N.O.V.A. Legacy Reviews

by Adarchin

Back in the good old days of mobile gaming, I remember playing the NOVA trilogy on both my iPhone and iPad. The gameplay in those games were marvelous (though NOVA has better gameplay imo.). Once I heard that a remake of the series is announced I was excited that we are having another NOVA game. But as soon as I see more details, I was getting less excited as it is announced as a free P2W game. Nevertheless I downloaded the game and to find out that the system of this game is very similar to Brothers in Arms 2 Plus edition but twice as worse. Energy limits, chopped-up campaign and of course the ‘wonderful’ P2W nonsense.

Gameloft, what were you thinking? You had one chance to make this reboot a good reboot and maybe I could enjoy a bit more like the first NOVA. But, no. You disappoint me, instead you decided to make this like any F2P game that uses the horrendous P2W garbage so that you could squeeze more pennies from the players dry in the long run.

by R_242b

After seeing an old rival, MiD_V3N0M, write a review I thought Id write one too. Like him, NOVA 2 was my jam when i was 13, I was addicted and could not stop playing. I remember all the fun times with half-jumping your way out of the map, double tapping the fire button as fast as possible to hit the quickscope headshots with the sniper, the god awful hackers with the rocket spams (ill admit, i even got so tired of it i became one of them for about 10 levels) and insane time to kill on the alien lightning gun, and how can i forget the good old skin colors, man i miss those! I rocked the black and turquoise/blue skin. :’) so awesome. Then NOVA 3 came out and it was awesome as well! It added weapon sway, ADS, some crazy aim assist for the sniper and railgun, improved graphics, a super hot Yelena, and friggin jetpacks! So many memories in both games that i thought this nova legacy would carry on, but alas, this game is trash. Graphics are terrible, campaign missions take 5 minutes, no voice acting, and the ability to aim and shoot is just trash. Not to mention the hitboxes in the campaign expand outside the actual enemy character. Never even played multiplayer on this. Anyway, I was really disappointed to wait about 5 years and have this crap show up. Really hoping NOVA 4 will be as epic as NOVA 2 and NOVA 3. For anyone who made it this far, I miss the old days too. Cheers, IC3FLY :)

by Llllll---dave---llllll

Instead of having a better game, with more features, the game is a worse compared to its predecessors. Why is there no option to scope with assault rifles, a feature that is not missing in much older games. This game also doesn’t feel nearly as smooth in terms of controls as something like NOVA 3 or modern combat 5 or even modern combat 3. This retro approach can be done well, like the Wolfenstein games, but here it just a feel like a lazy decision. Even when I turned the sensitivity down to 1% I still had trouble navigating a hallway. This game worked better on my iPhone 7, and it seems worse on the iPhone 10. On the iPhone 7, the games smoothness was mediocre, but the switch to an iPhone 10 makes the controls much less fluid. Even if the controls operated like butter, the game itself would still be eh at best when compared to past games. The servers are also rather trite. A game like PUBG will have really good connection, and something like Modern Combat 5 will have passable connection, but this game’s connection is pretty bad. You also can not modify the control layout so that the trigger button is not in the very corner of the screen. It’s not a good sign when the gameplay gets better because you turned on auto fire when enemies are on target.

by HonestReviewerOfGames

I remember back in 2012, I came upon a game called N.O.V.A 2. As a 13 year old then, I was amazed by how great NOVALegacy was! All I had was an iPod Touch 4th gen and it was the best app of all my games then. I would play multiplayer every night! It was a memorable one. Then came out nova 3! It was twice as good as the 2nd! I just couldn’t let it down! I mean sure it was like $7 but for what it was, it was worth it. My point being, when I just happened to search NOVALegacy Store and see if Nova 4 was out, I was surprised to even see this. I was like, WOW it took them 5+ years to come out with this! It must be great! However, when I launched the game.. I was really disappointed.. it compared nothing to the 2nd or 3rd nova series game.. they added energy, downgraded the graphics by far worse than Nova 1.., the story is not really interesting, voice acting was cut out, it just wasn’t as immersive as it used to be. About to be 20 and would have loved to experience the joy I felt when I was 13.. I guess I’ll just be looking up the Nova 3 app trailer to somewhat experience it again, since the apps are no longer on the AppStore to download. Guess the servers have been empty for the longest. ~MiD_V3N0M in case any pals after many years see this :) I remember the Palringo days! Nice Review IC3FLY!

