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Lumenox: Aaru’s Awakening Preview

I recently stumbled upon a game that I believe should have more attention – Lumenox: Aaru’s Awakening. I can’t remember how I got to this YouTube video but I remember being completely entranced from the opening voice-over and throughout the small gameplay trailer. The game itself seemed interesting but what really captured me was simply the beautiful hand drawn environments and animation. I had to learn more about this game! And so I did…

Lumenox: Aaru’s Awakening is a 2D action platformer  where the player takes on the role of Aaru, a strange creature with special abilities. The world ‘Lumenox’ exists because of a balance between the domains of Dawn, Day, Dusk and Night, each with it’s own ruling deity. Now the evil deity bred from Night is attempting to tip the balance and rule all so Dawn sends out a mighty champion – Aaru. Traveling through the four deadly, yet magnificent, domains of Lumenox to reach Night, Aaru must use his gifts to navigate the world. His first gift is his strength with which he can charge through obstacles and dash in the air but his second skill is by far the most useful – teleportation. Aaru can fire his soul ahead of himself and instantly jump to that point, giving him the ability to avoid dangerous terrain, manoeuvre through areas he couldn’t normally fit through and destroy any enemies he may encounter. The four domains will each have their own unique look and set of varied and amazing creatures which Aaru will have to avoid or use to his advantage.

dusk_start_in_game

The teleport works by charging a shot, aiming with your cursor and releasing, which will fire Aaru’s soul in the form of a small ball. The soul bounces off of walls and and allows for clever trick shots through holes or at crazy angles and never dissipates, meaning you can always leave your soul behind if you believe there may be danger ahead. Aaru can then teleport to his soul at any time, whether it is ats its peak height or even if left on a safe cliff face as you dive into a pool of deadly poison in an attempt to reach a collectible item. Firing your soul into an enemy and teleporting into them is how Aaru can eliminate enemies in his path. The charge allows an extra bust of movement in the air but also can smash through certain obstacles. The controls are definitely hard to get used to and I’ll be the first to say I completely suck at this game, but with each death I could feel myself already learning how to effectively traverse the environment.

The game is scheduled to be released in Q4 of 2013 for the PC and Mac and later on the PS3, Wii and Xbox. The game is made using Unity, which is why I hope to also see an OUYA port in the future (I’m staying positive). Unfortunately, they are low on funding and can’t use use a crowd-sourcing due to certain restriction but let’s hope they pull through and release a successful game, that’s what being an Indie team is all about! Right now there is an Alpha demo that is readily available from their website and a Steam Greenlight campaign that I have personally liked.

This is my play-through of the Alpha demo, where I died…a lot.