Can't do it, guys. Sorry. The game makes it very clear that in order to play it, you need Xbox360 controllers and friends. I have neither of those things.
Links
https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26067
Monday, September 30, 2013
Super Massive Shooter
You've got to be careful about adding words that are synonymous with "good" in the titles of your projects. In fact, pretty much any adjective used to describe the game itself rather than something in the game (The "Dark" in "Dark Souls" for example, is fine) is generally a bad idea. Super Massive Shooter decided to forget all that and pretty much name itself "you will have fun playing this."
And, for all it's worth, you will have fun. There are, however, a few frustrations that you'll have to deal with. First, though, let's talk about what this game does right.
First off, the "level design." I put the air bunnies there because I'm really talking about enemy design, but in a shoot 'em up like this, those two terms are pretty much synonymous (I've been using that word a lot lately, huh. Maybe I should find some synonyms...whoa). The screen fills up with just enough enemies and their projectiles to keep the game challenging without ever feeling like demise is inevitable. For me, the hallmark of a badly made bullet hell is when I've just given up on trying to conserve my supply of lives and I just bombard the enemy with as many shots as I can before I'm dead for realsies. That never happened in this game; I was always trying to maintain a bit of strategy. Gold star for that.
As you progress throughout the levels, you will gain bigger and better weapons to take down bigger and badder enemies. This keeps the player immersed at all times and gives them the rewarding feeling of getting stronger. It's the kind of lip-biting satisfaction that games like Sugarbaby will never be able to achieve. The presentation is great; the hitsparks are beautifully satisfying and the game runs at a cool 60fps.
Then there are some things that just seemed pointless. For example, throughout the entire tutorial, your ship will be blinking and emitting a noise similar to the one when your health runs low in a Zelda game. In Zelda, though, the noise serves a purpose both as a punishment for being careless with your life and a motivation to get some life back. in SMS, it's just there for no apparent reason.
What got my goat the most, though, are the things that genuinely decrease the quality of play. There's a reason most bullet hell games have enemies come exclusively from the top of the screen: that's because anything else will make the game feel cluttered and confusing. In SMS, not only do enemies blend into the background very easily, but they also spawn at random locations, leading to more than one occasion where I was killed by a completely invisible enemy. That just ain't fun.
And you know what else? I don't even think you can pause the game. Maybe I'm wrong, but "esc" didn't work. When I play games, I like to be able to stop what I'm doing and chat with a friend on the facebooks or something. A game that demands that you devote your attention to it nonstop until you're done with it is just selfish.
Anyways, while Super Massive Shooter is not entirely super nor to any degree massive, it's certainly a shooter, and an entertaining one at that. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay kersplosive.
Links
Standard Message Service: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25997
And, for all it's worth, you will have fun. There are, however, a few frustrations that you'll have to deal with. First, though, let's talk about what this game does right.
First off, the "level design." I put the air bunnies there because I'm really talking about enemy design, but in a shoot 'em up like this, those two terms are pretty much synonymous (I've been using that word a lot lately, huh. Maybe I should find some synonyms...whoa). The screen fills up with just enough enemies and their projectiles to keep the game challenging without ever feeling like demise is inevitable. For me, the hallmark of a badly made bullet hell is when I've just given up on trying to conserve my supply of lives and I just bombard the enemy with as many shots as I can before I'm dead for realsies. That never happened in this game; I was always trying to maintain a bit of strategy. Gold star for that.
As you progress throughout the levels, you will gain bigger and better weapons to take down bigger and badder enemies. This keeps the player immersed at all times and gives them the rewarding feeling of getting stronger. It's the kind of lip-biting satisfaction that games like Sugarbaby will never be able to achieve. The presentation is great; the hitsparks are beautifully satisfying and the game runs at a cool 60fps.
Then there are some things that just seemed pointless. For example, throughout the entire tutorial, your ship will be blinking and emitting a noise similar to the one when your health runs low in a Zelda game. In Zelda, though, the noise serves a purpose both as a punishment for being careless with your life and a motivation to get some life back. in SMS, it's just there for no apparent reason.
What got my goat the most, though, are the things that genuinely decrease the quality of play. There's a reason most bullet hell games have enemies come exclusively from the top of the screen: that's because anything else will make the game feel cluttered and confusing. In SMS, not only do enemies blend into the background very easily, but they also spawn at random locations, leading to more than one occasion where I was killed by a completely invisible enemy. That just ain't fun.
And you know what else? I don't even think you can pause the game. Maybe I'm wrong, but "esc" didn't work. When I play games, I like to be able to stop what I'm doing and chat with a friend on the facebooks or something. A game that demands that you devote your attention to it nonstop until you're done with it is just selfish.
Anyways, while Super Massive Shooter is not entirely super nor to any degree massive, it's certainly a shooter, and an entertaining one at that. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay kersplosive.
Links
Standard Message Service: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25997
Sunday, September 29, 2013
Sugarbaby
First impressions for this one were good when I noticed that the menu screen, instead of just telling me to click "play," "options," etc, had me drag a little sugar cube over buttons that said "play," "options," etc, thus telling me early on that I will be dragging sugar cubes around. It's little things like this that I think more games nowadays should remember more often.
Well anyway, how's the game? Well, it's not bad if you like dragging things. Each level has you using little cubes of sugar to attract these lemming-like creatures called sugarbabies (rather unfortunate name choice if you ask me, but I digress) into portals. As the levels go on, they get more and more complex, having you do things like click buttons or manipulate the attractiveness of certain sugar cubes, etc.
Do not pick this game up expecting to be challenged or tested in any way. Don't pick it up if you're looking for pulse-pounding action or brain-destroying puzzles. This game isn't meant for that. What this game is is relaxing, charming; it's something to put you in a good mood.
The downside to this kind of game, at least for me, is that it doesn't feel as fulfilling to play. See, when I play games, it's usually because there's a mountain of work that I don't want to do somewhere around me, so I want every minute of gaming to make me feel like I've accomplished something. Sugarbabies doesn't really deliver that feeling.
Again, though, that's not really what the game is about. Bottom line, I guess, the game does what it sets out to do: put a smile on your face. There's plenty of levels to keep you occupied, too, so I suppose it's a useful thing to have on your hard drive for whenever you need a pick-me-up. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay manipulative.
Links
Sugarbaby The real Sugarbaby all the Other Sugarbabies are Just Imitatin: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26016
Well anyway, how's the game? Well, it's not bad if you like dragging things. Each level has you using little cubes of sugar to attract these lemming-like creatures called sugarbabies (rather unfortunate name choice if you ask me, but I digress) into portals. As the levels go on, they get more and more complex, having you do things like click buttons or manipulate the attractiveness of certain sugar cubes, etc.
Do not pick this game up expecting to be challenged or tested in any way. Don't pick it up if you're looking for pulse-pounding action or brain-destroying puzzles. This game isn't meant for that. What this game is is relaxing, charming; it's something to put you in a good mood.
The downside to this kind of game, at least for me, is that it doesn't feel as fulfilling to play. See, when I play games, it's usually because there's a mountain of work that I don't want to do somewhere around me, so I want every minute of gaming to make me feel like I've accomplished something. Sugarbabies doesn't really deliver that feeling.
Again, though, that's not really what the game is about. Bottom line, I guess, the game does what it sets out to do: put a smile on your face. There's plenty of levels to keep you occupied, too, so I suppose it's a useful thing to have on your hard drive for whenever you need a pick-me-up. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay manipulative.
Links
Sugarbaby The real Sugarbaby all the Other Sugarbabies are Just Imitatin: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26016
Saturday, September 28, 2013
SugarSwarm
I have to admit, even after all these months of lame-brained reviews, I still feel kind of guilty when a game gives me a lot of content but I don't have much to say about it, like what happened with Subsonic. I wish I could write 30 page dissertations on each of these games, and if I wanted to devote my entire life to this blog, I probably would, but since I only have a year, I have to just write what's on my mind and move on, which doesn't always give me the best feeling. There are certain games, however, that I don't feel guilty at all in writing 2-paragraph reviews for. Sugarswarm is one of them.
Sugarswarm takes place in 3 acts, each no more than a couple minutes long. The first one is a tutorial, wherein you learn how to send and recall your maros, little marshmallow buddies that follow you around. One of the things you learn in this tutorial is that maros can break walls. Interesting, especially considering you will never ever use this ability again for the rest of the game. Seems kinda silly, doesn't it?
in act II, you're tasked with avoiding different kinds of enemies and getting from one side of the room to the other. You could use the mechanics you just learned to efficiently dispatch the enemies, but it's much quicker, easier and more effective to just run across the room. Sure, you'll lose a few maros that way, but they're not dead, see, they're just sleeping. In the game's quest to be as kid-friendly as possible, maros never die, and they can always be woken up my walking over to them.
This makes act III, the boss fight, insanely easy. All you need to do is click on the thing you want dead and run around the room waking up maros and avoiding enemies. With the exception of the damage I took when an explodey enemy was dropped on me with no warning whatsoever, I got through the whole thing unscathed on my first try.
Sugarswarm isn't a terrible game, and it's over before the adorable factor wears off, but it'll take more time to install than it will to complete, so I can recommend it only if you're very bored.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay sweet.
Links
aww, wook a da widdwe marshmawwows: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26706
Sugarswarm takes place in 3 acts, each no more than a couple minutes long. The first one is a tutorial, wherein you learn how to send and recall your maros, little marshmallow buddies that follow you around. One of the things you learn in this tutorial is that maros can break walls. Interesting, especially considering you will never ever use this ability again for the rest of the game. Seems kinda silly, doesn't it?
in act II, you're tasked with avoiding different kinds of enemies and getting from one side of the room to the other. You could use the mechanics you just learned to efficiently dispatch the enemies, but it's much quicker, easier and more effective to just run across the room. Sure, you'll lose a few maros that way, but they're not dead, see, they're just sleeping. In the game's quest to be as kid-friendly as possible, maros never die, and they can always be woken up my walking over to them.
This makes act III, the boss fight, insanely easy. All you need to do is click on the thing you want dead and run around the room waking up maros and avoiding enemies. With the exception of the damage I took when an explodey enemy was dropped on me with no warning whatsoever, I got through the whole thing unscathed on my first try.
Sugarswarm isn't a terrible game, and it's over before the adorable factor wears off, but it'll take more time to install than it will to complete, so I can recommend it only if you're very bored.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay sweet.
Links
aww, wook a da widdwe marshmawwows: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26706
Subsonic
You all know that I love me a good stealth game. When I started this blog, I was midway through a playthrough of Deus Ex: Human Revolution. I actually just started playing that game again with the intention of this time going for a louder, less stealthy approach, but I just couldn't do it. To me, there's no more fun to be had than sneaking around guards and navigating around enemies' cones of vision.
Subsonic takes those gameplay elements and puts them in a top-down minimalistic perspective, kind of like that flash game The Classroom. In Subsonic, you're given three different types of sound guns. One distracts guards, one breaks glass, and one lets you move silently, as explained in the relatively hilarious tutorial screens.
The most identifiable feature about the game is that it's haaarrrrdddddd. Seriously, this game takes no prisoners, but in a good way. The levels are short, so starting from the beginning isn't too much of a pain. It frustrates you just enough to make beating the level immensely rewarding.
and...yeah. That's all I can really say about this one. It's a good game that's worth your time. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay quiet
Links
Don't wake daddy: Revengeance: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=18538
Subsonic takes those gameplay elements and puts them in a top-down minimalistic perspective, kind of like that flash game The Classroom. In Subsonic, you're given three different types of sound guns. One distracts guards, one breaks glass, and one lets you move silently, as explained in the relatively hilarious tutorial screens.
