Village Gamer

Blasting at you from Vancouver Island is the brand new indie game called Cosmochoria, launching on Steam Early Access today for PC, Mac and Linux, for only $9.99 USD. As an added bonus, Cosmochoria will launch with a 10% discount for the first week. Developed by Nate Schmold and a small team of game wizards, Cosmochoria is described as a love letter to and re-imagining of, old school action-arcade games like Asteroids, Mario Bros and Donkey Kong.  Hopping between planets, unravelling forgotten secrets and mysteries, killing aliens and planting seeds to sprout new life across a long-barren galaxy. There’s even a magic 8 ball. And space dragons. You know that any game with a magic 8 ball has got to be cool. Oh yes – and your little astronaut dude is naked.

[youtube:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fv4z8weU_WI]

Cosmochoria was successfully funded via Kickstarter earlier this year, blasting by the initial goal of $10 000.00 to raise $28 696.00. I notice that the Wii U port was the last stretch goal reached, and as the Wii U is my favourite gaming console, I would be interested in giving the game a go when it becomes available in 2015. In the meantime, the Cavechild has been playing the game, and he has streamed it a few times on his Twitch TV channel. He made a new video for me last night as his previous ones have a chunk of audio missing due to Amazon censoring the videos due to music playing in the background. You can see the video below, but be warned, he uses his swears so it may not be appropriate for work or around small children.

Watch live video from NorthwindGaming on Twitch

While the artwork is simplistic and reminiscent of classic games, the audio is of very high quality and even impressed the Cavechild, who is very picky about audio quality in games..and TV…and movies… Anyway, getting back to Cosmochoria – the game impressed both the Cavechild and Scott, who has also been playing it off and on for a week or so. They both like the level of replayability in this single player game, which also has partial game controller support. In every play-through of the game, the map is different, so there is no memorizing where the planets are. Smaller planets are easier to revitalize than the bigger planets, but they are all capable of giving health points to our little hero should he take some hits from the multitude of planet-killing aliens jetting around in outer space.

You can use the little jewel-like rewards from blasting aliens to get power-ups, and it’s prudent to make use of them as at times the gameplay can become a challenging bullet-hell, so there is a difficulty ramp-up. Oh, and watch out for the sun. You don’t want to be like Icarus and fly straight into the burning star.

You play the role of a tiny pink naked cosmonaut who finds himself’ in a distant galaxy. While no story is immediately apparent, consecutive games will begin to reveal some of the deeper mysteries surrounding the universe around you.

You are free to roam the galaxy in search of these secrets, or to remain on a single planet, establishing a home base to fight aliens and tend to your galactic garden.

Game Features:

• So much Pew Pew Pew High Score arcade action.
• Plant seeds to sprout new plants, new plants give more seeds.
• Grow plants to fill dead planets with your Love Juices.
• Massive UltraNova Explosions Like from Contra III.
• Build Towers like a construction BOSS.
• Procedurally generated galaxy. Each game is unique like a snowflake.
• Aliens poop crystals from their bums before they explode.
• Spend said poop crystals at the upgrade shop to improve your abilities.
• Radical interstellar screen sized boss fights.
• Mini-Map Upgrade plots your cosmic journey.
• Warping around the whole place like U really mean it.
• Fresh electronic soundtrack by Ilkae, Zebra & Mantrakid.
• Hand Crafted Vector illustration stylee.
• Form Deeply Special Bonds with Secret Cartoon Animal Pets.
• Befriend an old hermit alien at his wooden shack.
• Discover hidden artifacts strewn across the galaxy.
• Fire Bullets into a whole bunch of Bad Guy Faces.
• Float NAKEDLY all over Outer Space!!

System Requirements:

For PC:
Minimum:

• OS: Windows XP
• Processor: Intel Core 2 CPU
• Memory: 2 GB RAM
• Graphics: Hardware Accelerated Graphics
• Hard Drive: 175 MB available space

Recommended:

• OS: Windows 7
• Processor: 2 Ghz Dual Core
• Memory: 2 GB RAM
• Graphics: Hardware Accelerated Graphics with Dedicated Memory

For Mac:
Minimum:

• OS: Mac OS 10.7+
• Processor: 2 GHz Dual Core
• Memory: 2 GB RAM
• Graphics: Hardware Accelerated Graphics
• Hard Drive: 175 MB available space

Recommended:

• OS: Mac OS 10.9+
• Processor: Intel i5+
• Graphics: Hardware Accelerated Graphics with Dedicated Memory
• Hard Drive: 150 MB available space

For Linux: