- Commandeer a Velosphere to the finish line at the end of each maze
- Gather every ounce of your short-term memory to finish the game
- No respite, race against time after three seconds of memorizing the layout
Nothing captures that fleeting feeling of timelessness like synthwave, a genre associated with Miami sunsets and vintage race cars, like the Lamborghini Countach. It's mostly celebrated for its '80s neon aesthetic and cool electronic soundtrack. It has also found its way into many media works, and science fiction in particular shares a good chemistry with it. To prove my point, look no further than Blade Runner's Los Angeles and Akira's Neo-Tokyo.
Many yearn for its ability to blend a nostalgic past with the potential of the future. I am one of them. Listening to Timecop1983 or Wolfclub on my commute fills me with nostalgia. It also reminds me of fun times when I played on cereal boxes or newspapers during free time. Among them, personally, nothing can be more revitalizing and rewarding than navigating the mazes.
So when the trailer for Neon Zone came out, I knew I had to play it. It ties together two of my favorites, presented in a way that suits the smartphone generation plagued by goldfish memories.
Reshaping the temporal frontier
The first thing that struck me about Neon Zone is the Tron vibe. In the original arcade, there is a part called Light Cycle Match, where you race against an opposing racer and try to kill him with a light ribbon. Instead of that, here, time is your biggest enemy to run against.
Right off the bat, you start with 15 free mazes to run through with extra unlockable levels you can purchase. You play as a Velosphere apparently designed after the Alien's Shredder from 2014's Battleship.
This isn't your usual maze quest where you help little Joe find his way through a maze. All the mazes here have a twist in time. At each stage you are given three seconds to memorize the pattern. Once the time is up, the screen immediately enlarges. With only short-term memory and a sense of direction, you must tilt and turn to reach the yellow finish line. If you're a millisecond too slow to make that turn or accidentally run this way and that, your sphere explodes. Once the ticking stops, your running stops too.
Dangers lurk in the neon maze
Nothing compares to the thrill of navigating the intricate twists and optical tricks of a maze. Neon Zone designs its stages using these factors. They did this with a correct linear progression of difficulty in mind. Some mazes have multiple paths to maximize your time. Others deceive you with their confusing schemes. So, often, what seems complicated is sometimes just a straight race to the finish line. In addition to the walls, there are also red lasers and the occasional bomb to stay away from.
What defines a maze game is, of course, the design of the maze. Neon Zone has really flexed its creative muscles here. There is a linear difficulty level, so you don't immediately feel overwhelmed. Some levels later (like level 43) are absolutely challenging to conquer.
The same can't be said for the naming convention: while some of them make perfect sense like Arrow and Neon Maze, most of the words seem to have sprung spontaneously from ChatGPT. Some of the maze designs also seemed repetitive. Case in point: levels 23 and 29.
When it comes to monetization, other than level packs that require an actual purchase, Neon Candies are the primary currency awarded for each perfect completion of a level. In exchange, you can cash in on new songs or spend 20 coins to make the title screen more retro. The musical composition has a playful yet coherent upbeat melody. If nothing else, Bendik's passion for experimenting with different music is palpable.
The temporal perfectionist
Stars are awarded for completing a maze within a set time. Most of the time, it's easier said than done. To reiterate the emphasis, you are penalized for being a fraction of a millisecond too slow in your reflexes. If you don't time the turn correctly, the ball will crash into the wall. This can waste enough time to cause you to lose a star.
As well as setting a new time record and defeating your past self, there's also healthy competition in the form of leaderboards that allow you to compete with others, both of which provide endless replayability.
