Lunark in the test - fine pixel fare for adventurers
Short sequences accompany you through the entire adventure
© Canari Games / WayForward
Lunark tells a dystopian story in which you slip into the role of Leo. This faces the ruling regime with other allies and infiltrates enemy buildings, gets stranded in a huge forest and fights against the roaming droids. You will have some conversations in text form, which will also be accompanied by short sequences and can certainly inspire. Thanks to the appropriate sounds, the chic graphics and the varied environments, the entire staging is very believable and motivates you to unravel the mysteries behind it all.
The gameplay itself is based on the principle of exploration. All of the environments Leo finds himself in involve exploring rooms, flipping switches, or overpowering enemies. All of this is far from imaginative, using classic puzzles in the form of elevators and switches, but thanks to Leo's skill the whole thing plays beautifully and feels perfectly timed.
Leo is able to walk, run, climb and shoot and a combination of these is required to master each room. In addition to the puzzles mentioned above, your dexterity will be put to the test again and again, although several enemies are waiting for you, lasers are scanning the area and you have to jump over ravines at the same time. If this initially feels very overloaded and imprecise, the experience helps to improve in all aspects. The learning curve is really pleasant, but thanks to the associated loss of adrenaline it will probably be too much of a good thing for one or the other player.
Even larger enemies, like this voracious spider await you
© Canari Games / WayForward
In addition, you can upgrade Leo's energy and his gun in some places, which unfortunately doesn't really fit into the concept. While the upgrades are helpful, it still feels inappropriate and at times arbitrary. A more open game world would have been a better choice here to integrate the upgrade aspect into the game. Due to the linear design and the few branches, the concept does not fit the gameplay.
Nevertheless, the improvements are quite helpful, since your enemies in particular have penetrating power. However, Grim Reaper will probably pay you a visit again and again, mainly because of the many jump passages, whereby Lunark impresses with well-placed checkpoints, which usually means that only a few rooms have to be completed again. The great thing about it, however, is that your progress will carry over despite your death. In practice, this means that you still have new keys in your inventory, for example, even if you fall off a cliff without having reached a new checkpoint.
Everything All in all, Lunark is a great title that will especially delight those who grew up with the pixel look. For everyone else, around 20 euros for five hours of gaming fun is too much, even though I was personally very enthusiastic about the implementation.
