Developer: The Sixth Hammer
Publisher: The Sixth Hammer
Platforms: PC, PS4, Xbox One
Tested on: PC
Moo Lander – Preview
Moo Lander is a 2D adventure platformer where you control the last of your civilization’s spaceship to find the source of infinite amounts of milk. Of course, everyone knows where milk comes from: Cows! But in this game, there’s a mysterious device that can produce an infinite amount of milk. You’ll have to tame the Mighty Cows and recover that device for your own civilization. At the moment, this game is only playable as an Early Access demo via Steam, so it’s still a work-in-progress, but we still got the chance to take a look at the game in its current state.
In this world, milk is the purest energy source and is only rivaled by the brightest hypernovas. The story in this game is all about trying to obtain a new source of milk for your civilization, as your source of milk has been lost after The War, which is an unspecified event that took place ahead of the game’s timeline. It’s your mission to recover an ancient device that’s capable of producing an infinite amount of milk.
In terms of graphics, the game looks okay, but not overwhelmingly good. Your spaceship is definitely one of the most detailed objects in the game. It can also be customized with skins, themed after the appearance of encountered enemies after killing a specific amount of them, which will give your spaceship a completely new look. The cows in the game look a bit off and they have some weird animations. The current sound design is fairly good. Your character communicates with the rest of his kind via radio from time to time, and this has been nicely voiced.
The controls of this game are quite easy to master. The whole demo includes one playable level that also seems to function as the tutorial of the game. In this level, you’ll get to know each of your ship’s primary abilities. At the end of the level, you can put your skills to the test during a fight against the first boss cow. Your ship has crashed onto this planet, and all your ship’s functionalities are broken, except for its movement capabilities. As you progress through this first level, these will come back online and you’ll get access to your milk blasters, an indestructible milk shield, a dash ability called power jump, and the option to use non-lethal shock bombs. These shock bombs are specifically meant for beating cow bosses in a harmless way. Each of the ship’s abilities cost milk to use, but there are enough points where you can replenish your milky white fuel.
A few of your ship’s abilities are used in combination with your mouse. Both the blasters and the shield are pointed in the direction of your mouse cursor. The direction of your dash ability is determined by the direction you’re moving with the keyboard. All in all, the game’s controls are very easy, but some enemies will prove to be very difficult to get past. A powerful plant, with a claw that keeps on growing longer, can really give you a hard time. When this particular enemy grabs you, you’ll be crushed in no time. It’s best to try to avoid its grasp and fly past it as fast as you can.
The boss fight was definitely the biggest challenge in the game so far. You can only harm the boss cow by throwing the non-lethal shock bombs at it, which always fall down from your ship. This means you need to hover over the boss to hit it, but it can also repel you, and these shock bombs, with a very annoying shockwave “moo”. Some quick reflexes and good usage of your ship’s abilities are needed to be able to land a hit on the boss cow. As the health of the cow gets lower, the cow will grow more aggressive and starts calling for reinforcements that will try to hinder and kill you before you manage to beat the boss. It definitely sounds like this boss fight was very hard, but there was a safe place in the middle of the combat area, where you could heal up, so you could endlessly return there to refill your health and milk. After the boss has been defeated, you use a shrink ray to beam it over to your ship for unknown purposes.
Conclusion
Although our time with Moo Lander was a bit short due to the fact that the demo only has one level available, we did enjoy playing the game. The gameplay is easy to master, which makes the game accessible to anyone who owns a PC. The story sounds quite fun and we’re interested as to where it’ll lead in the full game. Moo Lander doesn’t have the best graphics, but it looks fine for a 2D platformer, a genre where graphics aren’t really the most important aspect.
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