➤ A suit for a friend 🎮

Knowing Kickstarter's mare magnum, we took a few seconds to analyze the objectives of the Canadians Over The Moon Games Studio and their The Fall, only to discover a curious element. The economic target to ensure the Wii U conversion comes well before the competition, which as things stand today will hardly ever host the title. It is not a given: eliminated the collection of publisher royalties on sales and Kickstarter withholdings, there are not many compulsory expenditure items left, since the development kits are often almost given away and the graphics engine in use - Unity , for a change - we already know its strengths and weaknesses when it comes to publishing on consoles. So why, after the PC, is Wii U the first platform of choice? Of course, the paying users of PlayStation 4 and Xbox One are now so used to receiving indie gifts every month that the feeling of purchase often changes in terms of waiting, moreover a rich and more inflated panorama of releases can easily put these in check. small quality beads. Of all the answers we could provide, none are corroborated by numbers, so we'll just throw the stone into the pond. The only real data is the tangibility of this conversion: about ten months after its release on Steam, the eShop is enriched with a title that we liked at the time and that has earned the right to receive a separate discussion, albeit with dark spots.

The indie The Fall finally arrives on Wii U: the product is there, the porting a little less

Gamepad

In one word: off-screen play. With regard to the support of the GamePad, the effort of Over The Moon is the minimum necessary to guarantee at least a dignity to the port, unfortunately leaving in the wish list a touch management of points of interest within the game.

System errors

We have already spoken extensively about the whole narrative-artistic sector that revolves around The Fall. The plot chosen by Over The Moon does not fail to interest thanks to the singularity of the protagonist, the military suit ARID, engaged in a mission to rescue her human host, injured in an elusive accident preceding the events. A choice that pleases, especially if placed in a dark sci-fi universe with sometimes grotesque colors that fully reflect a fabric of dialogues entrusted to cyborgs and machines.

It must be said that the proposal of the Canadians to date includes only the first part of the planned trilogy, so do not be surprised if the ending of the episode, however self-contained, is very open and screams a sequel out loud. If in a team of a few people the request for funding for the Wii U and Linux versions differs by just $ 12.000, it means that the time required for the port was relatively short. From a technical point of view, the result satisfies but not fully: however fluid and able to respond perfectly to the pad, we noticed a lack of optimization of some not too complex situations, with visible and inexplicable drops in frame rate to season an otherwise smooth experience here and there. We add to the list those that we would like to note as acoustic bugs in the finale: right at the moment of maximum tension, the climax is soiled by sudden moments of total audio silence that leave us perplexed. The listed problems might seem minimal and picky, but they weigh on what should at least be an experience clean of minor flaws.

Zigzag

We conclude with a note on the speed of re-entry into the game: death will come knocking a few times, but on those occasions you can witness a very long time frame, higher than what should be the legitimate wait for a software - in theory - as light as The Fall .

But it's time to put the technicalities aside and talk a little about the actual adaptation; if you look at the image on the right, you will notice how the idea behind the work of Over The Moon was centered on off-screen play and the guys took it to the end, guaranteeing the possibility of reaching the end credits entirely with the television off. Sadly, it's also the only real implementation, which is pretty weird: as a point-and-click adventure with action moments, The Fall is a title that could have easily used the touch features of the GamePad, but none of this has been included. Backbone and analog controls take more than one session to digest and still remain a notch behind mouse handling. Even the change between torch and weapon by pressing the right stick is not exactly a happy choice, but we let you discover it without taking too much away from the pleasure of continuing in what remains a beautiful adventure, albeit short.

Comment

Tested version Nintendo Wii U Digital Delivery Nintendo eShop Price 9.90 € Resources4Gaming.com

7.5

Readers (3)

6.7

Your vote

The Fall remains a good example of indie: correct in the feedback, particular in the chromatic choice, right in the setting. Almost a year later and far from the original sentiment, however, we feel that what Over The Moon proposed on Wii U is limited to firing their own cartridges. Given the very strong emphasis on backtracking, for € 10 the 4-5 hours it takes to finish the game are easily exhausted. And if to color the picture there are technical conversion defects such as drops in frames and non-ideal controls, the beautiful ideas inserted by the Canadians today appear slightly weaker, culminating in an adventure that satisfies even on Wii U but - unfortunately - ends just when it starts to heat up.