Steam “IXION” was a cologne simulator with a solid sci-fi style. That said, the beautiful outdoor space I have seen without resource management – AUTOMATON

announcement

The Tokyo Game Show was held from September 15th to 18th last month. At the German pavilion, a stand where German games gather, Kalypso Media exhibited a demo of “IXION”. I will report on how I interpreted the beginning of the main story.

This job is a simulation game that runs a colony in the space station. The game supports Japanese. Awarded the best strategy / simulation game at the gamescom award 2022 held on August 27th. In the demo version, you can try the test launch of the “VOHLE engine”, an engine for expanding the reach of space, which is the beginning of the game.

captivating tutorial

When the game starts, the opening video will play. The year is 2049. This is the scene where the ground shuttle is launched and docked at the “Tycoon” space station, which is the stage for this work. Not only the beauty of the images, but also the camera work is like a movie. The visual scale is very wide, so it has a strong power to attract players. Note that the in-game audio is only in English even in the product version, but it was like watching a foreign movie with subtitles. It shouldn’t get in the way of understanding what the game is about.

Then go to the station screen. Even though it’s called a space station, it’s so big it can’t compare to the one in 2022. It’s divided into multiple sectors, but each sector alone is a bit like a city. First, you can learn how to use the tutorial. You can rotate the viewpoint 360 degrees and use the wheel to switch between the interior and exterior views of the space station. This zoom change is continuous and pleasant. The interior, where the crew and the remnants of resources are densely packed, gradually narrows and as the view passes through the ceiling, the beautiful earth is projected into the background. The view of the earth from space was truly spectacular. I want to change my point of view for no reason.

After completing the operation tutorial, the mission begins. Your first mission is to build a vault and gather scattered resources. In the interior view, you will build various structures. Structures and roads can be freely organized. Teams and robots move frantically along the streets you create. It’s fun just looking at your layout. However, as the demo version progressed, there were scenes where I was concerned about placement. We want to be able to transport as efficiently as possible within the limited space and there are restrictions such as the need to contact the outer wall depending on the equipment. By the way, in the exterior view, the improvement of the solar panel and the motor is reflected in the exterior. On the planetary system map, you can check out the planets that may be able to acquire resources by exploring. Since the originally scattered resources are likely to be insufficient, there will be times when you will go and fetch resources from other planets.

The joys and sorrows of the space station administrator

Resource management is important in this game, but there are three main elements that should be managed in the end. This is what you see in red, yellow and blue at the top of the screen. One is the integrity of the hull. Translated as integrity, it is basically the state of the station. The gradually deteriorating hull must be repaired as appropriate. Alloys are needed for repairs and raw materials must be purchased from outside. The second management factor is the confidence of the crew. If you don’t have enough food and beds, an event will occur that will put you under pressure to organize your living environment. If you don’t keep your promise on time, their trust will be lost. Then the ship will not depart. The third is electricity. It is important to ensure the required power source for each facility. Power outages occur when demand exceeds supply. You can increase the supply by making solar panels, but there is a limit. There will also be situations where diligent energy savings are required. In this way, the basic flow of this work is to manage resources and maintain the station, while advancing to the outside world to obtain more resources.

I mentioned earlier that the transition between internal and external views is seamless, but the word seamless also applies to the structure of the game as a whole. For example, you need food to meet the demands of your crew. This is a problem with internal views. However, the amount left in the station is not enough and it is necessary to explore other planets. This requires reference to the interplanetary map. However, in order to build a scientific vessel for exploration, it is necessary to worry about the food supply of the working crew. The discussion then returns to the internal view. When the production line inside and outside the space station is seen as a single system, the humanities needs of the crew and the large planetary exploration project are also “perfectly” connected. It’s a natural design for a simulation game, but I found it interesting to see how the highest level of science and technology and the undeniable desires of real people are organically linked. And deciding where and when to step into that system is the real thrill of a simulation game.

So far we have grouped everything together as “resources”, but there are more than 10 types of resources in this game. Each of them has an intuitive icon. Personally, I liked the color coding of the icons, which was pleasing to the eye. Also, the terms are underlined and you can check the explanations by hovering over them.

An event occurs while exploring a planet. By choosing an option, you can obtain additional resources and knowledge (required to unlock skills) in exchange for the resource request. After encountering such an event several times, you tend to get stuck in your mind as to which option is the best to choose, but in this work the number of options increases according to the acquisition status of the skill tree and also the same event has new results. It looks like you can get it. I couldn’t confirm it within the range of the demo version, but it seems to be made so that you don’t get tired of it even at the end of the game.

By the way, as I unnecessarily zoomed in to see the crew’s daily life, and then unnecessarily zoomed out to see the beautiful blue land, I started running out of food. In the demo version, the possibilities of securing food seemed limited and as soon as the food supplies ran out, the crew starved to death. The administrator didn’t have time to take it easy. But the 360-degree outdoor space was really beautiful. I have no regrets.

Motif like science fiction

This work is a simulation game set in space, but it’s not just the inherent flavor, but the story seems to be solid. According to the development manager, this work puts the same effort into both the game system and the story. Even when I played the demo version, I felt that even the most detailed settings had been devised. Various experts appear in this work such as doctors, engineers, CEOs and philosophers, but from the passages of the statements of the characters you can feel the beliefs of each expert. I can’t wait to hear that it seems to have more endings which is rare for a colony simulation game. By the way, it seems that the story is not a complete fiction, but something that foreshadows the near future. From the characters’ jokes, I felt not only the enthusiasm to put the technology of the future into practice, but also something like a reflection on the destruction of the earth’s ecology.

Incidentally, I was curious about the title of this work, “Ixion”. Various special terms and proper names appear in the work, but at least the word “Ixion” does not appear in the demo version. This word is the same as the name of a human king in Greek mythology. All he did was kill his father-in-law and humiliate a goddess like a human, but in the end he was tied up in an “eternally spinning ring” as punishment. It is suggestive that the name of such a man is used in the title.

“I drew inspiration from the works of art created by Stanford University over 40 years ago and combined them with ‘Interstellar’ and other science fiction,” said development manager Christian Woolford. According to my research, this piece of art could represent a space colony called the Stanford Taurus. This is the first space colony project proposed at NASA’s summer seminar held at Stanford University in 1975. It was part of serious research, but the colorful colors and new ideas were so shocking that they had a huge influence on the science fiction works. Donald Davis, who designed this artwork, posted some of those illustrations on his site. The artwork depicts a space station on wheels and has something in common with the graphics inside and outside the space station, such as a building inside a circular tube.