Some days, all you really need is something relaxing to help you unwind. You don’t need action and high energy gaming; you need something serene to get lost in. Virtual Reality is the perfect place for that, allowing you to dip into worlds of your choosing, and Solara One is all about offering you a way to chill out in outer space.

Many thanks to the publisher for the review code.

IN SPACE, NOBODY CAN HEAR YOU BREATHE
The game sets the scene for your journey into space surprisingly well. Rather than dumping you onto the titular space station right off the bat, instead you start off in a jungle with a simple tutorial on how to get around. The teleportation-based movement is off-putting at first (at least for those more comfortable with VR), but thankfully smooth movement is easily activated in the options menu.

After calling your for your space-taxi, you’ll make your way to a space port containing what looks like a floating museum, teaching you all about the Solara One, your space suit, the planets, anti-gravity, and more. It’s a really beautiful environment set among the clouds and I rather enjoyed the audio explanations of everything. It really helps with the world-building and makes you feel like you’re heading out on a space voyage.

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When you finally get aboard the Solara One space station, the relaxing experience truly begins as you float amongst the stars. The station itself is pretty limited as there are two doors that are currently locked, although the developer plans to expand in the future so no doubt this will change. Nevertheless, you can still adjust the rotation of the viewing platform in order to watch the incredible views.

The main draw though are the guided walks that you can do where you step outside to see everything a little closer. There’s a selection of walks to choose, from examining the ship for repairs to floating around the warp drive. The best addition though is the ability to fly around freely with the thrusters in your gloves. It’s a nice addition, and helps add some depth to the space exploration – even if it’s still only really for observational purposes.

Despite not having much of an actual ‘game’ to it, the visuals and the slow-paced nature to it all makes it all incredibly serene. Each of the locations you can warp to all feel distinctly unique, and whether it’s a Saturn-esque planet or an asteroid belt, you’ll still gaze in wonder at it all. There’s a sufficient amount of places at the moment you can go to, and more are planned in future content so it’ll be interesting to see what more gets added.

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One thing I would love to see from the game is a tad more interactivity included in the future. Even though this is designed more of a space-safari where you mainly look but don’t touch, having the ability to do some basic repairs whilst scouting the ship for issues would be a nice touch. A scanner could even be included in one of the new rooms so that you can see when something is in need of repair, and it would be a nice touch.

Still, even without that it’s hard to deny that Solara One is a really chilled out experience. It’s clear that a lot of love has been poured into the game by its sole developer, and he’s made it clear that work hasn’t stopped yet – even if updates may take time to do on his lonesome.

VERDICT
Even though the lack of interactivity will probably put off many, Solara One still offers a beautifully immersive space experience that you won’t find anywhere else. I hope that the future is bright for the game and we see many more additions to this already breathtaking title.