Affordable Space Adventures is a bold game. Instead of trying to keep things vanilla with the Wii U, Knapnok and Nifflas has decided to go all out. Their newest child goes above and beyond to showcase the GamePad's worth, which can be a difficult challenge. Yet, Affordable Space Adventures seems to do it in ways that are endlessly clever and very exciting to the people playing. It might be the most brilliant thing I have played throughout the entirety of Gamescom 2014.

In the one hour demo that I played at the Indie Mega Booth, things became immediately clear. It was a very different game than I initially expected, but mostly met me as a delightful surprise. You control a small spaceship across various terrains while trying to solve puzzles in passageways. Affordable Space Adventures is a linear game that does not try to overcomplicate itself. Your focus should be on the moment; the puzzle, the ship, and on the current surroundings. Each of these play large parts in the journey, and combining them are critical to success.

The GamePad is at the center of this, which functions as the ship's user interface, and has plenty of functions on display. You start out with a simple scanner and flashlight so you’re able check the environments for clues. As you go along, more functions become available as challenges are quickly met to teach the new abilities. Acceleration, gravity, and mass are just a few of the elements presented in the game which you’ll be navigating through, with not one, but two engines.

Shifting between these engines is important mostly because of values found on the top of the GamePad screen. Certain enemies will react differently depending on your proximity, the sounds your ship makes, or by the ship’s electric emission. You will learn about these enemies by scanning them. Some of them are very unique from the group that they’re placed in. One of the maneuvers will have you shutting down the acceleration almost entirely and making use of anti-gravity to reach higher places. Clever things like that make Affordable Space Adventures stand out so much.

Using your weaponry correctly, offensive and defensive, is your only way to make it through every puzzle alive -- but not without unexpected situations. Shooting at switches always comes at a risk, as your ship wobbles all over the place, maybe coming in contact with a laser. Luckily, you get the stabilizer later on to deal with these problems. But in the early goings, you will have to focus on both screens a bit too much. In other situations, it is only the trial and error that can push you forward. Trying different techniques without interruption is endlessly entertaining. If you fail, you are quickly set back to the last checkpoint, but trying something after so many times will get some people frustrated.

The dark atmosphere helps build suspense. With just the flashlight as your guide, the title is overwhelmed with darkness. This can become a bit much when you need to navigate carefully in a few areas. Overall, I feel that it made the demo more exciting to experience. The moody environments will lead you to the idea that some utterly dreadful things happened to the people responsible for the surrounding robotic machinery.

After that hour, I feel like I needed to stop and not spoil myself any further. Affordable Space Adventures was a fascinating demo to play through, making me super excited for its release early next year. The usage of the Wii U GamePad is really clever, and it’s cool to see the ship expand with as you go. How that comes together in the final product is hard to predict, but it’s clear that an utterly strong foundation has been built so far by the people who taught me to dance like crazy.