Stream the stunning underwater adventure ABZÛ now on NVIDIA SHIELD
Now available to stream on NVIDIA SHIELD via GeForce NOW, ABZÛ casts you as a diver adrift in a beautiful ocean. Developer Giant Squid has modelled entire ecosystems packed with corals, seaweeds, crustaceans, fish and mammals, and you can interact with them – or at least try – but you’re not there to hunt and kill. This game’s interaction, like its water, goes deeper.
If you own an NVIDIA SHIELD device, you can stream ABZÛ for a special launch price of $15.59 (20% off its regular price) on GeForce NOW. And if you purchase the game on GeForce NOW you will also receive a key to download the game on PC at no additional cost.
So what are you doing in ABZÛ? You’re there to explore, to swim gracefully through its open waters, its caves, its sunken secrets and abyssal trenches. You’re there to discover and witness its beauty. And somewhere below lies the ruins of a once-great civilization, and the answers to who they were and what brought about their downfall. You’re there to solve the mystery.
There are no checkpoints to reach, missions to complete or objectives to tick off. You won’t find yourself racing a box jellyfish around a coral reef in order to progress to the next level. And while there are occasional levers to find and pull, and exploration-based puzzles to untangle, you can ignore them and just carry on if you want.
ABZÛ’s genius is to make you not want to ignore anything. Unlike more traditional games, there’s no desire to simply rush ever onwards. It’s a uniquely serene, elegant and relaxing experience, but one that’s nevertheless filled with stunning moments that will stick with you long after you put down the controller.
It hooks you with a fantastic blend of visual artistry, wild colors, a score that ebbs and flows from ambient to orchestral, and player movement that borders on the sublime. Swimming through the game’s glowing shallow seas and menacing depths is so gracefully fluid it’s a pleasure in itself.
The controls are simple. You can swim, dive or breach the surface, plus you can build extra speed with well-timed taps as you kick. Head for the waves at top speed and you can even leap right out, dolphin-style… something the dolphins themselves may well respond to. Further down, your speed boosts are necessary for dodging certain obstacles, and following faster creatures.
There’s much to discover about the drowned civilization, and pleasingly you do so without being forced out of the flow of things. There are no jarring cutscenes or voiceovers explaining it all. The story unfolds right up to its final reveal in a wordless, visual way. It’s as effective as it is unusual.
Because the behavior of the creatures is procedurally generated, rather than scripted to occur certain ways, ABZÛ is different each time you play. The story remains the same, of course – for a game so much about free-spirited exploration and player autonomy, it has a very strong narrative – but there’s always something new to experience. And ABZÛ really is an experience, at once absurdly relaxing and brain-searingly memorable.
If you want to play it now (and you should), there’s no better way than with GeForce NOW. NVIDIA’s cloud-based service offers unrivalled performance, and its 1080p, 60 frames per second capability means you’ll see ABZÛ in all its exquisite glory. The game is available now on all SHIELD devices – so dive in and get playing in seconds.