – as fans of publisher Nicalis, who originally brought the officially translated HD version of “Cave Story” to the Western world. Honestly, I didn’t know what to expect going into “NightSky,” as I simply saw that it was published by Nicalis and that it was next to free during a Steam sale, so I bought it. It turned out to be a very good purchase.
Presentation
“NightSky” uses simple, flat 2D graphics that invoke silhouettes. The result is a game that isn’t really much to look at on the surface, but possesses surrealist and abstract qualities that give it’s visuals more depth than a casual glance might indicate.
The soundtrack, composed by Indie musician, Chris Schlarb, is likewise not much on the surface, but oddly unique and artsy for those who take their time to just sit and listen.
“NighSky” has one major technical flaw, and that is that the ending sequence – which, like the intro sequence, is a series of hand-painted stills with captions – does not actually play upon completing the game. This is a significant oversight, but can be remedied by simply looking at the images in the game’s directory using any standard image viewer.
Story
“NightSky” is a sedate, relaxing tale about dreams. The intro reveals that an unnamed person discovers a mysterious orb on the beach one evening. Upon taking this orb – which seems to pulse with a hidden life force of its own – home with him, the unnamed individual is haunted by a series of surreal dreams in which the orb navigates through alien landscapes.
This premise sets-up the gameplay perfectly, as guiding the orb through dreamscapes is exactly what the player is tasked with doing for the entirety of the game. I would have preferred a little more explanation of the orb’s true nature, but even the ending isn’t exactly satisfactory.
Of course, it’s fairly difficult to do anything particularly epic, storywise, with a short puzzle/platformer in which there are no characters. Leaving the player hanging seems like an adequate and suitable way to construct the narrative in this case.
Gameplay
As a child, I used to love playing with marbles on specially constructed tracks. “Marbles” the game never interested me in the slightest, but taking a single marble and watching it roll across a series of obstacles, aided only by gravity (and a variety of other physics my young mind couldn’t grasp) was an infinite source of joy, as I setup elaborate ‘marble racetracks’ on every staircase in the house.
“NightSky” recaptures the simple pleasure of guiding a marble through obstacles, while simultaneously capturing the aspects that made 2D Platforming such a popular videogame genre. The player controls the mysterious orb from the game’s opening and must navigate through 10 thematic worlds, each of which contains 13 individual stages. Each stage in “NightSky” is pleasantly short, with three screens’ worth of obstacles to navigate. The game provides unlimited chances to complete each stage, and the player can easily reset the stage should they get irreversibly stuck. “NightSky” also has two difficulty modes, ‘Normal’ and ‘Alternative,’ with Alternative providing slightly different and slightly tougher takes on the same puzzle themes seen in Normal. Both Normal and Alternative include 12 hidden exits throughout their stages, which must be discovered in order to complete the final set of stages.
“NightSky” has fairly simple controls and includes full native support for Xinput controllers. Unfortunately, the Steam page for the game doesn’t indicate ANY controller support, and the game itself only explains the keyboard inputs during the tutorial stages, leaving controller users to guess what each button does. Regardless, it’s not particularly difficult to figure out how to control the game. Left and Right on the d-pad move the orb, X applies the orb’s brake, A allows the orb to accelerate or reverse gravity (depending on the context of the stage), B activates contextual objects, Start resets the stage, and Back returns the player to the previous menu (or stage select from within a stage).
Any of the orb’s abilities can be granted or taken away arbitrarily by a given stage, but remain constant within said stage. Regardless of the orb abilities available in a given stage, the use of physics in solving the stages’ puzzles is a constant, as the player must take momentum, friction, and gravity into account at all times. Some stages even throw-in one-off vehicles that the player must pilot, keeping the gameplay fresh.
Thanks to the short stage length and relative lack of repetition required to complete the game, “NightSky” doesn’t last very long. A blind playthrough of Normal mode might take 2-3 hours, while a blind playthrough of Alternative might take about 6 hours. But 130 stages (not including the playable credits) is a solid amount of content, and all of it is interesting and fun.
Overall
Anyone looking for a surreal, artsy, and ultimately relaxing puzzle/platforming experience should look no further than “NightSky.” The physics-based platforming is top-notch, and the use of a spherical protagonist allows for plenty of unique, novel puzzles.
Presentation: 4/5
Story: 3/5
Gameplay: 5/5
Overall (not an average): 4.5/5
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