izigame.me

It was 10:30pm on a dark and stormy night. There was absolutely no reason to download a game. Yet two of my friends, we'll call them Chris and Zak, wanted help with their Space Engineering program. Having blown $10 on worse, I started the download. As I wait for the game to install I see a review from a player with 7500 hrs played and another player with 2200 hours who DOESN'T recommend the game. What the hell am I getting myself into?
The title screen greets me with a classical organ piece and it only gets stranger from there. Next thing I know, I'm in a pod floating towards the planet surface.
"You're going to have to kill yourself," Zak says immediately.
"I'm not going to kill myself," I pout.
However, I land in the middle of nowhere (which I would later learn is the majority of the planet). Of course there is no immediate way for me to know I am 20 kilometers from my friends. When I complain about this, Zak posts a complex GPS string in our Discord channel and patiently talks me through how to paste it into the GPS tab and label it. Not feeling particularly suicidal, I strike out towards their location. Problem 1, there is a massive mountain in the way. Problem 2, 20 kilometers is a LONG in game journey. I could have shaved off 5 kilometers with my jetpack, but we'll get to that later.
After a couple of minutes of stumbling through the vast empty nothingness of this desert biome, I finally admit that Zak was right and start to query suicide options.
"Push backspace," Chris says.
I follow his instructions and immediately respawn at my landing pod. I stare with irritation as my HUD informs me I am again 20 kilometers out.
"I think you actually need to kill yourself," Zak says and proceeds to explain how to use the jetpack.
I press X, hold down the space bar, and the planet surface recedes below my feet. Before long, I get a low fuel warning. No turning back now. The immutable force of gravity wins out and soon I am free falling back to the surface. Good-bye cruel world. I hit the ground and BOUNCE. Ohhh, maybe I survived? Nope, my space-suited corpse is splayed out on the ground. AAANNNDDD, I'm back to my lander pod. This mini-game to get to my friends' base is pushing me towards an Alt-F4 ending.
"Can you just bag me in?" I ask. Somehow, even Rust seems preferable at this point.
"All right, here's what you do," says Zak, "Hotkey 2 should be a Grinder. Use the Grinder to destroy your landing pod."
What the $@%!? Soon, the sparks are flying and my landing pod is falling apart while my inventory fills with inexplicable detritus.
"Okay," I say as the last remnants of my pod dissolve.
"NOW, kill yourself," says Zak.
Jesus Christ.
But it works! Now I have new options and this time I correctly select "Survival Kit" whatever that means. Low and behold, I am greeted with a new landing pod, an 8-bit version of the Kennedy Space Center launch pad, and 2 space-suited dudes running around in the sand. Still only knowing how to use my grinder, I walk over to a forlorn looking leafless tree and set to work. The tree falls over and I think I have some wood.
"Do we need any wood?" I ask.
"No," says Chris.
Later investigation of my inventory would reveal the tree produced no wood anyway.
Chris was too busy to train an ignorant moron and assigned Zak to the task.
"Follow me," Zak says.
We strike out across the desert and he starts teaching me the ins and outs of jet pack use. He is an expert of course and I quickly have to learn the hard lesson of high speed impacts with the ground. It pisses me off to no end but Zak insists I have to master it because otherwise I will spend 30 minutes finding a resource node. His advice proves accurate. As I walk around, the landscape change is barely perceptible and the vast nothingness quickly overwhelms me.
After a few more untimely deaths, I start out from base again, now understanding it is hydrogen that fuels my jet pack. I watch the bar carefully to ensure I don't dip below 50% before turning around. Instead of finding a resource node, I land on a huge frozen lake.
"Oh yeah, we need ice," Zak says enthusiastically so I break out my hand drill.
At first I am a little nervous as I have visions of puncturing through the ice and drowning in frigid waters. But as I drill, no water appears. The lake is frozen solid. My inventory fills quickly and I pause to examine my handiwork. The once pristine surface is now pockmarked with craters that would make a figure skater wake up in a cold sweat. I nod to myself, a job well done. I take off and immediately crash into the ground at full speed dying on impact.
"We need some silver," Chris says a few minutes later.
By now, I am better at using my jet pack and Zak helpfully informs me that if I put a hydrogen bottle in my inventory, I can greatly increase its range. How nice. I use this new knowledge to locate some silicone and successfully bring it back to base. I also fly out to some kind of unknown object and get $5000 space dollars. I pocket it thinking maybe I'll eventually run into some kind of exotic Tatooine themed bar. Maybe I can just win the Millennium Falcon in a game of chance and get the hell out of here.
But for now its time to find a silver node. I go back to base and replace my depleted hydrogen bottle with another and head out. At five kilometers, I get a low fuel warning.
"That's strange," I say to myself, "Usually the hydrogen refuels automatically."
I miraculously make a safe landing and open my inventory. I have an OXYGEN bottle.
"#$$%$%$#@#%^$^$%#$@@#," I say not relishing the 30 minute walk back to base.
"No worries," says Zak, "I will fly out to you with a Hydrogen bottle."
My hero. After a few minutes of lamely describing landmarks to each other, Zak manages to find me and proceeds to immediately crash land and die. Interesting. Now I have TWO hydrogen bottles. I range out even further and see a large stone poking out of the ground. I glide in for an examination and EUREKA, its freaking silver. What are the odds?
Zak flies out to join me and we break out the hand drills. The node sits on a slight incline and as we drill, small chunks of silver and rock break off and roll away... literally... they just keep rolling. I become concerned and pause my drilling to give chase. I captured a lot of it, but then my inventory filled up. I watched forlornly as the remaining chunks continued to roll towards the horizon.
It was a minor set-back though, we had what we came for. We returned to base to find Chris building a landing gear. Hell yeah! The Stars our destination! By now it was past midnight though. Landing gear would have to suffice for now. Time to call it a night.
10/10, would recommend.