Heavenly Bodies | PS5 Review
Heavenly Bodies, developed and published by 2pt Interactive, is an indie simulation-focused puzzle game. It is currently available on Windows PC and PlayStation, and for the purpose of my review I was playing the PlayStation 5 version.
Heavenly Bodies initially puts itself across as taking itself quite seriously, however I very quickly just found myself singing “Space Oddity” the whole time as I was simply floating in my tin can. The physics in space would certainly be something out of this world; and the physics in Heavenly Bodies did not disappoint. Your general aim is to complete tasks around your space-craft. These tasks are relatively simple in theory, but in practice it's a whole different demand. Initially I thought, “Oh this is easy. Got it!” but I could not have been much more wrong if I tried and the game brought me crashing back down to Earth. To complete seemingly simple and mundane tasks, Heavenly Bodies will see you battling zero gravity and you’ll likely find yourself in a pickle on an occasion or two.
Firstly, it’s very clear that a lot of work and care was put into Heavenly Bodies. It’s not tremendously demanding graphically, but it's clean and well presented and I really enjoyed the art style. It looks hand drawn in a lot of areas with really nice textures. Equally, alongside the visuals I was very impressed with how the controls handled. Each thumbstick and each of the triggers corresponded to your limbs; for example L1 and L2 will deal with your left arm and leg and the left analog stick can be used to direct you and similarly with the right side. Alongside this, the developers made excellent use of the adaptive triggers, providing some resistance which created an almost tangible sense of the gravity, or lack thereof. It is very well done and resulted in me feeling totally immersed in the game.
The bulk of my time in Heavenly Bodies was spent playing the local co-op mode and we had many laughs in a very short space of time. My little brother's first observation about the game on loading up was, “This is like OctoDad in space”, and I could totally see where he was coming from. We very quickly discovered, however, that Heavenly Bodies is a lot harder, but far less infuriating because the game works so efficiently and isn’t terribly frustrating. At this point, I also believe it's important to note, my little brother is only 10 and managed relatively fine throughout Heavenly Bodies. There were some areas where he struggled and perhaps got a little frustrated, but it seemed like a very good brain workout for him, despite his age. I feel like this speaks volumes to the variety of age groups and interest types that will enjoy and lose many hours in Heavenly Bodies.
Heavenly Bodies is made up of seven different scenarios each with a main mission and other optional missions as well. It sounds short but I feel like it took the time it deserved and didn’t force loads of filler levels and scenarios in there just for the sake of longevity which is something else to be respected.
Overall, I really struggle to find much to complain about in Heavenly Bodies. Yes, the controls and the physics could get a little bit frustrating sometimes but I feel like there's effectively no way to stop this. I feel like the developers really put some real time into this game and worked hard to make the controls feel realistic and really allow the player to immerse themselves in the zero gravity nature of the game.
Lj’s Rating: 4.5 astronauts out of 5.
For more information on Heavenly Bodies please use the following links...
2pt Interactive - Developer | Publisher | YouTube | Twitter | Website
Many thanks to Future Friends Games for the Review Key.
Heavenly Bodies | Windows PC | PlayStation
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