Publisher(s): Annapurna Interactive
Platform(s): PC (Steam)
Release Date: 2025
Faraway is simultaneously complicated as all get out and yet not complicated at all. If that sounds like a contradiction, I promise you it isn’t. Faraway‘s premise is simple: you’re a shooting star echoing across the night sky who is always on the verge of disappearing…But you survive by slinging and zipping around other stars to form constellations and harvest their energy. There is only one trigger button to press, no secret moves to unlock, and no gadgets to equip. It’s just you, your controller’s joystick and trigger, an awesome soundtrack, and the momentum energy you create to slingshot yourself around.
And I’m not kidding about the momentum energy. During my 10-minute demo of the first level, it took a while for me to figure out how things work. You move around in space by getting within range of another star, and it will start to glow red when you can grapple with it. Once you press the trigger and do so, it will shift your momentum to pull you into orbit around that star. When you’re ready to go on with your Faraway journey, you let go of the trigger and fly off. You can kinda shape your trajectory with the joystick at that point, but not too much, because you’re going to be ultimately going in whatever direction you’re aiming at when you let go (respecting the laws of momentum, of course).
The goal of Faraway, as I’ve said earlier, is to complete constellations. You will see a giant blue circle pop up as a general direction on the map. Once you’re in range of it and you go inside, you’ll see stars connected by thin translucent lines. You have to grab onto the star indicated as the start point and start mapping out the constellation by flinging yourself from star to star to complete the constellation shape. This is easier than it sounds, because Faraway will cancel out your attempt to complete a constellation if you cross your own constellation line. What this means for you is that you have to orient yourself to make sure you’re orbiting the initial star in the right direction before you fling off onto the subsequent stars. Once you complete a constellation, you’ll get a giant boost of energy that you can use to go quickly to another constellation puzzle to repeat the process over and over again.
All of this gameplay in Faraway sounds easy, but it is also somewhat complex. The momentum aspect takes a while to get used to, and I found myself continually having to sling around random stars to get where I wanted to go and to get facing the direction I needed to face in order to complete the constellation correctly. I was honestly a bit frustrated with the gameplay in Faraway, but I am putting that down to my inexperience with the gameplay mechanics than bad game design. By the time that my Faraway demo ended on the first stage, I had completed six out of seven of the constellation puzzles and I was pretty happy with that. I also absolutely loved the power I felt when I finally started completing the constellations after the midpoint of my demo and figuring out how to make it all work.
If you are looking for a chill puzzle game to enjoy, Faraway can have everything you need. There is a lot to enjoy about floating around in space, and with Faraway‘s core game being procedurally generated alongside 16 puzzle levels, you won’t be running out of content anytime soon. Steph Thirion has genuinely done a good job creating an audiovisual experience with Faraway, and it will be worth trying out when it comes out later in 2025.
Are you excited to pick up Faraway when it releases?
What are your favorite constellations?
Let us know in the comments below!
