Super Motherload - GR Review - Game news at Chat Place

Tuesday, 26 November 2024

Super Motherload - GR Review

Added: 27.11.2013 23:11 | 16 views | 0 comments

Let's head back. The red soil crumbles gently as the drill burrows deeper, one level at a time, one mineral at a time. First a unit of bronze, then a unit of silver, or whatever the silver mineral equivalent is on the Martian planet. It's cold, and dark, and wet, and dead transmissions keep interrupting the comfort of silence with audible warnings that I'm not alone beneath the surface of Mars. My rover beeps, signaling the final drops of fuel burned up tunneling for bronze, silver, and gold to make the more valuable White Gold. The flight back to base keeps me on my toes and the finely dug out path leads me snaking left and right until I see red soil and the surface once more. In the same sunlight that bathes Earth millions of miles away, I refuel, repair, and sell my haul. Before returning underground to the thick vein of valuable minerals I discovered last, I stop by the shop for an upgrade. This is Super Motherload, an awesome blend of obsessive compulsive profiteering and addictive, satisfying gameplay. This is challenging 2D sci-fi Minecraft, multiplayer Dig Dug, and an amazing next-gen indie rolled into one package. XGen Studios first to Super Motherload at the Game Developers Conference earlier this year. At the time, four PS3 controllers let attendees group up and dig for cash in the shallow crust of Mars. This set up introduced me to one of the first mechanics that layer into a satisfying rhythm of digging, smelting, and cashing in: fuel. As you dig and fly about on Mars, a fuel gauge will tick down to empty at which point you can no longer drill, whether you've stuffed your rig full of valuable minerals or not. You and any co-op buddies have to collectively watch shared fuel and carrying capacity, though playing solo alleviates this by simplifying the group-think required by coop. Playing by myself at home, I didnÄ‚ËĂ˘â€šÂ¬Ă˘â€žËt have the same satisfaction in guiding a group of newbie excavators. I couldnÄ‚ËĂ˘â€šÂ¬Ă˘â€žËt bark orders, but I could dig deeper into the smelting mechanics by which intelligent mining reaps even greater cash rewards. That bronze, silver, gold combo to make White Gold I mentioned earlier? That barely breaks the surface as greater smelting variety unlocks at with each new upgrade. In the shop, you can increase your health, your carrying capacity, your drill and rotor speed, and your on-board smelter. The more money you pour into smelting, the more money you can make carefully carving a path between lesser-valued minerals to perfect combo chains and create valuable hybrids. These elements will be totally lost on cooperative dig teams who focus more on racing to the gold deposit or blowing up a chasm to open up the crowded flight path. In single-player, Super Motherload drills into gamer psyche in two distinct ways. The first is in the obsessive maximizing of profits, especially when it comes to extensive mineral chains offering cash bonuses. Every single mineral offers up a delightful ca-ching with combinations gradually increasing in value and audible joy. The second is the soul-crushing difficulty and despair you might get from playing the game in Hardcore mode. Hardcore places even greater focus on managing resources by killing you if you donÄ‚ËĂ˘â€šÂ¬Ă˘â€žËt make it back to base before your fuel runs dry. On Normal difficulty, you fly slowly at zero fuel, but on Hardcore youÄ‚ËĂ˘â€šÂ¬Ă˘â€žËll be one unit of red sand away from a valuable combination when you blow up on the spot for running out of juice. The characters you choose might not say much beyond the pilot select screen at the beginning of the game, but youÄ‚ËĂ˘â€šÂ¬Ă˘â€žËll remember how Karl Redden died every time you pass by the skull and crossbones marking his corpse on the map. Hardcore mode turns a fluffy, semi-shallow indie game into a resource-intense 2D adventure. Enemies wonÄ‚ËĂ˘â€šÂ¬Ă˘â€žËt come bursting out of the silver deposits around your rover, but you might just drop a few hundred yards and bust your rig on a rock outcropping. Once you understand the systems in place, it can be impossible to watch your fuel closely enough to stay safe. YouÄ‚ËĂ˘â€šÂ¬Ă˘â€žËll want to reach a bit deeper to find the next base of operations or drill just a bit further to finish your combo, but you can kill several characters with eager or greedy behavior like that.