The most identifiable feature about the game is that it's haaarrrrdddddd. Seriously, this game takes no prisoners, but in a good way. The levels are short, so starting from the beginning isn't too much of a pain. It frustrates you just enough to make beating the level immensely rewarding.
and...yeah. That's all I can really say about this one. It's a good game that's worth your time. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay quiet
Links
Don't wake daddy: Revengeance: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=18538
Thursday, September 26, 2013
Stronghold (lol nope)
so, I can't get stronghold to run. Also, it's my birthday today, so I think my conscience can survive my taking the day off.
Peace and love.
Links
Stronghold: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26680
Peace and love.
Links
Stronghold: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26680
Wednesday, September 25, 2013
Stratalyst Blastegy
A little part of me dies every time I review a tower defense game. I've said this many a time before, but I just don't even know how to judge the quality of a tower defense game. I can tell you how boring it was for me to play it, but that only tells you that I don't like the genre, which you all know by now. What am I supposed to critique, the rate at which baddies shuffle through your shoddily assembled defenses and kill you?
Another reason Stratalyst Blastegy is not nearly as fun to review as it is to pronounce is that it's just such an average tower defense game. There are killable things trying to kill you, so you have to put things in the way of the things that will shoot things at the things to make the things dead things. The 3D art is cool, I guess, but other than that, there's not much to distinguish it.
I suppose there is one unique feature, though, and that's that you can modify the baddies' paths by putting things in their way. The level is pretty much just a flat surface to start off with, but by building towers in the enemies' way, you can force them to take a more roundabout route, adding to the time they'll spend soaking up bullets. It's a neat way to add a layer of strategy (or, blastegy!) to the game, but that does little to distract from the fact that 90% of it is still waiting for your slow ass towers to kill enough enemies to let you build more.
Also, there's a bit of an issue with balancing. The only thing I ever ended up building was attack towers. There are 2 other structures you can build: slowers and slicers. The slowers, obviously, slow enemy movement, which is helpful, but they cost so damn much that I always decided it more prudent to slap another attack tower in the way. The slicers ostensibly damage enemies that are close by; they're cheap and very small, so they could be a useful tool in determining the enemies' routes before slaughtering them with attack towers, but they do so little damage that you're better off just using attack turrets from the get go.
So, yeah. Once again I have to conclude the review with "if you're a fan of this kind of game, you should try it out." For what it's worth, Stratalyst Blastegy's unique selling point was unique enough to sell a least a small part of me, so if you're a tower defense enthusiast, maybe you really will have a great time with this one.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay blastegical
Links
Strata bada bing bong: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=1474
Another reason Stratalyst Blastegy is not nearly as fun to review as it is to pronounce is that it's just such an average tower defense game. There are killable things trying to kill you, so you have to put things in the way of the things that will shoot things at the things to make the things dead things. The 3D art is cool, I guess, but other than that, there's not much to distinguish it.
I suppose there is one unique feature, though, and that's that you can modify the baddies' paths by putting things in their way. The level is pretty much just a flat surface to start off with, but by building towers in the enemies' way, you can force them to take a more roundabout route, adding to the time they'll spend soaking up bullets. It's a neat way to add a layer of strategy (or, blastegy!) to the game, but that does little to distract from the fact that 90% of it is still waiting for your slow ass towers to kill enough enemies to let you build more.
Also, there's a bit of an issue with balancing. The only thing I ever ended up building was attack towers. There are 2 other structures you can build: slowers and slicers. The slowers, obviously, slow enemy movement, which is helpful, but they cost so damn much that I always decided it more prudent to slap another attack tower in the way. The slicers ostensibly damage enemies that are close by; they're cheap and very small, so they could be a useful tool in determining the enemies' routes before slaughtering them with attack towers, but they do so little damage that you're better off just using attack turrets from the get go.
So, yeah. Once again I have to conclude the review with "if you're a fan of this kind of game, you should try it out." For what it's worth, Stratalyst Blastegy's unique selling point was unique enough to sell a least a small part of me, so if you're a tower defense enthusiast, maybe you really will have a great time with this one.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay blastegical
Links
Strata bada bing bong: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=1474
Tuesday, September 24, 2013
StoneAge and Strangeways (kinda)
Well, yesterday I reviewed an interesting mix: a survival horror and a platformer. Today, I played another interesting mix: a survival horror and a platformer. Huh...
Well, I use the word "played" loosely. Strangeways crashed at startup, so all that leaves is the platformer, StoneAge. Strangeways actually looked really good, though. Read the description on the game gallery and tell me that's not the coolest thing. Still, it is a senior game, so I guess I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up to begin with.
At least nobody can accuse StoneAge of overstaying its welcome. The levels are each about a minute long and there are a grand total of 4 of them. I was ready to call this game "just another plafromer" with nothing too interesting to talk about, but then the last level happened, which is, and I'm being as nice as I can when I say this, a very poorly designed level. The whole game until then had been about moving to the right, but suddenly you're expected to go downward. Not a big deal in and of itself, but the game puts hazards right underneath your field of vision. There's no skill to it, it's just memorization. Remember which areas to fall from are dead zones and which aren't.
So yeah. Today we had a game that didn't work and an anemic platformer that left a bad taste in my mouth. Doesn't make for the most interesting read, I guess, but whatever. That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay entertaining.
Links
Oonga Bunga: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25894
Strangeways: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=1654
Well, I use the word "played" loosely. Strangeways crashed at startup, so all that leaves is the platformer, StoneAge. Strangeways actually looked really good, though. Read the description on the game gallery and tell me that's not the coolest thing. Still, it is a senior game, so I guess I shouldn't have gotten my hopes up to begin with.
At least nobody can accuse StoneAge of overstaying its welcome. The levels are each about a minute long and there are a grand total of 4 of them. I was ready to call this game "just another plafromer" with nothing too interesting to talk about, but then the last level happened, which is, and I'm being as nice as I can when I say this, a very poorly designed level. The whole game until then had been about moving to the right, but suddenly you're expected to go downward. Not a big deal in and of itself, but the game puts hazards right underneath your field of vision. There's no skill to it, it's just memorization. Remember which areas to fall from are dead zones and which aren't.
So yeah. Today we had a game that didn't work and an anemic platformer that left a bad taste in my mouth. Doesn't make for the most interesting read, I guess, but whatever. That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay entertaining.
Links
Oonga Bunga: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25894
Strangeways: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=1654
Monday, September 23, 2013
Stonewick Manor and Starside Continuum
One of the biggest bummers I've faced in maintaining this blog is the tendency of the games on this list to fall into categories. There are, obviously, way more tower defense and RTS games on here than I'd like (but whatever, de gustibus non est disputandum, it can't be helped), but there is also a saturation of the kind of games I tend to like. A good platformer every now and again is wonderful, but make it a daily staple and before long you'll be crying out for something new and interesting...something like...survival horror.
I only recall one game on this list so far that can actually claim to be survival horror, even though it kind of tripped over the whole "survival" aspect, forgetting that games become significantly less scary when you play in god mode. That game is Erebus, and other than that one flaw, it certainly knew how to keep me on edge.
Stonewick Manor started out in a similar fashion. Its trippy screen effects and weeping cherubs that only move when you don't look at them had the little man in my brain screaming with terror...for the first 5 minutes of the game. Eventually, you realize that the little baby angels are literally the only threatening thing in the game. That doesn't sound too bad, right? After all, that one SCP: Containment Breach game was super scary and it used a very similar type of enemy. The difference is that in SCP, getting anywhere near the enemy would leave you with three of your vertebrae where your teeth should be faster than you can say "oops." In Stonewick Manor, I only got hurt once unintentionally, and all that resulted was the world's least intimidating hit sound effect and the loss of about a fifth of my health, which replenished the second I got out of the room. It was an almost cosmic loss of tension. Suddenly, the game became nothing but a fetch quest with a new coat of paint. Good try, Stonewick Manor. You made it one step past Erebus and made it actually possible to die, but you're just too anemic and nonthreatening to hang out with it and the other greats.
Well, that was a nice breath of fresh air. Time for some more plafromers....uuuggghhhhhh....
To be fair, Starside Continuum is not a bad platformer. It's actually very well put together and holds up fine save for some nitpicky things. For example, your armor is literally the exact same color as the background, making you seem more like if the dude from Perspective and King Fluff from Kirby's Epic Yarn had a baby and it went into space.
You are armed with devices that literally allow you to bend space and time to your will, yet you're only allowed to use them to combine certain items and make floating platforms. A missed opportunity, perhaps, but again, the game is far from boring. The mechanics are conveyed neatly without pandering and it's fun to toy around with different combinations of things to see what happens. It's like Dead Rising 2 but without needing to truck it back to a workbench every time you want to try something new. Definitely an improvement in my book. Of course, there are no zombies here...boo.
Starside Continuum is definitely the more competent of the two games, but Stonewick Manor is more interesting. Unfortunately, I've probably already spoiled the latter for you, but if I hadn't said all that stuff about the babies being harmless, you'd be on edge for a little while, I know you would. If you're a platforming enthusiast, I'd give Starside Continuum a shot. Will it blow your mind? no, but there's nothing to complain about, and hey, lesser games will have the gall to charge you upwards of $5 for a similar experience, so check it out if only in the name of opportunistic frugality.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay scary
Links
Pardon me, where are my Stonewick Manners?: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25905
Big Words that mean "Sci Fi:" https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25443
PS- yes, I know I skipped over Stone Age, but I had already written this by the time I realized it. Shut up...I'll get to it tomorrow...
I only recall one game on this list so far that can actually claim to be survival horror, even though it kind of tripped over the whole "survival" aspect, forgetting that games become significantly less scary when you play in god mode. That game is Erebus, and other than that one flaw, it certainly knew how to keep me on edge.
Stonewick Manor started out in a similar fashion. Its trippy screen effects and weeping cherubs that only move when you don't look at them had the little man in my brain screaming with terror...for the first 5 minutes of the game. Eventually, you realize that the little baby angels are literally the only threatening thing in the game. That doesn't sound too bad, right? After all, that one SCP: Containment Breach game was super scary and it used a very similar type of enemy. The difference is that in SCP, getting anywhere near the enemy would leave you with three of your vertebrae where your teeth should be faster than you can say "oops." In Stonewick Manor, I only got hurt once unintentionally, and all that resulted was the world's least intimidating hit sound effect and the loss of about a fifth of my health, which replenished the second I got out of the room. It was an almost cosmic loss of tension. Suddenly, the game became nothing but a fetch quest with a new coat of paint. Good try, Stonewick Manor. You made it one step past Erebus and made it actually possible to die, but you're just too anemic and nonthreatening to hang out with it and the other greats.
Well, that was a nice breath of fresh air. Time for some more plafromers....uuuggghhhhhh....
To be fair, Starside Continuum is not a bad platformer. It's actually very well put together and holds up fine save for some nitpicky things. For example, your armor is literally the exact same color as the background, making you seem more like if the dude from Perspective and King Fluff from Kirby's Epic Yarn had a baby and it went into space.
You are armed with devices that literally allow you to bend space and time to your will, yet you're only allowed to use them to combine certain items and make floating platforms. A missed opportunity, perhaps, but again, the game is far from boring. The mechanics are conveyed neatly without pandering and it's fun to toy around with different combinations of things to see what happens. It's like Dead Rising 2 but without needing to truck it back to a workbench every time you want to try something new. Definitely an improvement in my book. Of course, there are no zombies here...boo.
Starside Continuum is definitely the more competent of the two games, but Stonewick Manor is more interesting. Unfortunately, I've probably already spoiled the latter for you, but if I hadn't said all that stuff about the babies being harmless, you'd be on edge for a little while, I know you would. If you're a platforming enthusiast, I'd give Starside Continuum a shot. Will it blow your mind? no, but there's nothing to complain about, and hey, lesser games will have the gall to charge you upwards of $5 for a similar experience, so check it out if only in the name of opportunistic frugality.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay scary
Links
Pardon me, where are my Stonewick Manners?: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25905
Big Words that mean "Sci Fi:" https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25443
PS- yes, I know I skipped over Stone Age, but I had already written this by the time I realized it. Shut up...I'll get to it tomorrow...
