Summary
Another uninspiring tron game
The Good
Considering the age of the game, the graphics look quite good. Too, the implementation of the game is well-done: the movement of the walls is smooth, and the game responds immediately to keypresses.
The Bad
Unfortunately, the controls are difficult to use: Insert and Delete to turn, F9 and F10 to change speed. While playing initially, I kept confusing which of Ins and Del turned which direction, and as a result I lost fairly quickly. Also, playing on a laptop keyboard was rather difficult due to the tiny size of the keys--about half as large as the already small arrow keys. This is not really the fault of the game designers, but had they used any other keys, it wouldn't have been an issue, and even on a normal keyboard these keys are not well placed.
Besides control issues, I had some difficulty telling how much room I had left before running into a wall. Though the graphics are pretty, I don't quite like the viewing angle. The sound, too, was not particularly good--not too surprising, given that the game is 25 years old, but still a point against it.
The Bottom Line
Novatron isn't too terrible, but it's far from being an outstanding example of the genre. It'd be better to play some other lightcycles game, and leave this one alone.
