Another World

Mature, moody and brooding, Eric Cahahi's (From Dust) sci-fi creation was stark contrast to the era of colourful platformers that was just dawning. Severe difficulty spikes, constant trial and error, and muted colours gave the game a counterculture edginess. It's cinematic storytelling, immersive locale and a strikingly emotional partnership with a hulking alien brute propelled it to deserved critical acclaim.

2011 and the market is dominated by modern day shooters, wholesale slaughter, adrenaline rushes and little chance to pause for thought, to absorb. There's an interesting symmetry to the fact Another World is still going against the grain to the era's norms, twenty years later.

This iOS release, £2.99 buying you a copy that works on both iPad and iPhone, marks the second anniversary edition re-release of the title. In a generation in which we see re-iterations of 90s classics spreadeagled across multiple formats like a hooker desperate to pay the gas bill, re-releases are a dime a dozen. Yet the stretch between the original and the 15th Anniversary, and this, the 20th, only hammers home the idea that this is something special, and worth savouring.

Another World is genetic mishmash between Jordan Mecher's 1989 Prince of Persia, with precision timing needed on controls to navigate platforms and dangers, and point & click adventures, where interaction with the environment and exploration necessary much of the time to progress. You've got to concentrate; aside from a five-step help guide outlining the controls - both on-screen virtual pad or swipe - there's no tutorial, no explanation of how you interact with the world - and your only comrade doesn't speak a word of english.

Couple this with the surroundings, and Chahi manages to evoke a sense of isolation still little seen in games. A brief cut-scene - a red-headed, casually-dressed professor transported onto an alien planet through a science experiment gone wrong - is the only backstory you'll get. You materialise in the middle of a lake and end up wandering through a mountain terrain, get knocked out and kidnapped, escape a cage, make a friend, and try and make it out of an alien city together; learning what will kill you as you go.

You'll die a lot in Another World. It's possible to die on the first screen if you linger longer than a few seconds. Trial and error is engrained on nearly every screen you walk through, but even as you're angry you're forgiving; learning about this treacherous environment in every poisonous bite, dismemberment, crushed bone, drowning and scorching. You'll learn when to duck, roll, dodge and leap - and then die again trying to string them together, or encountering the next fatal step in the game.

You're not defenceless; early on you'll pick up an alien laser, a small black pistol with three different rates of fire. Tap and you'll launch red beams that'll cook foes, or slice chains in half. Hold for a few seconds and you'll project a red shield in front of you with a short-life span, hold longer to full charge and you'll launch a blistering white shot that'll blow apart enemy shields and walls.

The game offers a striking dichotomy. Puzzles usually need solved with a degree of violence and speed - such as flooding a cavern by shooting out the support structure for an overhead lake, and running to escape the ensuing wave - seemingly counter to the game's otherwise cautious pacing. You're tossed into overwhelming fire-fights in which fastest charge wins, with timing and speed proving solution to life-or-death situations. Yet for all that Another World doesn't feel like an action title. It's interactive cinema with slow-burn pace, enemy confrontations staccato beats amid multiple screens of wide-eyed tension. The closest modern day equivalent would be Valve's Portal; you're stuck in a hostile environment and its your wits that'll save the day.

It'll annoy you, though this 20th Anniversary adds an extra problem due to the controls. On the virtua pad, double-tapping a direction will start you running, another tap will stop you, a tap up will make you jump or leap. The pad option feels the right choice between the two on offer , and compliments must be given for mapping the buttons to the top left and right of the screen - on the iPad it feels much comfortable, letting you lean the tablet on a surface and doesn't obscure your view. However, it still doesn't give you the tactile feedback a raised D-Pad gives, and you'll find yourself mistiming taps or missing the buttons completely. Infuriating in a game that requires precision - luckily the restarts drop you only a screen or two away from were you died.

On a format which indie development is rife, Another World's basic visuals remain both timeless and distinct. A double-finger swipe down will flick the visuals between original and higher resolution re-tweak, the latter pleasingly emphasising the stark colours on the touch screen. It also serves to highlight the environment - both its dangers and its usefulness.

Everything has a use in Another World. The miminalistic approach to the visuals - due to limitations in tech of the time, but a boon today - means there's rarely an object on screen for aesthetic pleasure alone. A draping vine over a canyon's edge? Might be useful. A flying reptile fluttering off-screen due to an earthquake? Best to follow it. One addition over the original's visuals is apparent, when you've got to sync up a patrolling guard's path with his reflection on a green glass ball hanging from the ceiling.

There are annoyances - the ever-increasing death count will eat away at your patience. Staring at an impossible situation for far too long knowing the solution is right in front of you will kill your self-esteem. But even in these moments it's sadistically enjoyable, and unlike some RPGs or adventures that end in you hammering the action button over every object in the hope of triggering something, Another World always leaves the answer on the screen for you to decipher. And for that, along with its low-level ambient soundtrack broadening the atmosphere, resurrecting the fear of survival in facing a lone opponent, and crafting a low-key yet highly emotive escort plot that was the primeval soup from which all subsequent comradeships draw from.

In a store where the most critically-acclaimed and addictive titles can be bought for the price of a chocolate bar, Another World's solitary play-through and higher price marks its at odds with its digital brethren. Yet it's a game worth the asking price for those that want their games as deep as other's are brief. Worth an experience for players who want an iOS experience that'll have them tonguing the memory of story from between their teeth long after its been devoured. And for those intrigued by the clutter of gaming's creative dead-ends, (bar one title, no-one's attempted anything similar) this sci-fi zeitgeist is rightly detached from its peers, fore-bearers, and successors - and worth an Anniversary revisiting.