Technosphere Reload Review
Fast Facts
Title: Technosphere Reload
Developer: Adaptive Games / Blackrose Project (port)
Publisher: Ultimate Games
Website: https://www.nintendo.co.uk/Games/Nintendo-Switch-download-software/Technosphere-1698924.html#gameDetails
Genre: Platformer, Puzzler
Platform: Nintendo Switch
Audience: PEGI 3
Release Date: 10/01/20
Price: £13.50 – Rapid Reviews UK were very kindly provided with a review code for this title.
You have 10 hours to save the Earth from disaster! Or so I’m told by the publishers. Controlling balls (careful) has been a bit of sub-genre in itself, the most notable of which is Super Monkey Ball. Cut from a similar gameplay cloth but sporting a bananaless sci-fi theme, Technosphere rolls into the Switch’s early 2020 line-up.
Technosphere opens to a menu without so much as a publisher’s logo or a ‘press A to start’ prompt insight. Opting for simple control scheme initially comprised of 3D movement, a jump and a brake (humorously named ‘break’ in the control options screen), your aim is to move the ball down metal walkways, jumping over or pushing boxes, flicking switches, balancing on circular lasers, taking lifts, smashing objects, you get the drill. How this translates to saving the world is anyone’s guess but as an old man in a backwards cap once said, keep rollin’.
Keep the stabilisers on
Diving into the training mode starts the training mode. Beginning a new game, however, starts the training mode. Good to know there are options.
Speaking of options, let’s address the issue of the camera early on. You can’t change it properly. The camera rotates horizontally to four fixed positions only and, given the angle chosen, Technosphere would definitely have benefited from a free camera. More annoyingly, as the transition between camera positions can be interrupted, you can effectively control the camera, it just won’t rest at an angle. The limitation is clearly not a technical one. Visibility and depth perception aren’t exclusively impaired by the stubborn camera, no, for a place that’s littered with luminescence, there’s also a distinct lack of light to help you on your way. Judging whether a gap was a thin bridge or indeed, a gap was downright difficult at times.
There are no real clues as to what your aim is so, in the absence of any preamble I’ve decided to call the red-lighted defective disco ball, Henry Rollins. Rolling around in Technosphere is slow. Slow to an absolute fault. A great deal of Henry’s slow ascension through this mechanical space is taken by waiting, a key component of Technosphere’s high-octane action. Wait for a lift, wait for a moving platform, wait for a short cut scene so you can see the bollards lower. Wait.
There are some decent visuals on display with the futuristic backdrops creating a distinct atmosphere, however muddy on Switch, but the feeling of isolation doesn’t work in Henry’s favour without any context. Or music. Technosphere is technically a puzzle platformer so, really, few will give much thought to it, but the lack of excitement really drags within minutes of getting acquainted.
It’s worse than I sphered
Fall off the side and you’ll plummet to your death, suffering a (very) minor explosion on impact, which seemingly has the force of a wet fart on a sofa. Once your lives are depleted, you’ll be swiftly informed that ‘spheres is over’.
The training mode is short, quickly leading to the terrible realisation that what you believed to be the second desolate training stage was actually the first proper level. What I simply cannot get my head around is why the game insists on precision in its opening moments. The boost gives hope that some temporary momentum can be found and it certainly delivers on that front. Once the boost is introduced, Henry is asked to cross a gap with a jump. Seems reasonable. Now the window for pressing jump after boost is fairly short but easy enough to get down. The trajectory, however, is another matter. If you’re slightly at the wrong angle, you’re liable to take flight once you hit the nearest surface. Well, at least you gain a bit of airtime. Exciting stuff. Of course, that’s until you land, causing another wet fart/explosion so, yeah, spheres is over.
If having a pitiful jump and the pace of a butch slug wasn’t enough, Henry has an astonishingly small fuel reserve. It strikes me that mobility was perhaps not part of the design. Your slithery silver sphere is sluggish and feels a touch slippery at times. Your jump is frustratingly short, meaning each leap has to be at its peak to reach the top of boxes or higher platforms. That’s with a run-up, and it simply feels unnecessary. Eventually, there’s a further power mapped to a trigger; impulse (a barrier/shield), both this and the boost are in limited supply and both are used in pretty unimaginative ways when combined with the platforming elements. The level design itself isn’t necessarily bad, it just feels that, even with the current elements, if there was more time spent on adding the background visual designs to the foreground and doubling the speed of the ball, the whole experience would be so dull.
Technopolis Zone
Collectables come in form of rings from Sonic. You know the ones. After collecting 50 I kept trying to hit jump while in the air to turn super. Obviously, I later realised that was stupid. I hadn’t collected the Chaos Emeralds yet.
Some of the puzzles are fine, but the slow monotonous slog that is the platforming ruins any hope of those moments holding any weight. In between some light puzzle solving involving switches and pushing blocks there lies some branching paths. It isn’t unusual to get lost because everything looks so similar. Paths will lead you down a metal walkway that may or may not house a set of bollards. It’s as enthralling as parking.
Quick note: as you roll on your merry way you may be interested to learn that Henry sounds like a hairdryer. On low. Oh, and there’s no music. Unless I just missed it. In the dead abyss. Spheres is over.
Spheriously
The presentation is blurry on the Switch screen and though performance mostly holds its 30fps target, as one would expect with little happening on-screen during most scenes, it’s not without drops. The endless shimmering wouldn’t be as distracting if there was anything else to grab your attention. Henry’s pulsing red cold sores aren’t the answer. When entering busier areas the resolution appears to take a dive, too, perhaps an element of dynamic scaling is at play. Either way, everything feels tame and screams of sacrifice in the porting process (a process which, of course, is no small feat for an indie developer with a limited budget in mind).
To Technosphere, I apologise for the Super Monkey Ball comparison. Clearly, that was way off the mark. Technosphere aims to push arbitrary limits (fuel, offensively named ‘Energon’ alongside an outdated lives system) into an infuriatingly difficult game. A difficulty based entirely on the fact that it refuses to let poor Henry have another go at a jump without slowly rolling down the same repeated walkways with added visual impairment. I’m sure there’s someone out there who will enjoy this game. But Henry certainly doesn’t.
One thing I can say is that Technosphere is the best 2020 release I’ve reviewed this year. Make of that what you will. Spheres is over.
Rapid Reviews Rating
You can buy Technosphere Reload from the following stores:
eShop Steam
You can find and read our reviews on OpenCritic.
