Osmos is a single-player Indie game developed and published by Hemisphere Games. You begin as a tiny mote and your primary objective is to grow by absorbing smaller or similar (in size) motes. As a mote, you move around by propelling matter behind you. You need to watch it though as each matter that you eject from your body makes you smaller. In other words, this game needs you to use your brain something games nowadays lack.

Requirements

• Windows Operating System
• 1GHz processor
• 512MB RAM
• 33MB HDD Space
• Graphics card with OpenGL support.
• Soundcard

Installation

Installation is easy as hell thanks to Steam...Valve I love you. And I'm pretty sure that with such low requirements, only people that mess up their computers would have some problems installing the game.

First Impressions

I bought this game when Steam had it on sale last November and the first thing that I noticed about this game is that...it has an awesome background music. The music is just so soothing like a super sedative pill or something. Second is that it's not your normal game...I mean you're a mote. But just because you're a mote doesn't mean that you suck. In fact you gobble! The colours are attractive enough to make you play the game for hours and not stress out your eyes. And last but not the least, this game reminds me of Asteroids from Windows 3.1 especially on how you move like for example once you start moving, it'll be very difficult for you to go to a complete stop - definitely something I have to keep in mind when I'm done with the tutorial part!

Singleplayer

Just like what the intro says you are a hungry mote and most of the time, your objective is to grow by eating the smaller motes in your area. The more you eat and the closer the other mote to your size is, the bigger you get. During the first couple of levels, I was expecting at least a 30 minute long game but the first couple of levels only lasted a couple of minutes. Is it a bad thing or a good thing? Well it's a good thing that I get to the harder ones faster but it's also a bad thing as it reduces the replayability of the game. And speaking of replayability, you can actually tell the game to randomize the current level so this way you won't be exactly moving the same way like last time.

Multiplayer

Osmos does not have multi-player so we'll be skipping this section.

Final Thoughts

It took me more than 12+ hours of game time to finally realize that I have to review and play another game. Up until now, I still start Osmos from time to time, the game is pretty damn addictive if you like to use your brain. The BGM, the colours, the effects...everything just fits together. I mean I could think up of other words to describe this game like...fascinating, majestic, engaging, addicting...and I could go on forever.

Plus how the hell did they pack an awesome game in just under 32MB? Now that is awesome.

Ratings

Installer - Steam just keeps impressing me everytime I use it to install games.

Graphics -This game is beautiful and I mean it. You could probably take a screenshot of a level and then turn it into a poster.

Sound - Where do they get people that make this music?! Osmos should release a CD. I'm pretty sure people will buy it (including me).

Gameplay - The game is user-friendly, but if you think you could just click your way out of every single level then you're mistaken. Although the first few levels might seem easy at first, the harder ones can take hours to finish! And it could take double that if you're a perfectionist! The random level generator also increases the replayability of this game which is why I'm still playing it from time to time. And just a friendly reminder...remember to use your brain!