Sunday, September 22, 2013
Starfall: Alyssa's adventure
I'm going to start out by saying that this game takes way too long to load up. I guess a game's gotta do what a game's gotta do, but I started this game up for a second time just to check and make sure I got the title right, but the loading screen had burned such an infernal memory into my brain that I alt+f4'd as soon as I saw it. So yeah, I'm not 100% sure this game is in fact subtitled "Alyssa's Adventure," so let's just call it Starfall
Starfall is a third-person platformer, and if I could maintain any semblance of credibility as a reviewer and just say "iz rly gud," I would, because I have very little to comment on that isn't simply a summary of mechanics....
...so here's a summary of the mechanics.
You have 3 abilities: dash, double-jump and platform. By right clicking in the air, you can place a platform underneath you, holding left click makes you go super fast, and you can double-jump. Pretty self explanatory, right? You use these three mechanics to reach the top of a spiral mountain type place and do some stuff with stars that I didn't really catch onto.
With a little more fine tuning, I would've been ready to call this game great...fantastic, in fact. The three movement abilities work together nothing short of beautifully. They allow for freedom while maintaining focus. If this game had abit of a bigger budget and was more open, even my Spartan behind would be inspired to fork up some cash to have it in my collection.
Now, when I say "if this game had a budget," included in that is the fine tuning I was talking about before. Sometimes, the mechanics simply refuse to work. Obviously, you can't double-jump from a platform and create another platform underneath you; such freedom would be game-breaking, but there's this weird half-second cooldown period between your moves that will undoubtedly have you fall into more abysses than you would like.
It's also worth noting that I got stuck in a loop in the level at one point, which probably means the level design should have been a tad more refined, but once I died and respawned without consequence Prince of Persia style, I was pointed in the right place, so who really cares. All-in-all, this is a very well constructed game. I say give it a shot. This one gets my seal of approval.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay stellar
Links
ponytail of destiny: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26170
Starfall is a third-person platformer, and if I could maintain any semblance of credibility as a reviewer and just say "iz rly gud," I would, because I have very little to comment on that isn't simply a summary of mechanics....
...so here's a summary of the mechanics.
You have 3 abilities: dash, double-jump and platform. By right clicking in the air, you can place a platform underneath you, holding left click makes you go super fast, and you can double-jump. Pretty self explanatory, right? You use these three mechanics to reach the top of a spiral mountain type place and do some stuff with stars that I didn't really catch onto.
With a little more fine tuning, I would've been ready to call this game great...fantastic, in fact. The three movement abilities work together nothing short of beautifully. They allow for freedom while maintaining focus. If this game had a
Now, when I say "if this game had a budget," included in that is the fine tuning I was talking about before. Sometimes, the mechanics simply refuse to work. Obviously, you can't double-jump from a platform and create another platform underneath you; such freedom would be game-breaking, but there's this weird half-second cooldown period between your moves that will undoubtedly have you fall into more abysses than you would like.
It's also worth noting that I got stuck in a loop in the level at one point, which probably means the level design should have been a tad more refined, but once I died and respawned without consequence Prince of Persia style, I was pointed in the right place, so who really cares. All-in-all, this is a very well constructed game. I say give it a shot. This one gets my seal of approval.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay stellar
Links
ponytail of destiny: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26170
Squishy the Starfish
You know, we've all got our problems in life. Maybe school's getting you down, maybe your boss is giving you a hard time, or maybe an oppressive blogging schedule that you set for yourself in late December is finally starting to drive you to the brink of insanity, but the bottom line is that every now and again, people need to unwind...escape, you know?
Squishy the Starfish aims to be a "feel good game." One that you can turn to when you need to turn your frown upside down. Aesthetically, it hits the nail right on the head. The pink pastel color scheme and ridiculously cheery visual style could make even the world's toughest man go "d'aww." The sound direction also nails it with those peppy steel-drum melodies, though the game allows you to import your own music, so if you feel like floating through the ocean as a smiling starfish while Murder Sermon plays in the background, you can do that too, you sick bastard.
The gameplay is, for the most part, done well. All you really do is use the mouse buttons to cast out one of your five starfish arms, which will then stick to a wall, leaving you to swing accordingly. Rinse and repeat. It works well enough, but lil' Squishy's arms are only limber when they're outstretched, so you can't aim your arm at all. You're put completely at the mercy of the physics engine, which will leave you patiently waiting for your arm's trajectory to line up the way you want it.
Apart from this frustration, I have nothing to complain about. If you put your arms in the right places, Squishy folds in upon himself, but I found that more charming than annoying. All-in-all, it's quite a relaxing game. I'd give it a shot if you're feeling down.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay squishy
Links
Happy Starfish Man: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=474
Squishy the Starfish aims to be a "feel good game." One that you can turn to when you need to turn your frown upside down. Aesthetically, it hits the nail right on the head. The pink pastel color scheme and ridiculously cheery visual style could make even the world's toughest man go "d'aww." The sound direction also nails it with those peppy steel-drum melodies, though the game allows you to import your own music, so if you feel like floating through the ocean as a smiling starfish while Murder Sermon plays in the background, you can do that too, you sick bastard.
The gameplay is, for the most part, done well. All you really do is use the mouse buttons to cast out one of your five starfish arms, which will then stick to a wall, leaving you to swing accordingly. Rinse and repeat. It works well enough, but lil' Squishy's arms are only limber when they're outstretched, so you can't aim your arm at all. You're put completely at the mercy of the physics engine, which will leave you patiently waiting for your arm's trajectory to line up the way you want it.
Apart from this frustration, I have nothing to complain about. If you put your arms in the right places, Squishy folds in upon himself, but I found that more charming than annoying. All-in-all, it's quite a relaxing game. I'd give it a shot if you're feeling down.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay squishy
Links
Happy Starfish Man: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=474
Saturday, September 21, 2013
apologies again
the past 2 days have been really hectic between school and my sister's birthday, so I haven't been able to post reviews. I know I'm behind schedule and I'm going to try my absolute best to fix it (which will probably mean a glut of 2-sentence reviews tomorrow, but maybe not so don't hold your breath). Stick with me, though.
Sorry again. I've still got 3 months to finish off the list, and I'm on page 8 of 10 in the gallery; this is before, of course, I go back and try to get all the games I missed due to their screwy release timing, but I still think I can pull it off.
Until next time
PS- to whoever has been +1ing all my reviews as of late...thanks. It really means a lot. I hope in a past life we were bros who would hunt warthogs together for sustenance and sport...Sorry, I'm tired. I should go to bed now...
Sorry again. I've still got 3 months to finish off the list, and I'm on page 8 of 10 in the gallery; this is before, of course, I go back and try to get all the games I missed due to their screwy release timing, but I still think I can pull it off.
Until next time
PS- to whoever has been +1ing all my reviews as of late...thanks. It really means a lot. I hope in a past life we were bros who would hunt warthogs together for sustenance and sport...Sorry, I'm tired. I should go to bed now...
Friday, September 20, 2013
Spirit Stone
Well, this was disappointing. I started up this game thinking it would be just another Alien Swarm clone, mostly because it's literally a mod of Alien Swarm, but then curiosity (and the words of my girlfriend who you should totally all visit at vivalavidaconamor.blogspot.com sorry I'll stop with the shameless plugs now) drove me to click on the "backstory" button. Upon clicking it, I was treated to a slideshow animation thing explaining the game's narrative that looked professionally done. I mean it droned on forever and way overstayed its welcome, but I'm a game critic, yo, not a slideshow critic. My point is that the quality of the slideshow whetted my appetite for the actual game. Then, I started up the main game to find something that looked completely different from Alien Swarm, unlike Rapidfyre, which I would go so far as to call a carbon copy. After seeing this, I was ready and raring to explore the world in front of me. I was going into this smiling a smile that I seldom smile. Then, the game froze up. HHHHHNNNNGG-
aaaand then I restarted the game. Hah! Had you going there for a second, didn't I? Well anyway, the game worked fine after that. More than fine, really. Well, since the game decided that a 5 minute slideshow about the story was justified, I guess I should talk about the story a bit. You are one of four brothers, guardians of the spirit stone, who must protect said stone from the evil minions of brother #5. Basically, you're in Lyoko killing X.A.N.A's minions. Wow, can't believe I managed to pull that reference somewhere in this blog. As far as motivation goes, it's pretty standard. There are a few holes and the plot as a whole isn't terribly interesting, but if you're one of those guys who can't get immersed in a game unless you know exactly who you are and what you're doing and why at all times, then this game has you covered.
Another thing to note: this game is sexy as all hell. When I say it looks like it could have been done professionally, I mean it. I don't know how many points I should subtract for it being a mod, since, as I said, it doesn't look anything like the game from which it was built, but at the end of the day, a pretty game is a pretty game. If you're into that stuff, you're in luck.
But of course, a game's looks should always take a backseat to its gameplay. So how is the gameplay in Spirit Stone? Well, for one thing, it's super difficult. I died on the first non-tutorial level because there were just so many enemies. A bit of a gentler difficulty curve would have been nice. The tutorial explains the mechanics fine, but I like to experience the tools I'm going to use before I use them. You can tell your little cousin all about how a hose works, but until you let him spray a brick wall for fun for a while, don't expect your daisies to survive when you pass the chores onto him. Catch my drift?
The mechanics themselves, though, are quite impressive. 10 points to the first person who, in the comments, tells me which review of mine this was from (I was too lazy to search for it myself), but remember when I said that the best way to make a tower defense game fun was to let you shoot things yourself in addition to all of that resource-mining tower-upgrading nonsense? Well, this game takes that lesson and sprints to Valhalla with it. The meat of the game is shooting baddies with your fantasy laser thingy, but you can upgrade your laser by upgrading certain guardians, or towers. See that? The tower mechanic is being used to serve the actual FUN part of the game, not the other way around. Beautiful.
While Spirit Stone doesn't have the most solid foundation of all the games on this list, it's certainly done the most it could with what it had. It's a wonderfully crafted mod (I guess. Again, I've never modded anything myself, so I'm just assuming) that shows off the talent of its creators. If I were a teacher, I'd give it an A. So yes, the seal of approval has been given. Congrats.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay spiritual.
Links
420 Spirit-Stoned blaze it up don't do drugs: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24913
aaaand then I restarted the game. Hah! Had you going there for a second, didn't I? Well anyway, the game worked fine after that. More than fine, really. Well, since the game decided that a 5 minute slideshow about the story was justified, I guess I should talk about the story a bit. You are one of four brothers, guardians of the spirit stone, who must protect said stone from the evil minions of brother #5. Basically, you're in Lyoko killing X.A.N.A's minions. Wow, can't believe I managed to pull that reference somewhere in this blog. As far as motivation goes, it's pretty standard. There are a few holes and the plot as a whole isn't terribly interesting, but if you're one of those guys who can't get immersed in a game unless you know exactly who you are and what you're doing and why at all times, then this game has you covered.
Another thing to note: this game is sexy as all hell. When I say it looks like it could have been done professionally, I mean it. I don't know how many points I should subtract for it being a mod, since, as I said, it doesn't look anything like the game from which it was built, but at the end of the day, a pretty game is a pretty game. If you're into that stuff, you're in luck.
But of course, a game's looks should always take a backseat to its gameplay. So how is the gameplay in Spirit Stone? Well, for one thing, it's super difficult. I died on the first non-tutorial level because there were just so many enemies. A bit of a gentler difficulty curve would have been nice. The tutorial explains the mechanics fine, but I like to experience the tools I'm going to use before I use them. You can tell your little cousin all about how a hose works, but until you let him spray a brick wall for fun for a while, don't expect your daisies to survive when you pass the chores onto him. Catch my drift?
