Am announced now with a few hours in the availability in the AppStore starting from yesterday of the new First Person Shooter from the Gameloft, NOVA (Near Orbit Vanguard Alliance) with the promise of a review, soon, well, here it is.
Few games have managed to arouse the curiosity of fans and specialized publications in the manner done by NEW and much fewer of them managed to rise to the level of expectations and NEW it is truly an admirable creation because it manages to bring to the iPhone screen that FPS gaming feeling that is completely missing in many much better rated games.
In the NOVA universe you control a former marine, Karl Warding, who has been recalled to duty to investigate extraterrestrial activity around human colonies, the action taking place in a futuristic future where the Earth is no longer capable of supporting human life , humanity being forced to colonize planets from nearby galaxies. The storyline or the voices are not the strong points of the game, but you will easily get over these small inconveniences thanks to the well-designed gameplay that will keep you on your toes throughout each mission.
In the first levels of the game you have to navigate through a spaceship, killing everything in your way, guided by your comrades via radio (and an arrow at the top of the screen), activating switches that will open you doors allowing you to pass from one section of the ship to another and collecting all the dropped items from downed enemies. But that's not all, the first levels will also take you through missions outside the ship, missions that will test your speed to get from one pressurized section of the ship to another using "magnetic boots" and avoiding get hit by asteroids.
After crossing the ship, you will reach the control room where you will activate the self-destruct process, then you will have to escape from the ship, reaching one of the planets colonized by humans, which is now infested with aliens, which you will have to kill, for to fulfill the final objective, it remains for you to discover which, I will only tell you that the gameplay takes place along 13 levels in 5 different environments.
Similar to Halo is the way you use your weapons and abilities, the hero having a "shield meter" displayed on the right side of the screen, a shield that is loaded automatically over time, not being able to be loaded by any other method. As a new element for this type of iPhone games is the fact that at certain points along a mission you will find boxes that once opened will put you in front of some puzzle games that you will have to complete in order to receive different objects which will help you throughout the game, none are mandatory or necessary to complete a mission.
If you played Modern Combat: Sandstorm then you will notice that on the control side the 2 games are quite similar, but there is also the option to use a virtual joystick located on the left side of the screen with which you will control the character's movements, and the left/right swipe-up will change the angle of view. In addition to these options, several buttons will appear on the screen that can be used to: shoot the weapon, throw a grenade, change the weapon, reload it, etc., also having the possibility to change their location on the screen according to your needs .
In the graphics department, the game looks absolutely exceptional, being a true work of art by those from Gameloft, but we are already used to such games and people expect more and more detailed graphics considering that the hardware exists. From a performance point of view, unlike Ridge racer presented by me yesterday, which is a monumental failure from the point of view of optimization, NOVA runs extremely well from the iPhone 3GS to the oldest version of the iPod Touch, even in online play. As for online, to play on the NOVA servers you must have a Gameloft Live account and you can only play via WiFi, but in multiplayer mode you can "kill" your friends both via Bluetooth and WiFi.
That's all about this game, if you are a fan of FPS for iPhone/iPod Touch then this game is perfect for you and you will surely not regret your choice, and if you are not yet a fan, maybe you should try this game, who knows, maybe you'll change your mind.
If you want to buy the game, you can do it for $6.99 from the US AppStore here and for €5.49 from the RO AppStore here. And finally a new gameplay trailer:
