t's hundreds of years in the future. The planets and moons of 20th century textbooks and childhood imaginings have been colonized and mined. Corporations have taken over control of the solar system and created new home worlds for millions of Earth's descendants. Space travel is big business.
In the past hundred years, the ever-territorial human colonists of the solar system had grown weary of Earth's dominance. With a demonstrative cry for colonial independence, a galactic war is ignited that devastates the planets and moons revolving around Sol. Earth is particularly ravaged.
In the aftermath, the scavenging of technology and resources commences. The three most powerful corporate entities in the galaxy (Celestia, Cairn-Vance and The Martian Central Government Agencies) each initiate their own rebuilding strategies.
As a space-faring mercenary contractor and pilot of a titular Lander vehicle, players of Lander take on numerous recovery missions for the highest-paying corporate clients. In any given mission, Lander pilots may be required to seek and destroy military targets, recover technology pods or parts, navigate treacherous tunnels or locate tiny life-saving accessories.
Action-oriented gamers may experience a sense of deja vu while playing Lander, which is a direct distillation of classic '80s "floater" arcade games like Lunar Lander and Gravitar, combined with a little bit of Parallax's terrific Descent series. All statements about the benefits of good pedigree are true in this instance.
Piloting a Lander ain't like dusting crops
Lander is no mere run 'n' gun game. It actually requires players to adopt a pilot's patience and precision if they want to achieve success in a variety of extremely difficult missions. Some may be put off by the challenge of Lander, but most will find it invigorating--especially those who have grown weary of generic 3-D blasting.
Controlling the Lander ship is an exhaustive exercise in hand-eye coordination. The player's mouse hand corresponds to the three-dimensional pivoting of the craft. The left mouse button is the thruster, which will propel the ship in any of the myriad directions available. Pilots use the keyboard for firing laser blasts, turning the craft left and right, stabilizing the Lander and activating the handy tractor beam. Players must always be cognizant of the accurate physics model employed in the game. Bumping through tunnels and bouncing over hillsides is a quick way to damage protective shields and ultimately destroy the craft. It takes several crash-and-burn attempts to fully acclimate to the complex configuration of the controls, but, once achieved, the sense of reward and accomplishment is well worth the effort.
The visuals of Lander, while not the most impressive ever witnessed on a 3-D accelerated PC, are lovely nonetheless. The exterior sections of the game have players flying over miles of desolate, pock-marked landscape. The interiors of Lander are cluttered with clanking metal doors, incinerator bursts and various blinking and beeping security systems. Lens flares, colored light-sourcing and accurate shadow projections are all part of the game's gloss.
Aiding the deluxe presentation of the game is Lander's brilliant Dolby Digital soundtrack. With proper equipment and a Dolby Digital decoder installed, players of Lander will be absolutely engulfed in the spacey sound effects and atmospheric music streaming off the disc.
Lander is that rare modern videogame that adheres to the principles of plain old playability without sacrificing the esthetics that today's players demand. Just learning how to control the Lander is more fun than many games. That the developers also spent the time to construct more than 30 complicated and ornately detailed single-player missions plus a host of multiplayer games illustrates the level of quality and care achieved here. Lander is not to be missed.