The mechanics themselves, though, are quite impressive. 10 points to the first person who, in the comments, tells me which review of mine this was from (I was too lazy to search for it myself), but remember when I said that the best way to make a tower defense game fun was to let you shoot things yourself in addition to all of that resource-mining tower-upgrading nonsense? Well, this game takes that lesson and sprints to Valhalla with it. The meat of the game is shooting baddies with your fantasy laser thingy, but you can upgrade your laser by upgrading certain guardians, or towers. See that? The tower mechanic is being used to serve the actual FUN part of the game, not the other way around. Beautiful.
While Spirit Stone doesn't have the most solid foundation of all the games on this list, it's certainly done the most it could with what it had. It's a wonderfully crafted mod (I guess. Again, I've never modded anything myself, so I'm just assuming) that shows off the talent of its creators. If I were a teacher, I'd give it an A. So yes, the seal of approval has been given. Congrats.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay spiritual.
Links
420 Spirit-Stoned blaze it up don't do drugs: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24913
Thursday, September 19, 2013
Spherious
Yeah, I know I was supposed to have posted this review yesterday. And you know what? I almost did. I played the game, I had stuff to say...I was just too tired to think of a way to make it witty. And now guess what? I'm even more tired than I was before. Well, crap. I'd say I need a vacation but I'm only 2 weeks into the school year. It's gonna be a fun one.
In times like these, I need something to calm me down. A nice video game always helps. Spherious is a loyal companion always ready to be picked up and played. It's got your back when you're feeling down.
The game is a bit like Bejeweled; there are a bunch of spheres piled up on top of one another, numbered each 3-6. You can rotate any group of four spheres to try and make rows of the same number. This will upgrade the value of those spheres. So, for example. if you manage to get three 3s in a row, they will blink and transform into 4s. Get four of those in a row and they turn into 5s. Then 5s to 6s, and when you get six 6s in a row, the spheres disappear and you get points and happiness.
The first thing I noticed about the game was that the music kicks ass. Honestly, though, I don't know what to think about music in these games anymore. On the one hand I got the Astrobunny people saying they just select songs from a list, but on the other, I've got the Purge people sending me pictures of their ghetto music-recording equipment (seriously, go to the comments section of that review and check it out. It's super cool).
The game looks fine, too. Granted, it can't be too difficult to properly render spheres, but I can imagine people screwing it up way more than they did here. And yes, the game feel is fine. I wish that the sounds were a bit more enthusiastic and that the powerups were a bit more satisfying, but what are you going to do.
If you like puzzlers like you'd find on Popcap, check out Spherious. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay super cereal.
Links
I've had enough of your sphere puns, DigiPen: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=449
In times like these, I need something to calm me down. A nice video game always helps. Spherious is a loyal companion always ready to be picked up and played. It's got your back when you're feeling down.
The game is a bit like Bejeweled; there are a bunch of spheres piled up on top of one another, numbered each 3-6. You can rotate any group of four spheres to try and make rows of the same number. This will upgrade the value of those spheres. So, for example. if you manage to get three 3s in a row, they will blink and transform into 4s. Get four of those in a row and they turn into 5s. Then 5s to 6s, and when you get six 6s in a row, the spheres disappear and you get points and happiness.
The first thing I noticed about the game was that the music kicks ass. Honestly, though, I don't know what to think about music in these games anymore. On the one hand I got the Astrobunny people saying they just select songs from a list, but on the other, I've got the Purge people sending me pictures of their ghetto music-recording equipment (seriously, go to the comments section of that review and check it out. It's super cool).
The game looks fine, too. Granted, it can't be too difficult to properly render spheres, but I can imagine people screwing it up way more than they did here. And yes, the game feel is fine. I wish that the sounds were a bit more enthusiastic and that the powerups were a bit more satisfying, but what are you going to do.
If you like puzzlers like you'd find on Popcap, check out Spherious. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay super cereal.
Links
I've had enough of your sphere puns, DigiPen: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=449
Tuesday, September 17, 2013
Spherical
(I couldn't resist...)
Spherical is a sumo wrestling game with spheres. I'd explain the mechanics more thoroughly, but I'm pretty sure you already know exactly how the game controls. You're a sphere. Ever played that one Mario Party minigame, Boulder Ball? Well, it's basically like that, except instead of trying to knock your opponent solely off edges, you can also try and knock them into little holes in the field.
Your primary focus, however, is going to be defense, not offense. One thing Spherical has that Boulder Ball omitted are the abilities to dash in whatever direction your momentum is pointed and to halt in your tracks. With these tools being very generously used by the AI, manipulating enemies is an exercise in futility. If you survive long enough, they'll kill themselves off eventually. I guess it's as good a way to design your game as any other, but it just doesn't feel as satisfying as does engineering my opponents' demises myself.
The game looks nice and feels fine. If that's all you're after, knock yourself out. That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay a'rollin.
Links
Newton Balls Gone Wild: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=18594
Monday, September 16, 2013
Sphere
*groans* I just don't have the energy for this one...
Sphere is a 3rd person shooter wherein you shoot other spheres. It plays exactly like you'd expect it would. There's literally nothing interesting to talk about.
The game is designed...er...simplistically, to say the least. You're a sphere in an arena and that's about all there is to see. The weapons are all different combinations of a few polygons, and the death animation is just your sphere expanding and disappearing. It has its charm, I guess...
The only thing really worth saying is that the momentum mechanics, while appropriate for a sphere, are infuriating. These kinds of movement mechanics would work well in a large, open arena where momentum can be manipulated to your advantage, but here, doing anything but being painstakingly careful not to hold the "w" key for more than a half a second is just going to send you bouncing along walls uncontrollably.
The weapons are fun to use, I guess, but there's not much creativity. I've already thrown enough lasers at people; give me something interesting! Remember Slug 'em Up? That game had tons of creative weapons that made the game unique and fun to play.
Eh....yeah, that's all I got for today. Until next time, stay marbellous (ooh, portmanteaus!).
Links
Sphurr: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=515
Sphere is a 3rd person shooter wherein you shoot other spheres. It plays exactly like you'd expect it would. There's literally nothing interesting to talk about.
The game is designed...er...simplistically, to say the least. You're a sphere in an arena and that's about all there is to see. The weapons are all different combinations of a few polygons, and the death animation is just your sphere expanding and disappearing. It has its charm, I guess...
The only thing really worth saying is that the momentum mechanics, while appropriate for a sphere, are infuriating. These kinds of movement mechanics would work well in a large, open arena where momentum can be manipulated to your advantage, but here, doing anything but being painstakingly careful not to hold the "w" key for more than a half a second is just going to send you bouncing along walls uncontrollably.
The weapons are fun to use, I guess, but there's not much creativity. I've already thrown enough lasers at people; give me something interesting! Remember Slug 'em Up? That game had tons of creative weapons that made the game unique and fun to play.
Eh....yeah, that's all I got for today. Until next time, stay marbellous (ooh, portmanteaus!).
Links
Sphurr: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=515
Sunday, September 15, 2013
Speed Run and Speed Trip (kinda)
Now this is more like it. I was delighted when I saw that the next two games both centered around "speed," which I took to mean I'd get done playing them as fast as possible. Thankfully for me, I was right! One game was over in a matter of minutes and the other doesn't launch. So, let's talk about the one that worked: Speed Run
I gotta say, for a game entitled Speed Run, the default walking speed is pretty pathetic. I guess that's the point, though, because jumping over and over makes you go super fast. I must say, I'm very grateful that the game spelled that out in big white letters, otherwise I would have never figured it out, he said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
The levels are quick and simple, which the developers seem to think is a selling point; while it is true that I always prefer more complex and open level design, a game like this has to be streamlined, and if there's one word to describe the level design, it's streamlined.
There are a few simple design decisions that bug me. First off, the camera is way too low to the ground. I feel like I'm in quicksand (which might explain why the walking speed is so low relative to air travel speed). Second, the palate needs at least one or two dull colors here and there, otherwise all the pastel oranges and blues just blend together into this mess that isn't too easy on the eyes. Also, you gain a bit too much momentum when you run, but that's really only a problem in one level, which I'll get to later, after I'm done seething.
Now let's get to the big problems: the abilities. In most levels, you are given three basic abilities to expedite your race to the finish. There's a rocket, a jetpack, and a gravity-switcher. The only one you will ever use is the jetpack. Remember how I said jumping makes you go super fast? Well the jetpack is essentially just a really long jump, so if there's a quicker way to move, I haven't found it. The rockets are utterly pointless. There are no enemies or destructible environments, so the only use the rockets have is rocket-jumping, which vastly inferior to the jetpack.
Don't even get me started on the gravity-switching. It's a nightmare. An absolute nightmare. Maybe it's because of how low the camera is to the ground or maybe it's because the camera doesn't orient itself quite right, but if you ever flip the gravity, you will be confused and nauseated. All that sense of direction that was keeping you moving through the world in a timely manner will be gone, and you'll be lucky if you have enough motivation to restart the level. How could no playtesters have raised their hands and been all "uh, yeah, I kinda feel like a need a bucket right now so maybe clean up this mechanic..."
Other than all those monstrosities, there's only one other problem I had with the game: the last level. Up until then, you'd been programmed to storm through the level with the jetpack as fast as possible, but then, without notifying you, the game takes away your jetpack and gravity switcher so all you're left with is the stupid rocket-jump. Not that that will help anyway, because the level is just a bunch of rectangles that you have to jump on carefully and diligently, lest you fall and have to start all over. It's a frustrating, inconsistent, lazily designed mess of a level. Maybe you'll say "whatever, it's just one level," but this is an entire twelfth of the game we're talking about here. Not only that, but the final twelfth. The grand finale. The climax!
I like what they were trying to do, but Speed Run needed a lot more work before it could be considered fun. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay speedy.
Links
Gotta go fast: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24660
The other one: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=507
I gotta say, for a game entitled Speed Run, the default walking speed is pretty pathetic. I guess that's the point, though, because jumping over and over makes you go super fast. I must say, I'm very grateful that the game spelled that out in big white letters, otherwise I would have never figured it out, he said, his voice dripping with sarcasm.
The levels are quick and simple, which the developers seem to think is a selling point; while it is true that I always prefer more complex and open level design, a game like this has to be streamlined, and if there's one word to describe the level design, it's streamlined.
There are a few simple design decisions that bug me. First off, the camera is way too low to the ground. I feel like I'm in quicksand (which might explain why the walking speed is so low relative to air travel speed). Second, the palate needs at least one or two dull colors here and there, otherwise all the pastel oranges and blues just blend together into this mess that isn't too easy on the eyes. Also, you gain a bit too much momentum when you run, but that's really only a problem in one level, which I'll get to later, after I'm done seething.
Now let's get to the big problems: the abilities. In most levels, you are given three basic abilities to expedite your race to the finish. There's a rocket, a jetpack, and a gravity-switcher. The only one you will ever use is the jetpack. Remember how I said jumping makes you go super fast? Well the jetpack is essentially just a really long jump, so if there's a quicker way to move, I haven't found it. The rockets are utterly pointless. There are no enemies or destructible environments, so the only use the rockets have is rocket-jumping, which vastly inferior to the jetpack.
Don't even get me started on the gravity-switching. It's a nightmare. An absolute nightmare. Maybe it's because of how low the camera is to the ground or maybe it's because the camera doesn't orient itself quite right, but if you ever flip the gravity, you will be confused and nauseated. All that sense of direction that was keeping you moving through the world in a timely manner will be gone, and you'll be lucky if you have enough motivation to restart the level. How could no playtesters have raised their hands and been all "uh, yeah, I kinda feel like a need a bucket right now so maybe clean up this mechanic..."
