Written by
Albert H. Gates
Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 is a puzzle–adventure game with elements of horror and mystery. Developed and published by NovaSoft Interactive Ltd, a studio specializing in puzzle games, the game is set in Aurora Hills, a town in the Appalachian Mountains (USA), in 1981. The events in Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 begin with a series of mysterious disappearances that escalate in frequency. These disappearances leave no trace. You play as Ethan Hills, a park ranger working in the forest near Aurora Hills, investigating the disappearances to uncover the secrets hidden deep within the town.
Introduce about Aurora Hills: Chapter 1
Gameplay
Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 is designed as a point-and-click game. Therefore, every aspect, from graphics and gameplay to mechanics and overall experience, is built around that orientation. The game places you in a first-person perspective, directly observing and interacting through the viewpoint of the main character – Ethan Hills.
Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 also simplifies movement; you simply tap on designated locations within the area, and the protagonist will instantly move to that location. The game will transition to a completely new scene in the areas Ethan moves to.
You can interact with objects and pick up items by touching them. However, like other games of the same genre, only objects designated by the game can be interacted with. On the left side of the screen is the inventory of the main character – Ethan Hills. You can store items found throughout your journey in this inventory. Depending on the mechanism of each item, they have different uses and purposes. In addition, Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 also provides you with a camera so you can take pictures of information during your journey, and a notebook so you can store and note down that information.
Puzzle design
Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 features numerous puzzles, appearing frequently throughout the game. Unlike most other games, the puzzle system is the main and most important element of Aurora Hills: Chapter 1’s gameplay. The mechanics of each puzzle are also very diverse, ranging from deciphering locks and jigsaw puzzles to connecting water pipes.
Some puzzles even require you to use additional items or combine items to solve them. The game doesn’t underestimate your intelligence; the puzzles are very difficult, requiring you to gather and store information, and combine it with logical reasoning to solve them correctly.
Creative graphic style
The visuals in Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 are a combination of pre-rendered 2D graphics and 3D models. The majority of the game’s visual content is pre-rendered 2D graphics. The Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 development team designed, refined, and created the environments in a third-party software, then extracted the images and incorporated them into the game.
Therefore, the environment and landscapes in the game are essentially just 2D images created using the aforementioned process. However, this allows Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 to achieve a realistic level of graphics without consuming excessive performance on mobile devices.
Some moving objects in Aurora Hills: Chapter 1, depending on the orientation, may be pre-rendered or designed as complete 3D models. For pre-rendered 2D objects, the game’s development team uses alpha-masking techniques, ensuring that the frames in motion of the object are displayed accurately, and that areas not belonging to the object do not obscure what is behind it.
Additionally, the aforementioned objects are also given shadows and lighting effects on each frame, ensuring that the objects are not isolated from the environment. 3D object modeling is applied relatively sparingly in Aurora Hills: Chapter 1, usually only appearing in locations that the player can see from multiple angles.
Download Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 APK for Android
Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 is a product from a relatively young developer, but it boasts very high quality. Thanks to the dedication of NovaSoft Interactive Ltd, the game excels in every aspect, from graphics and sound to gameplay, puzzles, and mechanics. In particular, the game’s strongest point is its diverse, deep, and highly challenging puzzle system. Aurora Hills: Chapter 1 is a great game, well worth your time.