by Coyote Kal

This game is a pathetic excuse for a NOVA game. First of all, the game reeks of the same kinda junk that ruined Battlefront 2, namely loot crates and a pathetic excuse for a progression system. Second, whatever happened to the awesome graphics and intense gameplay of NOVA 3? I understand this game is really small storage-wise, but is that really a good thing when it sacrifices content and quality? And to top it all off, it doesn’t even have the lightning gun, which is literally my favorite weapon of all time and of all games.
Overall, this game is just a feeble attempt from Gameloft to squeeze some more money out of fans of the Nova series, and even worse it gives a bad name to mobile games. It’s crappy games like this that make people think that just because it’s mobile you can’t have a quality gaming experience. Give us a real game like NOVA 3 (heck even just bring that one back) or Infinity Blade 3 instead of wasting our time with this garbage.

by Slc56

I played Nova 3 for a while, and I still do. I was exited when I heard about this. But, it's not as good. The graphics are meh, the screen is too sensitive, and this whole system of "energy" where doing a mission takes some, and building weapons is just worthless. Nova 3 gave me what I signed up for, a fun campaign with an amazing multiplayer unfortunately ended on a cliffhanger. I understand this game was made before so naturally it's older and not as good, but I think with the amount of old fans for the franchise, and the need for a nice shooter game, Nova 4 with the plot line that Nova breaks into two and allies with different people would be a great idea. At the very least, update Nova 3 so it works wih IOS 11, because it's a great game and I don't want to give it up because of software updates. Please. Advertise it a little, and many more people will start playing it. You could even charge money for it again. But don't do this. Games are supposed to move forward, not get stuck in the past. There's a bit of philosophical advice for you. Thanks for reading.

by Unknown X-Wing Pilot

N.O.V.A was a great series until they killed the first two installments and replaced them with this disgrace of a game. Let’s see…we have loot boxes, no voice acting, an energy system. The recipe that takes the fun out of a game. Furthermore, the amount of glitches present in this so called “remastered” version is utterly frustrating and atrocious. Soon after I completed the campaign and received some of the best epics from gold packs using free gems, the game suddenly crashed and refused any attempts to open (I kid you not). All that time and effort I spent collecting items, upgrading them, and completing levels…gone. The same happened when I played Asphalt 8 some years ago. It is a middle finger to the customers. I would like to play my first N.O.V.A, not this crap. But we don’t have that kind of luxury, do we? There is no way I’ll be spending time playing this game again. The paywall was frustrating as it was. Will be deleting. The only game from this company that is even worth playing is N.O.V.A 3.

by AndrewJayK

I wish I could rate this twice. Once on my iPad with a high rating. And then a second time with this rating from my phone. However, giving a 5 and saying everything is all good would be a disservice to those playing on a cell phone. I’d rather criticize with a chance of the problem being fixed. That being said. The graphics and gameplay of this game is stellar. I mean think about it. We’re on mobile devices and this is just as fun as when I played call of duty 4 on Xbox 360 as a teenager. It blows my mind. It rly does. There’s rly only one thing that is a major major buzzkill for me. The sensitive settings on a cell phone are unenjoyable. It’s WAY too sensitive. Aiming is just about impossible. I put the sensitivity bar all the way to 0 and it felt as if it literally did nothing. On my iPad it’s perfect. I turn down the sensitivity and aiming with a touch screen is as enjoyable as it could possibly be. Playing on the phone is just about impossible. If I want my avi to take a full 10 seconds to make a complete 360, then via the sensitivity setting, that should be a possibility. That’s what the sensitivity bar is for. If they could patch this and let us ACTUALLY control the sensitivity on this smaller screen that would be so much better. Because then I can play on either device when it’s most convenient. Anyways. If they fix this I have zero problems revising and giving a 5 because it’s playable on multiple devices instead of being locked down to just one.

by Hi N.O.V.A Company

This game is a terrible phone game and the reason I’m rating it 2stars is because there are a bunch of things I don’t like about the game. First off the multiplayer is awesome but after a while it gets boring because there are only two different modes in it, also there aren’t a lot of maps so that just makes it even more boring. What makes matters worse is that one of the only ways you can get cool stuff is by playing a ton of multiplayer. Also whenever I do play multiplayer and I accidentally swipe the notifications down it disconnects me from the game. Plus I don’t think that you should have to spend energy to play campaign, I mean it’s just annoying. Then there are the adds. I keep on getting adds about how it is a bad idea to smoke and vape over and over again, I don’t smoke! I’m getting tired of this and if it just doesn’t stop I’m just going to move on to fortnite mobile. 😔

by Nova Noah

I played NOVA since I was a kid when iPhones were new and the first game came out. Goodness knows how much I played NOVA 1. I still remember the opening sequence and how awesome that was. After that I played 2 and 3 as soon as they released. In the past months I was honestly looking for some way to download them off the internet seeing as they are no longer available. Just today I found this and got excited thinking I could relive those awesome memories. I was sad the moment I started playing. It takes you out of the campaign after the first mission and shows you an abundance of ways to play. No more just playing through mission through mission. And you actually take energy to play missions. So after about 3 you have to wait a while to play some more or, of course, pay real cash for more energy. They changed the game so it fits with modern gaming now with packs and customizing that never used to be. Understandable but unexpected and disappointing. I may continue to play but not sure. For what it is it’s good, but it is no legacy to the true NOVA games.

