ASA: A Space Adventure - Remastered Edition

Good thing I only paid 2 dollars! Don't bother with this. This game deserves some note for it being literally the only game I have played which manages to have a less good navigation system than Myst. And Myst came out in the 90s so it gets a pass. You can't tell where you are, or what anything is. The very first room you start in has such insane perspective warping you can't tell what's going on. Good thing you have a little robot voice to tell you what you can click on and what objects are, because you won't understand otherwise! Every time you move forward, it changes perspective. So one screen you are standing on the floor, the next you are looking down at the room from the cieling, the next you look up from the floor. It's like you're a spider. Each shot is composed horribly, so you can't tell how things are oriented. This is inexcusable considering Myst mostly solved these problems in the 1990s and only got better from there. So that aside, the puzzles that I've seen aren't really good. They don't really have any reason for being what they are, just kind of random stuff that is put there arbitrarily. The story seems okay, but it seems to be mostly revealed through very boring voice acting of digital diary entries. I might give it another go since I didn't play that long, but I think it's just a no from me.

After playing Myha and enjoying it, I decided to do a complete playthrough of Black Cube series. ASA is the first game in the franchise, which consists of 4 main games + 1 free prequel. The game (and series in general) centers around a mysterious black cube that floats in space and possesses hypnotic powers. Our nameless astronaut is drawn to the cube and finds himself in a spaceship called Ark. The minute he steps into the ship the cube is stolen from him by another astronaut and he becomes trapped inside the Ark. Our hero needs to solve the riddles of the Ark and retrieve the cube to get back to his homeworld. Positive: - Puzzles are the most important element in this genre and they are well done in this game (with a tiny exception I will mention in the negative part). There is a very nice dose of variety; deciphering number systems, hacking into computers, geometry puzzles, searching clues in diaries etc. The pacing of difficulty is also well done, initial puzzles are easy without becoming boring and the later puzzles are difficult without being frustrating, It is clear that developer played many Myst-like games and learned what works and do not work in this genre. - Sci-Fi elements are more than window-dressing . It is clear that the author has a deep love for Sci-Fi; the story, exposition and atmosphere of the game is very captivating. There are lot of inspirations from classic Sci-Fi novels (2001 being the most evident one) and the especially towards the end game ends up delivering a lot more than being "Myst in space". - Graphics are above average in general, however the cutscenes are surprisingly good for an indie game. Negative: - Navigation is very messy. The environments are simple, however because camera angles change so abruptly it gets unnecessarily complicated to draw a mental map in your head or getting from point A to point B. I eventually got used to it, but I think this aspect will be very frustrating to first-time players. - There is one very under-clued puzzle towards the end, which kind of ruins the perfect puzzle design streak the game had up to that point. What makes it worse is, the clue for the puzzle becomes unreachable when you encounter with this puzzle, and hence if you didn't take note of the clue before, the puzzle becomes unsolvable. What make it even more worse is, once you understand how the puzzle works it is actually a very cool idea, I really wish it was implemented better. Fortunately there is a final puzzle after that one, which was a joy to solve and ends the game on a high point. - ASA is a bit on the short side, I think the game could have used at least 25% more content. Conclusion: ASA is a very promising start to the Black Cube series. Although it is far from perfect, the puzzles and atmosphere/story are mostly very good and it is definitely worth your time if you are looking for a solid Myst-like game. Score: 7.5/10

Myst-Like réussi. Le jeu est faisable sans solution... Tres bonne ambiance

Awful, awful, awful clunky interface. Not even remotely intuitive. Dumped ASAP.

les énigmes sont bien dosées en difficulté. en hd il semble mieux fait bien que je n ai pas joué à l original. durée de vie et histoire sympa. mais j ai du aller voir des soluces pour le finir. certaines enigmes j ai bloqué. pas trop d indications. il vaut mieux le faire sans faire de pauses longues. il n est pas du tout chargé en objet ou en point d interet mais je vous conseille de prendre en photo (avec votre portable par ex) des imprim ecran si il y a des choses importantes affichés. sinon vous allez galerer. donc c est un bon point un clic meme si il a de l age.

Overall, this game is a very good first attempt at emulating the Myst series of games (among my all-time favorites). However, considering this is a polished version of an older freeware game, it doesn't have much of an excuse for its problems, which include puzzles where the clues were too obscure and left me thinking, "How was I supposed to figure *that* out?" and some outright glitches and poor user-interface choices. Among the former was the locked door in the house on Kepler (perhaps this could be fixed by [spoiler] making it clear who lived in that house? [/spoiler] ) and among the latter were the computer puzzle (in which the commands work inconsistently and even the developer's own walkthrough didn't work for me) and the fact that I was able to pick up the silver key without opening the book first (if you're the developer or have made it far enough, you know what I'm talking about). Nonetheless, one of the best parts of this game is its soundtrack; I would highly recommend picking it up if you're into videogame soundtracks. Also, the puzzles are fairly unique and interesting, the story is decent, and the overall world is fun to explore. Final rating: 2/3 stars

Challenging but not too hard puzzels - excellent.