Nimbus Infinity Review (PC): A Decent Attempt at Capturing the Mech Action Genre

While a direct sequel to Project Nimbus, Nimbus Infinity is a completely different game. It’s not just the visuals that have been improved, which makes perfect sense considering that it’s been six years since the first game came out. The developers have almost completely redesigned the combat system and added a 2D-style anime story aspect to make it easier for players to follow what’s happening in the universe.

If you’re coming from Project Nimbus without playing Nimbus Infinity while it was in Early Access, the game will probably feel rather weird because of all the changes, but I’m convinced that all these make the overall gameplay experience slightly better than what we had in the original.

That being said, let’s see what Nimbus Infinity is all about. You play as a youngster who helps his family business by delivering tofu with … a mech. Although the game is set in the far future, it’s still unusual to use a mech to deliver cheese, and the protagonist does acknowledge this in the first hour of the game.

It’s only by chance that young Taiyo turns from a simple delivery boy into a veteran Battle Frame warrior. After finishing all deliveries for the day, Taiyo becomes the witness of a Battle Frame crash. While trying to offer first aid to the occupants he discovers two female pilots that are in dire need of hospitalization.

In fact, his first mission is to take the girls to the nearest hospital. It’s not a coincidence that the city is attacked around the same time making his mission harder than it should. But this is just a warm-up mission, so enemies aren’t as dense and don’t pose much of a threat. The only thing that makes the mission take a bit longer is getting used to the controls.

Unlike Project Nimbus where you get through missions almost without pause, the storytelling in Nimbus Infinity offers these intermezzo moments during which you get to know the characters a little better, as well as actually makes sense of the story.

While the writing and voice-acting are serviceable, they don’t really elevate the game from mediocrity. I reckon that I was tempted to just skip the unnecessary banter between the characters, but I found that not talking with certain characters will deprive me of important information about an upcoming mission.

That leaves combat to redeem the otherwise mediocre game. Before you jump into a new mission, you get to customize your loadout and even change the color of your mech’s parts. Surprisingly, there’s a wide range of weapons that you can switch between even from the start. Your mech can have two different weapons in its hands and a missile rack. The game lacks any melee weapons, which makes sense considering that you only have a “punch” melee attack at your disposal.

Out in space, you can opt for third- or first-person view. Depending on the objectives, battles can last more than 15 minutes because the maps are quite large. That’s a pretty weird design decision since battles are usually fought in small areas.

Your mech is moving very fast regardless of the environment, but you don’t really feel the weight of it, which makes the experience a bit floaty. It’s not bad, but you don’t get that mecha vibe that games from the MechWarrior and Gundam series. Battles are pretty tense and chaotic more often than not, but staying a bit farther from the action and just sniping enemy Battle Frames feels quite satisfying. Your advanced Battle Frame can switch stances (Offence, Defense, Speed), which greatly helps you in various scenarios. I didn’t use these stances immediately after they were introduced, but once I started using them, I realized they’re a game changer.

Conclusion

Nimbus Infinity is not just a step up from the original game, but also a departure from the formula. The new combat system feels a much better fit for a mecha game, and while the story bits are a mixed bag, I loved the idea of getting to know some of the characters through storytelling.

Truth be told, despite some tense missions, there’s really no reason to care about what’s happening in Nimbus Infinity. Thankfully, the fact that you get some story bits in between missions makes a huge difference and becomes a little bit of the carrot on the stick.

The first few missions were pretty fun, but then everything became more of the same. If you’re into mecha games, Nimbus Infinity can scratch that itch, but don’t get your hopes too high.

RATING: 7/10