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Continuum Passage
Dean’s either trying to work or busy slapping himself in the face, so today you get a guest review from me, Luis. As for the quality of the review, it’s going to be bumpy. I’m not really a review person. I’m more of a cynically-antagonize-everyone-around-me-until-they-loathe-my-opinion person, so if I start going off on wild tangents as to the negatives in this game, I apologize.
With that out of the way, Continuum Passage, made last (school) year by a group of three juniors.
The game advertises itself as a "first-person action exploration game with puzzling elements." If that seems like a lengthy, overly descriptive description for what amounts to a fifteen minute game, that's because it is.
But let me start with the good. Continuum Passage, in being the bastard son of about five different game genres, actually manages to create something uniquely entertaining. The object of the game is to get to the finishing point by utilizing floor pads that reshuffle the level. Step on a floor pad, the level continuously wraps in the direction the arrow’s pointing. It’s a very interesting mechanic, and works to further the idea of the ‘Continuum Passage.’ It seems like these devs, between the drunken parties and orgies DigiPen is famous for, took great care to make sure that their mechanics reinforced the general idea that the title introduces. The game has a vibrant and arcade-y color palette. Lots of neon, bright colors, but that’s indicative of a lot of the library. The music is...okay I guess. There’s one electronic track that the game plays on a loop. Not bad, but gets a bit annoying after awhile.
The annoying bits of this game still stick out obnoxiously, like a finger in your delicious Big Mac. For one, remember that lengthy description from two paragraphs ago? That’s a big issue. In combining so many elements into one game, the game loses focus and direction, like it doesn’t know what it wants to be when it grows up into a Kickstarter project. The puzzles aren’t really...puzzling, in a sense, and the mechanics reflect this. About midway through this game’s 15 levels, they introduce these little triangular barriers, which you can’t get through without a key. However, once you pick up a key, you never lose it. Well, let me phrase that better. If you pick up a key, and then die without reaching a checkpoint, you restart the level, still holding on to the key. All this does is remove the challenge from the puzzles and turn the game into a race. Speaking of races, the game occasionally feels like a racing game. No, I’m serious. Half of the time you're just running from the dissolving platforms, which to be honest isn't really that fun.
All in all, Continuum Passage is a short, mostly okay experience that could do with less variety and more specialization. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to go tame the horses of Raxacoricofallapatorius.
See you space cowboy:
Continuum Passage-https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25898
Shameless Plug-potentiallymeaningful.blogspot.com
Dean’s either trying to work or busy slapping himself in the face, so today you get a guest review from me, Luis. As for the quality of the review, it’s going to be bumpy. I’m not really a review person. I’m more of a cynically-antagonize-everyone-around-me-until-they-loathe-my-opinion person, so if I start going off on wild tangents as to the negatives in this game, I apologize.
With that out of the way, Continuum Passage, made last (school) year by a group of three juniors.
The game advertises itself as a "first-person action exploration game with puzzling elements." If that seems like a lengthy, overly descriptive description for what amounts to a fifteen minute game, that's because it is.
But let me start with the good. Continuum Passage, in being the bastard son of about five different game genres, actually manages to create something uniquely entertaining. The object of the game is to get to the finishing point by utilizing floor pads that reshuffle the level. Step on a floor pad, the level continuously wraps in the direction the arrow’s pointing. It’s a very interesting mechanic, and works to further the idea of the ‘Continuum Passage.’ It seems like these devs, between the drunken parties and orgies DigiPen is famous for, took great care to make sure that their mechanics reinforced the general idea that the title introduces. The game has a vibrant and arcade-y color palette. Lots of neon, bright colors, but that’s indicative of a lot of the library. The music is...okay I guess. There’s one electronic track that the game plays on a loop. Not bad, but gets a bit annoying after awhile.
The annoying bits of this game still stick out obnoxiously, like a finger in your delicious Big Mac. For one, remember that lengthy description from two paragraphs ago? That’s a big issue. In combining so many elements into one game, the game loses focus and direction, like it doesn’t know what it wants to be when it grows up into a Kickstarter project. The puzzles aren’t really...puzzling, in a sense, and the mechanics reflect this. About midway through this game’s 15 levels, they introduce these little triangular barriers, which you can’t get through without a key. However, once you pick up a key, you never lose it. Well, let me phrase that better. If you pick up a key, and then die without reaching a checkpoint, you restart the level, still holding on to the key. All this does is remove the challenge from the puzzles and turn the game into a race. Speaking of races, the game occasionally feels like a racing game. No, I’m serious. Half of the time you're just running from the dissolving platforms, which to be honest isn't really that fun.
All in all, Continuum Passage is a short, mostly okay experience that could do with less variety and more specialization. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to go tame the horses of Raxacoricofallapatorius.
See you space cowboy:
Continuum Passage-https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25898
Shameless Plug-potentiallymeaningful.blogspot.com
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Thanks for that, Luis!
Since that review was already the length of three of my normal reviews, I'm going to keep my own commentary short, so if I don't respond do something Luis said, you can assume I agree with it.
That said, here are the comments he made which i found to be only...potentially meaningful (GOT 'EM)
I wouldn't say the music gets annoying after a while, especially considering its pace matches the mood of the game. When you're in the world map, for example, if you zoom out, the music gets softer. A game's music score doesn't have to be fun to listen to, it just has to reinforce the feeling that the game wants you to experience, much like the graphical style does. Look no further that Silent Hill to see what I'm talking about.
I also wouldn't say that Continuum Passage is spread too thin. In fact, I wouldn't even say it takes influence from so many other genres. Continuum Passage is a first-person puzzler. That's it. I think it not only knows exactly what it wants to be but pulls it off in a very focused manner. It's certainly a bit of a stretch to say it feels like a racing game, though running from collapsing platforms does create that tension you usually get from racing games.
There are also a few flaws which I think Luis didn't pay enough attention to.
Most glaring is the jump. It's pathetic. I get that they only wanted you to be able to clear one block at a time, but the jump is so tiny I didn't even realize I had it until halfway through the game because it looks like the camera naturally bobbing up and down for a walk cycle. Also, it's difficult to see whether the jump you need to make covers one space or two at first glance, leading me to fall to my death during the last stage when I already had two of the three keys. This not only allowed the challenge to be lost, as Luis said, but forced the challenge to be lost.
That's pretty much all I have to say. Thanks for the help, Luis! Always appreciated.
And hey, if anyone else out there wants to send me their opinions of a game, I'll gladly feature and respond to their points as well.
Until next time, stay original.
Links
look in the guest review, sillypants!
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