ULTRAWORLD review
By Kevin (@prufesuroak)
- ULTRAWORLD
- Developer - Neon Serpent LLC
- Publisher -
Neon Serpent LLC
- PC
- Rating - N/A
Ultraworld is a first-person explorer that tackles existential crisis’.
You play… yourself dropped into this world that was built by an AI named Ultra who has become sentient and needs answers about himself, reality,purpose… etc. We find out that we were summoned in order to help him finder answers. On our quest to help Ultra we find another AI who suggests that Ultra does not know that he is there. He also mentions that If he is right there are more AI’s. A sub-plot is open to then find the other AI’s.
At first the game doesn’t really make much sense. In the beginning it’s revealed that Ultra basically built this game as a disguise for a ploy. Nevertheless you are still out to find the answers to the questions he is facing. As progress you do find that the existential questions proposed in the beginning do actually play a role in the development of the story. It’s built in a way where the objectives are very specific and you really don’t have to search really hard to find what you need to find. And that’s pretty much it. Ultraworld takes you captive and it asks you do do things. It will force your to contemplate questions and to go places. Or you could just totally play it going through the motions. There are a couple of good twists somewhere in there though. And exploring further does yield a good sub-plot and really adds to the benefit of the game.
Ultraworld brings something quite unique, it’s because I can’t quite label it. It’s not a puzzle even if it kind of seems like it is. It’s obviously not a shooter, not a hack and slash, not a platformer; it’s not anything. Hardcore Gamer calls it a “digital vacation” and that actually what it’s closest to. A vacation gone wrong wherein you can’t leave and you have to solve tons of problems.
The game is quite visually beautiful, the Ultraworld world is colorful and minimalist but at the same time quite radical. It’s built as a colorful, low-poly, lo-fi and grainy world. It’s empty, spacious, interesting and vast. But the game doesn’t really utilize this world very well. The floating black triangles aren’t difficult to find, they’re often in plain sight. But that aside closer to the end Ultras ploy is revealed quite slowly and they will get sort of resolved in the ending which to some might be dissatisfying, but I personally felt that it was the right ending story-wise.
It also fails to be interactive, you get the “press this button to advance” kind of dialogue, and really that’s all there is to interact with. But I still do think that the world Beech built is beautiful and it’s “art piece” you can walk into. And the same goes for it’s perfect for the mood soundtrack. I love the uniqueness of it and the beauty of it; it’s a nice place to be in. But it just falls short as a game.