Novus Aeterno is a MMORTS game that takes place in outer space. Although I’m not an RTS player myself, I often watch my friends play and bemoan my lack of ability to multi-task well enough enough to play. I was still interested in checking out Novus Aeterno because it looked, for lack of a better term, pretty.
Story
The story of Novus Aeterno begins within the aftermath of a catastrophic destruction of the main five empires that had dominated the galaxy. The Verunas, Azsendi, Acaean, Cauldron Born, and our own Human civilizations reached a high point in domination over their portions of the galaxy. The old empires are now no more and the galaxy is without any stable authority. The player can now enter the scene and determine the course of events between the conflict of various factions and the persistent outcome of further events.
As I waited for our meeting to start, I noticed two young ladies waiting at the edge of the stage. I heard one of them exclaim “Ooh I saw this game I can’t wait to play it!” Intrigued, I followed Nick Nieuwoudt, CEO and lead designer, to the podium to check out the game.
Gameplay
Being a space-lover and an RPG fan, the concept of space ships and their crews almost being like a character in an RPG was very interesting to me. When you first create a ship (after mining ore and creating parts etc.) that ship will originally have a low level crew. Eventually, as you build up your skills, the ship will receive a more veteran crew, and you will be able to create better, if more expensive, parts for the ships. Along with the basic stats, the different races also have different traits.
You have to be really mindful about what your planet is used for because you have limited space. Is this a mining planet or full of factories or more balanced?
Another fun aspect is the fact that you are pretty much constantly in danger of being attacked by someone. How you position your ships and the strategies of flanking, etc. will dramatically affect the outcome of this battle. I watched Nieuwoudt utterly destroy someone else’s fleet. He also showed me a cool tactic, blowing up big ships to damage the surrounding ships in the fleet.
Nieuwoudt emphasized that he really just made the game that he and his friends wanted to play. Strategy and tactics take the forefront, along with the ability to play with 30,000 other players in the same galaxy. There are over 10,000 galaxies available at one time, a pretty exciting aspect for an explorer like me. The game will have no match making and competition between players and natural threats can happen anywhere within the massive scale of the galaxy that will be connected with no loading screens. The entire galaxy of Novus Aeterno will exist on a single global network provided by Taitale’s unique server architecture. Players will be able to play with every other player on the network.
Characters
I asked Neiwoudt if there were any females in the game. He answered with an enthusiastic yes.
“Why can’t women be admirals in the military?” asked Neiwoudt. He went on to say that he wanted to create women that were really strong and not the stereotypical female characters. As you can see from the concept art, he made good on his ideals. I love these women and female races. Neiwoudt’s personal favorite is the Cauldron Born.
The races themselves sounded very intrigueing, with aliens that actually looked alien, including a race of crystal-trees thingies!
My Opinion
Based on the preview, I would say this is definitely a game to watch out for. This labor of love is smart and sharp and I’m really looking forward to giving it a try.
First appeared on NerdyButFlirty.com