Other than all those monstrosities, there's only one other problem I had with the game: the last level. Up until then, you'd been programmed to storm through the level with the jetpack as fast as possible, but then, without notifying you, the game takes away your jetpack and gravity switcher so all you're left with is the stupid rocket-jump. Not that that will help anyway, because the level is just a bunch of rectangles that you have to jump on carefully and diligently, lest you fall and have to start all over. It's a frustrating, inconsistent, lazily designed mess of a level. Maybe you'll say "whatever, it's just one level," but this is an entire twelfth of the game we're talking about here. Not only that, but the final twelfth. The grand finale. The climax!
I like what they were trying to do, but Speed Run needed a lot more work before it could be considered fun. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay speedy.
Links
Gotta go fast: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24660
The other one: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=507
Spell Circle
Yeah, I don't have that much to say about this one. I spent about 5 minutes with it before I decided "well, that's enough of that."
It's a top-down 2D adventurey type thing wherein you play as a wizard who shoots things at other things. Once you kill a creepy forest critter, you can pick up a gem which makes your magic more powerful. Seems simple enough. Well, that's just the word for it. It's simple, ergo, I'm at a loss for words. There's only so much I can say about a game like this.
This game is built a bit like Rouger, but without the hilarious walk cycle. Spell Circle is more streamlined than Rouger, to be sure, which is both a nice way of saying it got rid of 2 of the three attack methods that kept things interesting and an unenthusiastic way of saying it lets you stop that tedious process of picking up and putting down armor and weapons based on their numbers.
The big problem I faced with Spell Circle is the old Castlevania problem that you get knocked back every time you get hit. In Castlevania, this usually meant you'd fall into a well-placed pit after getting hit once. In Spell Circle, it means that if you get surrounded by a long, wormlike enemy, as you'll have to do in order to kill the darn things, getting hit once will start a disastrous chain of events wherein you'll be bounced around the many damaging segments of the enemy and have all your health drained faster than you can say "oops."
Now, I can't say that this is an objectively bad thing. The enemies were obviously deliberately designed to be death traps and utter nightmares to kill, and I know a lot of people who would be gratified by a feature like that. "It makes the game challenging," they would say. Nothing wrong with punishing a lack of skill, right? I agree with that, but there is something that I can say is objectively wrong: the hitboxes. If the air around an enemy is enough to trigger the death cycle, the game goes from gratifyingly difficult to annoying very quickly.
The other main problem is that, simply put, it's not fun enough to kill enemies. Seeking out their one weak spot and hammering them with spells for a minute is the kind of gameplay mechanic that really needs the assistance of hit sparks and satisfying sound effects.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay murderous.
Links
C-I-R-C-L-E, Circle: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24667
It's a top-down 2D adventurey type thing wherein you play as a wizard who shoots things at other things. Once you kill a creepy forest critter, you can pick up a gem which makes your magic more powerful. Seems simple enough. Well, that's just the word for it. It's simple, ergo, I'm at a loss for words. There's only so much I can say about a game like this.
This game is built a bit like Rouger, but without the hilarious walk cycle. Spell Circle is more streamlined than Rouger, to be sure, which is both a nice way of saying it got rid of 2 of the three attack methods that kept things interesting and an unenthusiastic way of saying it lets you stop that tedious process of picking up and putting down armor and weapons based on their numbers.
The big problem I faced with Spell Circle is the old Castlevania problem that you get knocked back every time you get hit. In Castlevania, this usually meant you'd fall into a well-placed pit after getting hit once. In Spell Circle, it means that if you get surrounded by a long, wormlike enemy, as you'll have to do in order to kill the darn things, getting hit once will start a disastrous chain of events wherein you'll be bounced around the many damaging segments of the enemy and have all your health drained faster than you can say "oops."
Now, I can't say that this is an objectively bad thing. The enemies were obviously deliberately designed to be death traps and utter nightmares to kill, and I know a lot of people who would be gratified by a feature like that. "It makes the game challenging," they would say. Nothing wrong with punishing a lack of skill, right? I agree with that, but there is something that I can say is objectively wrong: the hitboxes. If the air around an enemy is enough to trigger the death cycle, the game goes from gratifyingly difficult to annoying very quickly.
The other main problem is that, simply put, it's not fun enough to kill enemies. Seeking out their one weak spot and hammering them with spells for a minute is the kind of gameplay mechanic that really needs the assistance of hit sparks and satisfying sound effects.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay murderous.
Links
C-I-R-C-L-E, Circle: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24667
Saturday, September 14, 2013
Speculum
ah, genre melding. What a noble art. Today, we're dealing with a melding of the platformer and the mirror puzzle. Yeah, interesting, aint it?
Speculum loses points with me from the start by having a tutorial wherein you're only allowed to do what some text above you says you can do. Luckily, this only happens twice and both instances are over in a flash, but it's still a bit irritating to know that this game assumes stupidity on the part of its players...
Once that's out of the way, though, the game goes uphill fast, even in the conveyance department. First, though, let me try and describe how this game works.
You control a little blue ball who can place a certain amount of mirrors anywhere around him in a 3-tile radius. You use these mirrors to reflect a laser onto a door, thus opening said door and allowing you to go through it to complete the level.
At first, I was ready to say that the whole platforming part of this game is completely extraneous because once you open the door, getting to it is a cinch. However, the whole "only being able to place mirrors near you" thing provides challenging engagement, which is my pretentious way of saying it made me giggle like a schoolgirl on ecstasy.
The levels are specked with the occasional hazard, but you need to be near the hazards in order to place the mirrors where they need to go. Honestly, the concept is genius; it's creative and fun from start to finish.
When I was playing this game (with my lovely girlfriend who also maintains a blog at vivalavidaconamor.blogspot.com which you should all totally check out and give boundless love to yay), I kept thinking "every time I notice a flaw, the game fixes itself." Remember that conveyance thing I mentioned earlier? Well during the later levels, you're introduced to this mysterious blue box that you fall through if you try to stand on, but you have to go upward from where it's located. So then you're like "well crap, what do I do now?" So since the act of playing the game and screwing around with lasers is fun, you end up shining the laser at the blue box to realize the laser also passes through the box, but this time it's a blue laser. Out of sheer curiosity, you stand in said laser and it propels you exactly where you need to be. Brilliant.
The game isn't perfect by any means, but it's still definitely worth picking up. You'll encounter the occasional glitch and frustration, but otherwise it's got a very solid foundation and enough bells and whistles to keep you occupied. Check this one out. It's worth your time. It gets my seal of approval.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay reflective.
Links
Specs: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26015
Speculum loses points with me from the start by having a tutorial wherein you're only allowed to do what some text above you says you can do. Luckily, this only happens twice and both instances are over in a flash, but it's still a bit irritating to know that this game assumes stupidity on the part of its players...
Once that's out of the way, though, the game goes uphill fast, even in the conveyance department. First, though, let me try and describe how this game works.
You control a little blue ball who can place a certain amount of mirrors anywhere around him in a 3-tile radius. You use these mirrors to reflect a laser onto a door, thus opening said door and allowing you to go through it to complete the level.
At first, I was ready to say that the whole platforming part of this game is completely extraneous because once you open the door, getting to it is a cinch. However, the whole "only being able to place mirrors near you" thing provides challenging engagement, which is my pretentious way of saying it made me giggle like a schoolgirl on ecstasy.
The levels are specked with the occasional hazard, but you need to be near the hazards in order to place the mirrors where they need to go. Honestly, the concept is genius; it's creative and fun from start to finish.
When I was playing this game (with my lovely girlfriend who also maintains a blog at vivalavidaconamor.blogspot.com which you should all totally check out and give boundless love to yay), I kept thinking "every time I notice a flaw, the game fixes itself." Remember that conveyance thing I mentioned earlier? Well during the later levels, you're introduced to this mysterious blue box that you fall through if you try to stand on, but you have to go upward from where it's located. So then you're like "well crap, what do I do now?" So since the act of playing the game and screwing around with lasers is fun, you end up shining the laser at the blue box to realize the laser also passes through the box, but this time it's a blue laser. Out of sheer curiosity, you stand in said laser and it propels you exactly where you need to be. Brilliant.
The game isn't perfect by any means, but it's still definitely worth picking up. You'll encounter the occasional glitch and frustration, but otherwise it's got a very solid foundation and enough bells and whistles to keep you occupied. Check this one out. It's worth your time. It gets my seal of approval.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay reflective.
Links
Specs: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26015
Thursday, September 12, 2013
Spectrum
There's a strange phenomenon I've noticed that takes place in all forms of entertainment media, but in my opinion, is more rampant in video games. That's the idea that quantity and quality are somehow intertwined. I'm not saying the two are mutually exclusive, but It seems that the longer a game is, the more praise it will get. I understand that a 5-minute game can't possibly hold up to a 60-hour monster time-eater, but as long as a game's length is reasonable, I think the game should focus on exploring its mechanics as succinctly as possible. That is, unless the entire point of the game is to provide a nigh-endless amount of the dsame kind of fun, like in Skyrim or Just Cause 2.
I think that's the kind of game Spectrum was trying to be. In it, you enter tons of levels from the vast overworld and complete simple puzzles to unlock the next level. The game was nice enough to add in an auto-save feature so that you can put it down and play it whenever you get bored. It doesn't work, of course, what can you expect from a DigiPen game, but I'm just going to pretend that it did. It's possible that the problem is on my end, after all. Apparently my computer didn't want me using the autosave in Perspective, so why would it allow me to use it here?
Anyhow, as overused as I feel this phrase has become in this blog, Spectrum really is a fun time-waster and nothing else. The levels are almost annoyingly easy, and if it takes you more than 3 tries to beat one, I'd wager you're about 7 years of age or younger. That's not to say they aren't enjoyable, though. The game plays quite smoothly (except in the overworld, where it chugs up like nobody's business) and, with the exception of the blocks that slide along the floor as if their bottoms had been coated in grease, there's nothing in the game to drive you hairless.
If you like platformers, give it a shot. Chances are, you'll have fun with it if the autosave works. That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay agile.
Links
Special Rum: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26705
I think that's the kind of game Spectrum was trying to be. In it, you enter tons of levels from the vast overworld and complete simple puzzles to unlock the next level. The game was nice enough to add in an auto-save feature so that you can put it down and play it whenever you get bored. It doesn't work, of course, what can you expect from a DigiPen game, but I'm just going to pretend that it did. It's possible that the problem is on my end, after all. Apparently my computer didn't want me using the autosave in Perspective, so why would it allow me to use it here?
Anyhow, as overused as I feel this phrase has become in this blog, Spectrum really is a fun time-waster and nothing else. The levels are almost annoyingly easy, and if it takes you more than 3 tries to beat one, I'd wager you're about 7 years of age or younger. That's not to say they aren't enjoyable, though. The game plays quite smoothly (except in the overworld, where it chugs up like nobody's business) and, with the exception of the blocks that slide along the floor as if their bottoms had been coated in grease, there's nothing in the game to drive you hairless.
If you like platformers, give it a shot. Chances are, you'll have fun with it if the autosave works. That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay agile.
Links
Special Rum: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26705
Wednesday, September 11, 2013
SPARK
SPARK is a 2D puzzle game disguised as a platformer. You are a defenseless robot with three abilities: move, jump and spark. If you haven't already guessed, sparking is the game's unique selling point. By aiming a beam of...erm, something...at certain walls and pressing LMB, you can teleport to that section of the wall. Gravity will then change to orient itself to you so that spiked blocks and things of the like will fall on you if you're not careful. For some reason, when you, a robot, are killed by spikes, the game makes a rather squishy sound more suited to the comically timed death of an organic being, but I digress.
