Status killerstar Mar 6, 2023
I think the concept is pretty neat. It's very neat navigating around places with hyperbolic (and spherical) geometry, and even better after watching the developer diaries, which explains a lot of what's happening in more detail.
But the gaming experience lacks some meat. The gameplay loop is basically walking around talking to NPCs and doing some small activities that showcase …
I think the concept is pretty neat. It's very neat navigating around places with hyperbolic (and spherical) geometry, and even better after watching the developer diaries, which explains a lot of what's happening in more detail.
But the gaming experience lacks some meat. The gameplay loop is basically walking around talking to NPCs and doing some small activities that showcase the weird properties of the space. Like walking through a maze, which in hyperbolic space is huge and very disorienting. Or shooting things in spherical space where things that are far away actually appear extremely large and in the sky.
I don't think these are enough to support such a big space (which is even bigger in hyperbolic space!). There's too much walking around talking to NPCs until you find the "quest giver" (for lack of a better word). Honestly, I think a more linear and guided gameplay might've suited it better than this open world design.
I still recommend everyone to check out the Hyperbolica devlog, which is very interesting and explains things very well. At least the second and third videos, which are the ones that go in depth about these spaces (the others are a lot of technical stuff about the game itself).