by Jax Blast

I remember a few years back when I played NOVA 3. It was an amazing game. Better than Halo or Call of Duty at the time. As I slowly drifted away from NOVA, I missed its immersive and enjoyable gameplay. So I went back on NOVALegacy Store a few months back, and attempted to look for a NOVA game. What I found was this. I couldn’t wait! It looked so awesome that they were bringing back the NOVA games! I was so excited to play it that I didn’t even LOOK at the reviews or anything. I loaded up the game which took no time at all, and noticed something. Something about the menu screen was off. Something just didn’t seem... right. I played some of the campaign, and I’m sad to say that I was disgusted at the change in gameplay that it had added. It was almost nothing like the NOVA games of the past that we all know and loved. And the sensitivity. No matter how much I changed it it felt like it did nothing. Please make a new game that ISN’T seven dollars and fits the NOVA series better. I’m not giving one star because I used to love the NOVA games.

by Aetqs

I absolutely love the Nova series (mostly because it gives me halo flashbacks), it’s probably the best mobile shooter out there, but this version seems like such a downgrade compared to Nova 3, there was cutscenes that blew me away with its graphics and its voice acting was amazing, the multiplayer was awesome as well. But with this, I didn’t like it that much, now listen I know it’s supposed to be a remaster but make that remaster a good one give it Graphics like Nova 3...but even better. Give it the amazing voice acting like Nova 3. Most importantly give it the multiplayer like Nova 3. I really hate going onto Nova Legacy’s multiplayer just to wait for 3 more people to join for like a whole hour. Yet Nova still will remain as my favorite mobile FPS as the gameplay for these games shall always entertain people like me.

by Proemf

I’m sad to report that what used to be my favorite iPhone series is now mediocre. There are three reasons why this game falls short compared to the last game.
1) Basically nonexistent story. The story is so barebones compared to the predecessor. It’s basically walk from point A to point B while shooting hordes of samey enemies. There is hardly any challenge to the campaign too. It also doesn’t help that there is no voice acting, whereas N.O.V.A 3 had great voice acting.
2) Bland multiplayer. The multiplayer isn’t terrible, but it isn’t good enough to make me coming back to it. It’s basically whoever shoots first and longer wins every battle.
3) Terrible loot system. The loot is AWEFUL. Anytime you get a loot crate, the game gives you “chips” to use to upgrade or craft weapons. This would be great if THERE WERE MORE WEAPONS. Unfortunately, the better weapons are mainly just slightly reskinned, better versions of the common weapons.
It’s just sad to this great series become bland.

by ChoppaUFaceOff

I don’t typically like games such as this one (mobile fps) but this one is actually pretty fun. I just got it today so I don’t have a whole lot of experience with the game or any bugs it may have. The only thing that I would like to be changed is the whole “auto-shoot” bull crap. While it is convenient at times, I would prefer an option in the settings to turn it off. Also please add aiming down the iron sights on all guns and not just the sniper. These two things don’t really affect the gameplay and this is still a good game whether or not they add these things. I do recommend this game to anyone looking for a decent fps, and don’t listen to the negative reviews because if you don’t like the game you can just easily delete it. Thank you to any who read this review and God bless.

by Deathmijjit

So a lot of the reviews here are very unsatisfied-sounding. I’ve been all about nova since the first one. I played the hell out of nova 3 when time allowed at sea. Anyone that has done something similar knows how much it can mean, as far as your choices of games to bring out there, even if you hardly get time to play them. Anyway. I read the reviews from other die-hard nova fans, and I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t worried. But I decided to say screw it and try the game anyway. Not many people will likely agree with me, but I wasn’t disappointed. In fact, I was pleasantly surprised. I’m all about progress leading things in new directions, and we all know game loft excels at keeping with the times. So all things considered, I see this as a sort of anniversary/new experiment that I’m pretty into. No, it’s not a carbon copy of the first nova. I was hoping it wouldn’t be. They said they made improvements, and they did. As I hobby I write, and when I revise a personal story, I’ll change whatever I need to to create what I want the result to be. I see the exact same process here and I’m all for it. Also I have nova 3 downloaded for when the nostalgia is hitting hard, or the WiFi cuts out.