Maybe I'm just impatient or maybe I've been so conditioned by typical platformers that I think platforming should always be fast-paced, but I do find something a bit dreadful about SPARK's pacing. It's not so much that the movement speed is too slow or that stuff doesn't happen frequently enough, it's just that SPARK really really wants you to think of it as a puzzle game, so it punishes any and all thoughtlessness. If you teleport somewhere without thinking of why you're teleporting there first, you're going to get squished and you're going to have to restart the level. For this reason, I didn't make it past the second stage.
Other than that, everything's fine. The hitboxes are a bit too big, and I instinctively hate any game that kills you for touching the perfectly safe side of a spike rather than just for falling upon pointy death; both of these design choices and others, such as your sprite lingering for just long enough to be squished after teleporting somewhere, do make the game a bit more frustrating than I think it needs to be. Honestly, if there had just been more frequent checkpoints, I might have had the patience to play the game all the way through. It's about time game designers learned this valuable lesson, so let me give a word of advice to any prospective designers who may be reading this: gamers don't like to do the same thing more than once. There are plenty of other ways to punish our mistakes that don't involve invalidating our successes as well. Use them.
That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay sparky.
Links
BZZT: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26704
Maybe I'm just impatient or maybe I've been so conditioned by typical platformers that I think platforming should always be fast-paced, but I do find something a bit dreadful about SPARK's pacing. It's not so much that the movement speed is too slow or that stuff doesn't happen frequently enough, it's just that SPARK really really wants you to think of it as a puzzle game, so it punishes any and all thoughtlessness. If you teleport somewhere without thinking of why you're teleporting there first, you're going to get squished and you're going to have to restart the level. For this reason, I didn't make it past the second stage.
Other than that, everything's fine. The hitboxes are a bit too big, and I instinctively hate any game that kills you for touching the perfectly safe side of a spike rather than just for falling upon pointy death; both of these design choices and others, such as your sprite lingering for just long enough to be squished after teleporting somewhere, do make the game a bit more frustrating than I think it needs to be. Honestly, if there had just been more frequent checkpoints, I might have had the patience to play the game all the way through. It's about time game designers learned this valuable lesson, so let me give a word of advice to any prospective designers who may be reading this: gamers don't like to do the same thing more than once. There are plenty of other ways to punish our mistakes that don't involve invalidating our successes as well. Use them.
That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay sparky.
Links
BZZT: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26704
Tuesday, September 10, 2013
Space Paladins vs Space Zombies in Spaaaaaaaaaaaaaace
I'm not kidding, that's the real title of the game. Well "Space" is right, because that's what this game is. It's a vacuum that does nothing but take up hard drive space (see what I did there?), for me anyway. It crashes when I click buttons. That's not a very good quality for a game to have.
Maybe it'll work better for you:
Links
https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24651
Maybe it'll work better for you:
Links
https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24651
Monday, September 9, 2013
Sousui
Sousui, or as I like to call it, Asteroids with Attitude, is a top-down space shooter wherein you shoot things in space. Nuff said. Sometimes you're escorting colonists to gates while shooting things in space, sometimes you're defending a base while shooting things in space, and sometimes you're just plain shooting things in space.
So, how fun is it to shoot things in space in Sousui? Well, could be worse. The sound effects are satisfying and all the weapons are very well designed and fun to use, but the enemies are just way too tough. I don't care that the big battle cruisers take a long time to kill, but even the little grunts that may as well have a big neon sign above them that says "we die with one hit," actually take several hits to kill.
Even though the weapons are varied and cool looking, they're still not going to be as fun as they could be if killing even the smallest baddies weren't a chore. There's a reason the expert mode in Starfox 64 only makes you more vulnerable rather than making the enemies more durable. The former increases challenge and demands better performance on the player's part, whereas the latter just adds another layer of tedium onto the experience.
Apart from that, there are some cool little details that make the experience more enjoyable than your typical Asteroids wannabe. first off, the graphics, music, and voice acting (voice acting?), yes, voice acting, are all well grounded in the second decade of the 21st century (but Sousui came out in 2008! Shut up, voice in my head...ahem). Also, the first level ends not with a proclamation of your awesomeness and victory, but with your enemy utterly destroying your entire base with one powerful attack. This adds a whole new level of threat to the experience in a way not a lot of shoot 'em ups can claim to. I don't know whether this or anything like it happens again, because I only played the first two levels.
But why did you stop after the second level, Dean? I'm glad you asked. Frankly, I thought the game had overstayed its welcome. As I said before, killing enemies isn't incredibly fun, and the game also just throws way too many of them at you. Because of this, I never really felt like I was progressing. The scenery never changed, I rarely got any feedback from the high-pitched "Daniel Floyd in Extra Credits" voice over man, and the enemies just kept on coming. It felt like I was stuck in one particularly long segment of the game.
I was so tired of picking away at enemies with my vastly inferior weaponry after the second level that I just decided to quit. Maybe the game gets better later, but I couldn't tell ya. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay pewpewin.
Links
So Sweet: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=1422
So, how fun is it to shoot things in space in Sousui? Well, could be worse. The sound effects are satisfying and all the weapons are very well designed and fun to use, but the enemies are just way too tough. I don't care that the big battle cruisers take a long time to kill, but even the little grunts that may as well have a big neon sign above them that says "we die with one hit," actually take several hits to kill.
Even though the weapons are varied and cool looking, they're still not going to be as fun as they could be if killing even the smallest baddies weren't a chore. There's a reason the expert mode in Starfox 64 only makes you more vulnerable rather than making the enemies more durable. The former increases challenge and demands better performance on the player's part, whereas the latter just adds another layer of tedium onto the experience.
Apart from that, there are some cool little details that make the experience more enjoyable than your typical Asteroids wannabe. first off, the graphics, music, and voice acting (voice acting?), yes, voice acting, are all well grounded in the second decade of the 21st century (but Sousui came out in 2008! Shut up, voice in my head...ahem). Also, the first level ends not with a proclamation of your awesomeness and victory, but with your enemy utterly destroying your entire base with one powerful attack. This adds a whole new level of threat to the experience in a way not a lot of shoot 'em ups can claim to. I don't know whether this or anything like it happens again, because I only played the first two levels.
But why did you stop after the second level, Dean? I'm glad you asked. Frankly, I thought the game had overstayed its welcome. As I said before, killing enemies isn't incredibly fun, and the game also just throws way too many of them at you. Because of this, I never really felt like I was progressing. The scenery never changed, I rarely got any feedback from the high-pitched "Daniel Floyd in Extra Credits" voice over man, and the enemies just kept on coming. It felt like I was stuck in one particularly long segment of the game.
I was so tired of picking away at enemies with my vastly inferior weaponry after the second level that I just decided to quit. Maybe the game gets better later, but I couldn't tell ya. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay pewpewin.
Links
So Sweet: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=1422
Sonace
Well guys, the school year is officially upon us, meaning I'm not going to have the time nor the energy to write reviews of the kind of length I was able to this summer. Be warned, my weekday reviews are going to be more like barebones outlines than actual reviews. As the old adage goes, I don't need em good. I need em by Tuesday.
Sonace is a 2.5D Mega Man-esque platformer. There's really only one interesting thing to talk about here, and that's the game's conveyance. Like Mega Man, it tries to convey all of its controls by using the mechanics alone. A worthy challenge to pose to oneself, I must say. Certainly a great exercise for any aspiring game designer.
At the end of my playthrough, I had learned and mastered about half of the game's controls. Not terrible for a game with no textual explanations for anything whatsoever, but it could have been better.
I will say that the game did a very good, if annoying, job at conveying the fact that pressing jump twice will allow you to hover Princess Peach style around the level at a constant altitude. There's one section about halfway through that I think is impossible to clear without using this technique, so the player is guaranteed to learn it. Also, the first enemies you face are all very high up, attached to the ceiling, so such a technique would be very helpful when aiming your default arcing weapon. Only problem is that the enemies are just as easy to kill with a simple jump-shot, and are even easier to simply skip past, even without using the dash.
Dashing, then, is a skill I had no idea existed until I looked at the controls screen after my first playthrough. There's no need to ever use it, so conveying it isn't really essential, but it makes the game a heck of a lot more fun to play, so why not create some kind of room where you have to dash through a section of floor or spikes come out of it or something?
Also, you can switch weapons, but why you would ever want to is beyond me. Your secondary weapon is short range, and with the exception of the final boss, all of the enemies are fought at medium-long range, because if they get too close, they hurt you. Even the final boss is easily defeated by the default weapon, however.
Or at least I think it was. I honestly couldn't tell whether I beat the game or I died. I was wailing on the boss for quite a while when my health got dangerously close to 0. I kept hitting the boss, however, and suddenly the game just cut to the credits sequence, which makes it seem like I won...I guess.
All-in-all, it's an interesting game and a valiant effort to capture the genius of Mega Man's design. Unfortunately, it does fall short, but that doesn't mean it's not worth checking out. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay afloat.
Links
So Nice: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=514
Sonace is a 2.5D Mega Man-esque platformer. There's really only one interesting thing to talk about here, and that's the game's conveyance. Like Mega Man, it tries to convey all of its controls by using the mechanics alone. A worthy challenge to pose to oneself, I must say. Certainly a great exercise for any aspiring game designer.
At the end of my playthrough, I had learned and mastered about half of the game's controls. Not terrible for a game with no textual explanations for anything whatsoever, but it could have been better.
I will say that the game did a very good, if annoying, job at conveying the fact that pressing jump twice will allow you to hover Princess Peach style around the level at a constant altitude. There's one section about halfway through that I think is impossible to clear without using this technique, so the player is guaranteed to learn it. Also, the first enemies you face are all very high up, attached to the ceiling, so such a technique would be very helpful when aiming your default arcing weapon. Only problem is that the enemies are just as easy to kill with a simple jump-shot, and are even easier to simply skip past, even without using the dash.
Dashing, then, is a skill I had no idea existed until I looked at the controls screen after my first playthrough. There's no need to ever use it, so conveying it isn't really essential, but it makes the game a heck of a lot more fun to play, so why not create some kind of room where you have to dash through a section of floor or spikes come out of it or something?
Also, you can switch weapons, but why you would ever want to is beyond me. Your secondary weapon is short range, and with the exception of the final boss, all of the enemies are fought at medium-long range, because if they get too close, they hurt you. Even the final boss is easily defeated by the default weapon, however.
Or at least I think it was. I honestly couldn't tell whether I beat the game or I died. I was wailing on the boss for quite a while when my health got dangerously close to 0. I kept hitting the boss, however, and suddenly the game just cut to the credits sequence, which makes it seem like I won...I guess.
All-in-all, it's an interesting game and a valiant effort to capture the genius of Mega Man's design. Unfortunately, it does fall short, but that doesn't mean it's not worth checking out. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay afloat.
Links
So Nice: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=514
Sunday, September 8, 2013
Sombrero Ninja
At first, this game looked like a 2.5D version of Shattered Core, what with its "move with arrow keys, sword and gun with WASD" control setup. In terms of visuals, it was...interesting. You and the world are traditional 2.5D, the first two enemies you encounter do that Paper Mario thing where 2D characters move in a 3D plane, and your sword and death animations are absolute nightmares of particle effects that somehow actually look charming and kinda cool.
This was, unfortunately, the only experience I've had with Sombrero Ninja, because I couldn't figure out how to get off the very first platform. I started pressing random buttons, half out of desperation to continue and half because I wanted to figure out how to use the shuriken that was so tantalizingly advertised to me on the HUD, when I realized that the "U," "H," "J," and "K" keys can move the camera around. This would be a cool feature if it didn't break the game entirely. Somehow, the camera ended up tilted at a weird angle and I couldn't figure out how to fix it. Plus, the camera doesn't track your character anymore once you move it, so pressing any of those buttons may as well just make your character kneel down and drive his katana through his aorta for all the good it does. I was able to see, by moving the camera, that there are in fact more platforms to get to, but they're so far away from the first that I have no idea how to get to them.
