Fillin' up

Velocity developer FuturLab has finally raised the curtain on its super secret PlayStation Mobile launch title, Fuel Tiracas. The title – which the studio teased with an irritating trailer yesterday – is the summation of eight weeks' work, and subsequently represents the Brighton-based studio’s simplest game to date.

But what is it all about? “Fuel Tiracas is simple, elegant and a little bit clever, and it takes everything we’ve learned about addictive mechanics from Coconut Dodge and Velocity, and boils them down to their absolute core essence, building the simplest game possible,” the company tells us.

The game takes place on the Planet Tiracas, which unfortunately has no atmosphere. It’s up to you to use the planet’s natural resources as fuel to power giant atmosphere processors. That name’s starting to make a lot more sense now, isn’t it?

FuturLab describes the gameplay as a fusion of ‘Whack-a-Mole’, ‘Spinning Plates’ and ‘Simon Says’. Essentially, you must quickly collect fuel as it appears on each side of the screen, to raise a coloured fuel gauge in the centre. Balancing these gauges within a specified threshold sends power to the atmosphere processor, which in turn helps you to complete the level. Of course, the catch is that the fuel’s constantly depleting. Bummer.

“It’s simple, fast-paced action with a resource/time management slant, and it’s addictive as hell because, as with Coconut Dodge, the combination of random and predictable elements gives the player the opportunity to memorise and master the patterns that appear, whilst being kept on their toes by random events,” explains studio gaffer James Marsden.

The full game will feature 12 stages and global leaderboards. But the best part is that it’ll cost just £0.40. No, that’s not a typing error. The game’s due out later today, alongside FuturLab’s other PlayStation Mobile launch title Beats Slider.