So basically, I don’t think it’s that bad at all, and I’m gonna keep playing. I recommend trying it for yourself before letting other’s opinions be your own

by Roux Alister

I like the game it’s well made and fun. The campaign is short but interesting and gets you ready for multiplayer. My only problem with the game is that the multiplayer is a bit unfair because you tend to get matched up with people who may have 500 defense armor when you only have 250 armor and weapons at 220 which compared to their weapons which are at 400 range. This makes for a very unfair match in which one player just decimates the rest of the players on the map. My suggestions is that matches should be set up so people with similar weapon and armor score are matched up against each other so they can play and have a good time and not be stopped from playing the game. Otherwise than that the game is great and I would recommend it to others!

by 3793179

Only played it a bit but it seems cool, a high-sensitivity, fast-paced, run-and-gun shooter that reminds me of Quake or Archetype (a very old iPhone FPS). The enemies are very easy and the levels are kinda just “run into this room and kill these guys then go to the next room”. Gameplay and graphics (though sharp) feel very barebones, and sound design is lacking, but I think that’s what Gameloft was going for with the whole “retro FPS” thing. The cards and credits and gems business is honestly sort of confusing. Multiplayer also feels very stripped back compared to the last entry, N.O.V.A. 3. Here’s hoping we see more content and gameplay additions (especially attention to multiplayer - this is where the money is made Gameloft! - in the near future (or even N.O.V.A. 4). Of course Freemium remains a big negative but that’s been Gameloft’s model for a while now, so hopefully they use N.O.V.A.’s name for good.

by Hellcatsnredeyes

I have realized into 4 weeks of playing this game that you don’t even need skill to play all you need is luck and that is very disappointing. Not to mention the fact that there’s a system where you can self aim, and on the other side of luck all you need is a couple rush packs diamond packs etc. And boom you can kill everybody and another thing. Once you get some good guns you can start killing most noobs whose damage is below 200 same goes for shield. And then start getting coins and more currency’s and eventually be one of the top players in the game. And then there’s barely any campaign missions seriously only 19. The only things you can do when you finish the game is play multiplayer, play for events, shadow missions and that’s really it. And there’s only one event which is Rush. The game hasn’t updated in 2 years and really needs some improvements.

by XXDI3GOXx

I was a fan of NOVA 3 and it was really fun and couldn’t think it will get better but then I downloaded this game since it’s more recent and I love it more than NOVA 3. It has its pros and cons but more pros for the ability to customize your weapons and character. The weapons are fairly balanced just on multiplayer everyone is running around with the echo shotgun (at least in bronze) and it makes it so unfair but fun. Also the campaign is fun and interesting I just don’t like how we only have 10 stamina so after about 3 missions we have to wait till it comes back. But either with all that the game is really fun and the multiplayer system is fun to go up the tiers. Keep the good work up and one thing don’t make the game waste more than 1 GB like every other big Gameloft game.

by Reaper210

I love this game, I have always loved your nova games, but there is just one thing that bothers me.
Why don’t you update nova 3, specifically the freedom Edition? I loved that game with all of my heart, I used to play it everyday I came back from school. But one day that all ended because the game said I could not play it because it did not update to the latest version on my iPad. I wanted to ask if you can please bring back this game, this was literally the only game I played and enjoyed. I do not know if you the developer would actually read this, but if you can update it here is the latest iOS version, 12.1 .
Please bring back this game.

If you read this, thank you for reading.👍

by Gadon Thek

N.O.V.A was a great series until they killed the first two installments and replaced them with this disgrace of a game. Let’s see…we have loot boxes, no voice acting, an energy system. The recipe that takes the fun out of a game. Furthermore, the amount of glitches present in this so called “remastered” version is utterly frustrating and atrocious. Soon after I completed the campaign and received some of the best epics from gold packs using free gems, the game suddenly crashed and refused any attempts to open (I kid you not). All that time and effort I spent collecting items, upgrading them, and completing levels…gone. The same happened when I played Asphalt 8 some years ago. It is a middle finger to the customers. I would like to play my first N.O.V.A, not this crap. But we don’t have that kind of luxury, do we? There is no way I’ll be spending time playing this game again. The paywall was frustrating as it was. Will be deleting. The only game from this company that is even worth playing is N.O.V.A 3.