So that's it. Sombrero Ninja is about one hundredth of a very well designed game. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay isolated.
Links
Big Sword and Funny Hat: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=506
PS- I played the game again, and this time the camera manipulation didn't work. So I have no idea what happened the first time...
This was, unfortunately, the only experience I've had with Sombrero Ninja, because I couldn't figure out how to get off the very first platform. I started pressing random buttons, half out of desperation to continue and half because I wanted to figure out how to use the shuriken that was so tantalizingly advertised to me on the HUD, when I realized that the "U," "H," "J," and "K" keys can move the camera around. This would be a cool feature if it didn't break the game entirely. Somehow, the camera ended up tilted at a weird angle and I couldn't figure out how to fix it. Plus, the camera doesn't track your character anymore once you move it, so pressing any of those buttons may as well just make your character kneel down and drive his katana through his aorta for all the good it does. I was able to see, by moving the camera, that there are in fact more platforms to get to, but they're so far away from the first that I have no idea how to get to them.
So that's it. Sombrero Ninja is about one hundredth of a very well designed game. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay isolated.
Links
Big Sword and Funny Hat: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=506
PS- I played the game again, and this time the camera manipulation didn't work. So I have no idea what happened the first time...
Saturday, September 7, 2013
Solstice
Solstice is an "experimental" exploration game. Now, I'm fine with experiments, but I have to ask what hypothesis this particular experiment was testing. It seems to be "players will want to keep playing a game even if they're given no motivation whatsoever to continue playing it," which is a hypothesis long since proven false and the negative of which has been held as a basic tenant of game design long before games even stepped into the video world.
In Solstice, you play as a little fairy thing who flies around the world looking for sun fragments. The sun, you see, exploded one day for no particular reason, leaving the world to fester in darkness. Now it's up to you to fly around activating these sun fragments and filling the world's dark soul with LIIIIGHHTTTT....LIGGHTT..LIGHT...light....light....
Sorry.
In the beginning of Solstice, the game tells you that the game is not about winning or losing, but about immersing yourself in a world of music, flight and freedom. At first, I thought that was just a little hint at how to best play the game, like in the beginning of Amnesia, the Dark Descent, but only after I activated enough sun fragments to make the plants come back and found myself flying utterly aimlessly throughout the world I'd just unmasked did I realize that they were actually foreshadowing the "ending" if you can call it that. After a while, you're just left to fly around with no goals, no motivation whatsoever...at least I think so. The game gives you no indication as to whether or not you've accomplished all there is to accomplish. I would've at least started scrolling the credits over the screen or something.
Before the endgame phase, though, you're lead around the dark world from waypoint to waypoint...wait a second, waypoints?! I thought this was an exploration game, why am I still being lead on a linear path? Eh, whatever. At each waypoint, a man trying to do a dark, ominous voice will explain a little bit about what's happening. I have to say, the tone of the voice really clashes with the tone of the game. It's like if the voice overs from Kirby's Epic Yarn featured a Norwegian folk metal vocalist to shout the dialogue to chugging guitars and bagpipes.
And that's Solstice in a nutshell. It's insubstantial and goes from giving the player no freedom to do anything but go from point a to point b to giving the player the freedom to do anything he or she wants in a world in which there is absolutely nothing to do. If I wanted to immerse myself in music, I'd zone out to my Spa station on Pandora.
That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay experimental.
Links
Sun go Boom: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25267
In Solstice, you play as a little fairy thing who flies around the world looking for sun fragments. The sun, you see, exploded one day for no particular reason, leaving the world to fester in darkness. Now it's up to you to fly around activating these sun fragments and filling the world's dark soul with LIIIIGHHTTTT....LIGGHTT..LIGHT...light....light....
Sorry.
In the beginning of Solstice, the game tells you that the game is not about winning or losing, but about immersing yourself in a world of music, flight and freedom. At first, I thought that was just a little hint at how to best play the game, like in the beginning of Amnesia, the Dark Descent, but only after I activated enough sun fragments to make the plants come back and found myself flying utterly aimlessly throughout the world I'd just unmasked did I realize that they were actually foreshadowing the "ending" if you can call it that. After a while, you're just left to fly around with no goals, no motivation whatsoever...at least I think so. The game gives you no indication as to whether or not you've accomplished all there is to accomplish. I would've at least started scrolling the credits over the screen or something.
Before the endgame phase, though, you're lead around the dark world from waypoint to waypoint...wait a second, waypoints?! I thought this was an exploration game, why am I still being lead on a linear path? Eh, whatever. At each waypoint, a man trying to do a dark, ominous voice will explain a little bit about what's happening. I have to say, the tone of the voice really clashes with the tone of the game. It's like if the voice overs from Kirby's Epic Yarn featured a Norwegian folk metal vocalist to shout the dialogue to chugging guitars and bagpipes.
And that's Solstice in a nutshell. It's insubstantial and goes from giving the player no freedom to do anything but go from point a to point b to giving the player the freedom to do anything he or she wants in a world in which there is absolutely nothing to do. If I wanted to immerse myself in music, I'd zone out to my Spa station on Pandora.
That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay experimental.
Links
Sun go Boom: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25267
Solar Flare
Solar Flare is a 3D RTS wherein you are a planet hell bent on killing all the other planets. Seems legit.
The general rule of thumb with an RTS game is: the less wait time, the better. Actually, that's a good rule to stick to for any game, but RTS games seem to violate that rule more often than games of other genres do. Solar Flare commits the cardinal sin of "steadily refilling resource points," which means if you build stuff too quickly (that is to say, not making yourself a sandwich every time you erect a cannon), you're going to be waiting around quite a bit for your energy bar to fill up.
To Solar Flare's credit, it does try to keep things as fast-paced as possible, making the player control when the cannons fire rather than having them auto-fire. Honestly, though, that's just not enough. I spent about 3 quarters of a match just building energy towers to make my points refill faster, but I still had to wait an annoyingly long amount of time between cannon builds.
That's pretty much all there is to say about Solar Flare, really. It can be fun if you're patient enough not to mind taking a little nap every time you click a button, but I personally need more engagement. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay solar.
Links
Ahm Bliiind: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=8719
The general rule of thumb with an RTS game is: the less wait time, the better. Actually, that's a good rule to stick to for any game, but RTS games seem to violate that rule more often than games of other genres do. Solar Flare commits the cardinal sin of "steadily refilling resource points," which means if you build stuff too quickly (that is to say, not making yourself a sandwich every time you erect a cannon), you're going to be waiting around quite a bit for your energy bar to fill up.
To Solar Flare's credit, it does try to keep things as fast-paced as possible, making the player control when the cannons fire rather than having them auto-fire. Honestly, though, that's just not enough. I spent about 3 quarters of a match just building energy towers to make my points refill faster, but I still had to wait an annoyingly long amount of time between cannon builds.
That's pretty much all there is to say about Solar Flare, really. It can be fun if you're patient enough not to mind taking a little nap every time you click a button, but I personally need more engagement. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay solar.
Links
Ahm Bliiind: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=8719
Solace
The way I see it, there are 3 different kinds of video game narrative. First, there's the kind that explains the plot, setting, etc directly and overtly, like in Mass Effect or pretty much any AAA game. Then, there's the Oniro kind of narrative wherein you're given a vague idea of who you are and why you are where you are, but the events of the story aren't conveyed by traditional means; they're instead conveyed using symbols in the mechanics. That's my favorite kind of narrative, personally, but I digress. The third kind of narrative is the one in which there isn't really any narrative at all. No, I'm not talking about zero-context games like A Series of Tubes, I'm talking about the kind of games that just focus on an emotion or one theme and, rather than expand upon that theme with a story, characters, etc, they skip the middleman and just build their game to reinforce it, like in Shattered Nocturne.
Solace is in the third camp of video game narrative. It's a top-down rhythmic shooter that consists of 5 stages, each one named after one of the five stages of grief. For example, "Anger" has you decked out with a crap-ton of weapons from the get-go while super fast and powerful enemies flood the screen as metal music blasts in the background, each of your shots generating another guitar chug. "Depression" on the other hand, features enemies that pose you no threat whatsoever while your shots, which are almost completely ineffective, generate little acoustic guitar riffs as if played by the world's most depressed country music star. It's nice to see this kind of juxtaposition in the level design.
I only have two minor complaints for this game. First off, the rhythm in the depression stage needed work. Player input generating the music was an integral part of the game, and I understand the concept of taking a bit of control from the player in the depression stage, but the guitar riffs are just slightly off-beat, which is hard to ignore.
Second, some of the stages overstay their welcome a bit. Once again, depression is the worst offender, but really all the stages with the exception of bargaining and acceptance linger just a bit too long. I feel that the emotion they were trying to build gets built to its capacity a good 3-5 minutes before the level ends. Maybe I'm just a bit impatient, but timing is very important in a game like this.
Aside from that, though, the game is great. It's structured wonderfully, the gameplay is fun and varied, and while I won't say it makes you think, it certainly makes you feel. That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay comfy.
Links
Sock Lice: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=18525
Solace is in the third camp of video game narrative. It's a top-down rhythmic shooter that consists of 5 stages, each one named after one of the five stages of grief. For example, "Anger" has you decked out with a crap-ton of weapons from the get-go while super fast and powerful enemies flood the screen as metal music blasts in the background, each of your shots generating another guitar chug. "Depression" on the other hand, features enemies that pose you no threat whatsoever while your shots, which are almost completely ineffective, generate little acoustic guitar riffs as if played by the world's most depressed country music star. It's nice to see this kind of juxtaposition in the level design.
I only have two minor complaints for this game. First off, the rhythm in the depression stage needed work. Player input generating the music was an integral part of the game, and I understand the concept of taking a bit of control from the player in the depression stage, but the guitar riffs are just slightly off-beat, which is hard to ignore.
Second, some of the stages overstay their welcome a bit. Once again, depression is the worst offender, but really all the stages with the exception of bargaining and acceptance linger just a bit too long. I feel that the emotion they were trying to build gets built to its capacity a good 3-5 minutes before the level ends. Maybe I'm just a bit impatient, but timing is very important in a game like this.
Aside from that, though, the game is great. It's structured wonderfully, the gameplay is fun and varied, and while I won't say it makes you think, it certainly makes you feel. That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay comfy.
Links
Sock Lice: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=18525
Friday, September 6, 2013
taking the day off
My birthday isn't for another 26 days, but I celebrated it today, meaning I'm too hungover on cookies and pizza to focus, so screw it. I'll try to do 3 reviews tomorrow once the little gnome in my head stops playing the chimes.
Thursday, September 5, 2013
Sol Invictus
Ever since Skyrim spread its gargantuan wings and cast its shadow of influence over us all, I've seen western-style dragons become all the rage with the youth of today. "Hey, Sally, whatcha drawin?" "A dragon." I find myself wondering, though, why dragons are portrayed as these monsters of wanton destruction whose only real purpose is to provide an objectively threatening beast for the protagonist in a story to slay at the end. I haven't seen a story about good dragons since Dragon Tales...oh God....I just nostalgia'd myself way too hard.
Before I lose my mind to the elegy, let's talk about Sol Invictus, a game wherein you are a dragon who is ostensibly there to save the...urhm...world? From the evil...uhm...rainclouds? I guess? The game itself is very simple. You fly around clear skies and look for grey clouds. You breathe fire at them until they are grey no more.
