Lifeless Planet gameplay trailer is epic, verging on cosmically confusing

If you cast your eye back to the Kickstarter greats of 2011 , you'll remember Lifeless Planet .

. The fledgling action-adventure-mystery of Russian spaceman paraphernalia on what is supposed to be an uninhabited planet was incredibly intriguing, even back then in its early alpha stages. Now that the Lifeless Planet is hurtling towards release, it's got a gameplay trailer to show how far it's come.

Even without the charmingly creepy space setting, the heavy narrative focus makes this an absolute standout in the ever-growing list of up-and-comers. I especially like that the mysteries of life are given as much weight as those of space.

Over on the Lifeless Planet website, developer David Board of Stage 2 Studios reveals that he's now commenced work on level 20, out of the planned 20 levels—meaning that almost all of the content's in place now. Joy! Less exciting—for Board, anyway—is that completion of of the content will likely mark his entering the mindnumbing moonrock-polishing phase. What that means for us, though, is hopefully an eventually great adventure game. There's no rock-hard release date, though Board is "shooting for September."