N++ is a fast-paced platformer set in a distant future, and it asks you to play as a ninja. You dart through obstacles, narrowly evade a slew of inadvertently homicidal enemy robots, and collect gold in a minimalist sci-fi world. Metanet Software developed and published the game, which arrived in 2015 on PlayStation 4, Linux, PC, Mac, Xbox One and Nintendo Switch.
The pitch sounds thin. The execution is not.
Trailer, via IGDBcom.
Smooth Physics and Four Keys
N++ is built on smooth physics and the deft control of a character’s speed and inertia. That is the whole game, and it is enough. The feel of fluidly moving through each level is the reward the design keeps paying out.
The control scheme is spare. In the original N, gameplay involved four keys: move left, move right, jump, and suicide. Combinations of moving and jumping across different terrain let the ninja jump from wall to wall, climb vertical inclines, and slide down steep surfaces. N++ carries that grammar forward.
The suicide key is not a joke. It is a design admission that a run is already lost, and that restarting fast beats watching a mistake play out.
Gold, Switches and the Exit Door
Every level has the same spine. The player navigates tile-based levels while avoiding hazards, collecting gold, and eventually opening an exit door, which completes the level. The goal of each level is to trigger the switch and exit through the door it opens within the time limit. Some levels carry more than one exit and associated switch, which gives the player more freedom to choose a route.
That freedom is where N++ gets its teeth. A single exit is a puzzle with one answer. Two exits turn the same room into a question about which risk is cheaper.
The episode and level counts below come from the original N, in its 1.4 and 2.0 versions. The source does not give equivalent counts for N++.
| Version | Episodes | Total levels | Metanet-made levels |
|---|---|---|---|
| N 1.4 | 100 | 500 | 450 |
| N 2.0 | 120 | 600 | 500 |
Each episode in all iterations of the game features five levels, numbered 0 to 4. Version 1.4 of N held 100 episodes, numbered 00 to 99. Version 2.0 held 120, because two bonus columns unlock after the main game episodes are done. The remainder was player work: N 1.4’s extra 50 levels were user levels hand-picked by Metanet in 2005, and N 2.0’s extra 100 were user-made levels selected by a panel of fans in late 2012 and finalized by Metanet Software in 2013. The team behind the shortlist appears in the credits under their aliases.
A Built-In Editor Called NEd
N supports user-made levels through a built-in level editor called NEd, or the “N Editor.” Levels can be added into a game by modifying a text file accompanying the game that contains user level data.
That is an unglamorous way to run a community.
The lineage matters here. Metanet drew on Lode Runner and Soldat, along with other games that scroll from the side. N came first in the series, with N+ and then N++ following it. The original took the audience choice award in the downloadables category at the 2005 Independent Games Festival.
So the 2015 release is the third pass at an idea Metanet had already proven twice. The modes now cover single player, multiplayer and co-operative play, across platform, puzzle, indie and arcade territory, viewed from the side.
Where N++ Stands
The source does not rank the series. The order below is this paper’s own read, not a claim from the source:
- N++ — the fullest level count and the modern platform spread.
- N+ — the middle step.
- N — the freeware original, and still the purest.
The order is not close at the top. N++ wins on volume, and on modes the original never had.
What holds it back from a higher mark is that it never surprises you after the first hour. The physics are the argument, and once you have absorbed them, the game is asking you to run the same argument several hundred more times. The user-level pipeline softens that, but it does not erase it. This is a superb piece of movement design wrapped around a level structure that rarely changes its mind.
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