The game takes major cues from sci-fi console shooters, such as the Halo and Metroid series.

in the following ways: In the distant future, Earth is no longer able to sustain life, and humans live on artificial satellites called near-orbitals.

To protect themselves, the near-orbitals jointly formed a military organization known as the Near Orbital Vanguard Alliance (NOVA).

The protagonist of this story is Captain Kal Wardin, a retired soldier who is forcefully returned to active duty to investigate a missing transport.

He battles against an alien army simply referred to as the xenos, who begin to attack military facilities of NOVA across the planet New Ceres.

On July 21, 2010, N.O.V.A, along with Modern Combat: Sandstorm, Gangstar: West Coast Hustle, and Assassin's Creed: Altaïr's Chronicles, was heavily updated for the iPhone 4.

A remaster of the game called N.O.V.A Legacy, with updated graphics, a weapon upgrade system, a power meter, and other features was released on March 27, 2017.

The game innovated on the many designs created by the first N.O.V.A., and added many new features such as 10-player online multiplayer matches, retina display and gyroscope support for the iPhone 4.