Graphics and sound
Graphically, Aurora Watching almost looks like a console port, even though it isn’t in the slightest. For some reason the models and textures just look and feel flat and bland and for some reason reminded me of System Shock 2… I have no idea why but at times Aurora Watching reminded me of that. Perhaps it’s something to with the lighting system that has shadows and bright patches but your character and the enemy characters remain brightly lit no matter what. Perhaps it’s the below par game engine that allows you to riddle a pane of glass with bullet holes, but only draws the holes on one side, so the glass is undamaged when viewed from the other side. These and many other faults give you the sense of playing a game using a graphics engine from at least three years ago if not longer.
Much has been made of the incidental music, which it has to be said is here in full effect and working fine except again there’s flaw in here too. The music is just basically tied in with when you fire a shot, so no matter where you are or whether you’re under attack or not, fire of a shot and up comes the musical score to give you suitable ‘action’ type music. As I briefly mentioned before, the speech leaves a little to be desired but does improve once you’re past the training mission. Even here Metropolis haven’t quite managed to get it right with only the most rudimentary of volume effects in place for how far away the speaker actually is. Even Half Life had this cracked first time out, and with audio being such a big clue as to where the bad guys are, not being able to rely on the speech is a big problem. You can be hiding beside a hut, waiting for your moment, when suddenly there’s a voice loud and clear right in your virtual lughole… you then see that it belongs to a guy sitting inside in the next room… not very helpful.
