Publisher: Jandusoft
Developer: Team Stargazers
Medium: Digital
Players: 1
Online: No
ESRB: Not Rated
I have no way of knowing whether this is true, but Aureole – Wings of Hope feels like a game where someone came up with the concept as a joke – in this case, what would a Sonic the Hedgehog game be like if it focused just on the rings? – and fleshed it out more fully afterwards. While that’s not usually the recipe for success (sometimes a joke should stay a joke), other times it works out perfectly. This is one of those times.
The big reason why it works is that Aureole’s developer, Team Stargazers, basically took the most enjoyable parts of Sonic, and left it at that. You want to go fast through short levels, but don’t want success to rely on super-twitchy reflexes? Then this is the game for you.
That may sound like a negative to some, but I mean that in the most positive way possible. Aureole finds a way to keep you moving forward constantly, while at the same time throwing just enough obstacles in your way that the game isn’t a total cakewalk. You’ll have to slow down occasionally and figure out how to get your ring to cross large expanses, or how to avoid running into lethal red spikes and losing your progress.
To rewind a little, the gist of the game is that you’re playing as an angel trying to save Heaven from demons. To do that, you have to fling your halo from one end of a level to another, avoiding the various obstacles in your way. As I said, the game is designed so that you’re constantly moving forward, and it aids you in that goal by throwing in even larger rings in conveniently placed locations that help give you even more of a speed boost.
Obviously, Aureole – Wings of Hope isn’t a particularly complicated game – but it doesn’t need to be. It’s built around a great idea for a simple-but-addictive platformer, and it pulls it off nearly perfectly.
Jandusoft provided us with an Aureole – Wings of Hope PC code for review purposes.