This game's biggest problem is that it suffers from something I like to call "I meant to do that" syndrome. IMTDTS is a rather infuriating affliction to deal with. As the name suggests, it's when game developers fully acknowledge genuine flaws with their game (or movie or book or what have you) but rather than try to fix them, they simply say "oh, I meant to do that." The goal of Sol Invictus is to create a "casual gaming experience." Anyone who believes that Sol Invictus accomplished that goal, I invite you to play five minutes of Bejeweled or Peggle or Wii Play. One thing all of those games have in common is that they at least challenge you in some way, sometimes very much so. In Sol Invictus, there is simply no way to fail, especially since you can just hold the "Q" button and lock onto the nearest defenseless cloud.
So, of course, the game has no challenge. Without challenge, there are few legs a game has left to stand on. Now, I've liked unchallenging games in the past, like Snowfall, but that game was, of course, all about the narrative. It challenged your sense of morality rather than your reflexes (except for that damn grizzly bear). Sol Invictus challenges absolutely nothing, so it's about as gratifying as right clicking on your desktop to make that little menu appear and then clicking away.
The game looks nice enough, so if all you're looking for is the equivalent of an Nvidia tech demo, then I've found the game for you. People who value challenge or agency or all those other wonderful things games are known for will probably be left disappointed.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay shiny.
Links
Los Cintivus: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24659
Before I lose my mind to the elegy, let's talk about Sol Invictus, a game wherein you are a dragon who is ostensibly there to save the...urhm...world? From the evil...uhm...rainclouds? I guess? The game itself is very simple. You fly around clear skies and look for grey clouds. You breathe fire at them until they are grey no more.
This game's biggest problem is that it suffers from something I like to call "I meant to do that" syndrome. IMTDTS is a rather infuriating affliction to deal with. As the name suggests, it's when game developers fully acknowledge genuine flaws with their game (or movie or book or what have you) but rather than try to fix them, they simply say "oh, I meant to do that." The goal of Sol Invictus is to create a "casual gaming experience." Anyone who believes that Sol Invictus accomplished that goal, I invite you to play five minutes of Bejeweled or Peggle or Wii Play. One thing all of those games have in common is that they at least challenge you in some way, sometimes very much so. In Sol Invictus, there is simply no way to fail, especially since you can just hold the "Q" button and lock onto the nearest defenseless cloud.
So, of course, the game has no challenge. Without challenge, there are few legs a game has left to stand on. Now, I've liked unchallenging games in the past, like Snowfall, but that game was, of course, all about the narrative. It challenged your sense of morality rather than your reflexes (except for that damn grizzly bear). Sol Invictus challenges absolutely nothing, so it's about as gratifying as right clicking on your desktop to make that little menu appear and then clicking away.
The game looks nice enough, so if all you're looking for is the equivalent of an Nvidia tech demo, then I've found the game for you. People who value challenge or agency or all those other wonderful things games are known for will probably be left disappointed.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay shiny.
Links
Los Cintivus: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24659
Wednesday, September 4, 2013
Snowfall
Wow, what a journey this one was...
All right, time for a little backstory. There I was, browsing the DigiPen Game Gallery, catching glimpses of my projects for the next few days. Then, I see one thumbnail that looks familiar. The game is titled "Snowfall." I've never heard of it, but there was something about the art style...of course, I thought. I've seen art like this before. I clicked on the game, and sure enough, I see only one name credited with creating Snowfall. Andrew Nack, solo game designer extraordinaire. Needless to say, I was excited.
Then I read the description of the game. It read: "Instead of giving the player a fun experience, the game focuses on making the player as frustrated, angry, and depressed as possible while still maintaining a quality game experience." I tell ya, that got me thinking. First off, I wondered what exactly he meant by "quality game experience," because usually if a game makes me frustrated and depressed, I would alt+f4 out of it and judge its quality to be quite poor.
The game's description whetted my appetite even more. By this time, I was dying to see what this game was all about. Impatiently, I downloaded the game, ran the file, and was greeted by a title screen with no music or sound whatsoever...I didn't recall any of Nack's other games doing that, but hey, maybe this one's different...
I started the game and, still without any sound, was greeted by a character I presumed to be me being held by a character I presumed to be my mother in the middle of a snowstorm. And then......nothing happened. At this point, I was definitely feeling the frustration and depression that was promised to me, but I had my doubts that this was the way Nack intended it to happen. So, I looked up the game on YouTube to see if anyone else was having the problem (don't ask why I went to youtube before google. That's just how I roll). I found a video of the game, with Andrew Nack explaining the game as he played it, and sent a personal message to that account explaining my problem. I then caught a glimpse of my own inbox and the 61 unread messages that had piled up since I started my channel in 2008 and realized that the course of action I took might not have been the best one. I then composed an email to Andrew Nack and swiftly received a reply suggesting I play on a different computer and see what happens. If this were any other game by any other designer, I probably would have given up long before this point, but I was determined to get frustrated and depressed by whatever tricks Nack had up his sleeve. So, I went into my attic and searched for my old junker laptop with a Pentium processor, 11'' screen, and a staggering 1.9GB of free hard drive space.
At this point, I was quite pissed at...well pretty much everyone and everything, really. I was almost determined to slam my laptop closed with enough force to concuss the mice probably living in my wall at the first hint of anything in the game I didn't like. All the stars were aligned perfectly. I was hunched over on an uncomfortable piano bench, straining my eyes and having my thighs burned from the frankly ridiculous heat the old Pentium was giving off.
Then I heard the first few notes of the main theme...
dunnnnnnnn.....dunnnnnn.......
Then I heard the sounds of the storm blowing....
whooooshhhhhhh whooossshhhhhhh
This was it. The moment I was waiting for. I was finally going to experience Snowfall. And experience it I did. Not only did the game hold my attention until its completion, but it held my attention enough for me to play it three times in a row.
I'm going to do my best to avoid spoilers in this review, but do note that doing so is going to severely limit what I can say about this game. I guess you'll just have to experience it for yourself when you play it upon my recommendation...oops, did I speak too soon?
Anyways, I guess there are two questions one must ask when reviewing Snowfall. First off, how well did it adhere to its mission statement of frustrating and depressing the player, and second off, how well was the game designed?
My answer to the first question is...well...I guess it did what it sent out to do. After I played it for the first time, I felt like crap because of how the game ended, whereas my second and third playthroughs made me feel like crap while I was playing the game, but gave me a rather satisfying ending...I guess.
Playing this game made me feel similar to how I felt when I played Spec Ops: The Line, and if you've played that game, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Just like in Spec Ops, the area in which Snowfall excels is in player choice. You're given tons of choices throughout the game, most of which have a rather large impact on the story. You're given 3 paths to follow, which I'll call the paths of good, evil, and humanity. Each have their pros and cons, and you're pressured to make decisions very quickly, so your brain is not going to have an easy time getting through this game. Strangely enough, the game manages to make you think that time is of the essence when making decisions, but tends to give you enough time to think things through as much as you need (with one very annoying exception that I'll get to in a bit).
It's rare that I find a DigiPen game that's all about the narrative. The last game I played that I can remember really being all about the narrative was Be Good. Yeah, remember those days? That was a long time ago. Snowfall does nothing objectively wrong, and the things I really disagreed with (for example that there's only one opportunity to die, which will come to you after only a moment of hesitation and completely negate the progress you've made thus far), might be the things that make the game so beautiful in the end (Andrew Nack would probably respond to that criticism by saying I was meant to feel frustrated, and ask me if I enjoyed the game regardless, to which I would have to answer yes, because of how well written and designed the game was).
So yeah, Nack hits that narrative ball right out of the park with this one. The only game on the list that I've played that rivals it in terms of narrative is Oniro (I didn't mention that game before because it was all about the mechanics and puzzle solving at heart. It just had a really good narrative as well). The mechanics do exactly what they need to do and serve the narrative perfectly. Also, I don't even need to tell you about the other aesthetic elements like visual and sound design. Come on...it's Andrew Nack.
This game gets my seal of approval for, if nothing else, boldly going where no game (*cough* except Spec Ops: The Line *cough*) has gone before. If you're tired of playing just another puzzle game or just another shooter or whatever it might be, this game will be the breath of fresh, moldy, smokey air you were looking for, you crazy masochist. All I'll say in terms of criticism, though, is that it wasn't quite as impactful as I think it was meant to be. I mean, what can you expect from a game that's only about 10 minutes long?
Well, that was quite a wild ride I just went on. It's games like these that really make me glad that I took on this project last January. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay unconventional.
Links
Snowfall (DigiPen): https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26418
Snowfall (Andrew Nack's website): http://www.andrewnack.com/snowfall/
Andrew Nack explains his game: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6kn9Z6IecY&feature=player_embedded#t=1
All right, time for a little backstory. There I was, browsing the DigiPen Game Gallery, catching glimpses of my projects for the next few days. Then, I see one thumbnail that looks familiar. The game is titled "Snowfall." I've never heard of it, but there was something about the art style...of course, I thought. I've seen art like this before. I clicked on the game, and sure enough, I see only one name credited with creating Snowfall. Andrew Nack, solo game designer extraordinaire. Needless to say, I was excited.
Then I read the description of the game. It read: "Instead of giving the player a fun experience, the game focuses on making the player as frustrated, angry, and depressed as possible while still maintaining a quality game experience." I tell ya, that got me thinking. First off, I wondered what exactly he meant by "quality game experience," because usually if a game makes me frustrated and depressed, I would alt+f4 out of it and judge its quality to be quite poor.
The game's description whetted my appetite even more. By this time, I was dying to see what this game was all about. Impatiently, I downloaded the game, ran the file, and was greeted by a title screen with no music or sound whatsoever...I didn't recall any of Nack's other games doing that, but hey, maybe this one's different...
I started the game and, still without any sound, was greeted by a character I presumed to be me being held by a character I presumed to be my mother in the middle of a snowstorm. And then......nothing happened. At this point, I was definitely feeling the frustration and depression that was promised to me, but I had my doubts that this was the way Nack intended it to happen. So, I looked up the game on YouTube to see if anyone else was having the problem (don't ask why I went to youtube before google. That's just how I roll). I found a video of the game, with Andrew Nack explaining the game as he played it, and sent a personal message to that account explaining my problem. I then caught a glimpse of my own inbox and the 61 unread messages that had piled up since I started my channel in 2008 and realized that the course of action I took might not have been the best one. I then composed an email to Andrew Nack and swiftly received a reply suggesting I play on a different computer and see what happens. If this were any other game by any other designer, I probably would have given up long before this point, but I was determined to get frustrated and depressed by whatever tricks Nack had up his sleeve. So, I went into my attic and searched for my old junker laptop with a Pentium processor, 11'' screen, and a staggering 1.9GB of free hard drive space.
At this point, I was quite pissed at...well pretty much everyone and everything, really. I was almost determined to slam my laptop closed with enough force to concuss the mice probably living in my wall at the first hint of anything in the game I didn't like. All the stars were aligned perfectly. I was hunched over on an uncomfortable piano bench, straining my eyes and having my thighs burned from the frankly ridiculous heat the old Pentium was giving off.
Then I heard the first few notes of the main theme...
dunnnnnnnn.....dunnnnnn.......
Then I heard the sounds of the storm blowing....
whooooshhhhhhh whooossshhhhhhh
This was it. The moment I was waiting for. I was finally going to experience Snowfall. And experience it I did. Not only did the game hold my attention until its completion, but it held my attention enough for me to play it three times in a row.
I'm going to do my best to avoid spoilers in this review, but do note that doing so is going to severely limit what I can say about this game. I guess you'll just have to experience it for yourself when you play it upon my recommendation...oops, did I speak too soon?
Anyways, I guess there are two questions one must ask when reviewing Snowfall. First off, how well did it adhere to its mission statement of frustrating and depressing the player, and second off, how well was the game designed?
My answer to the first question is...well...I guess it did what it sent out to do. After I played it for the first time, I felt like crap because of how the game ended, whereas my second and third playthroughs made me feel like crap while I was playing the game, but gave me a rather satisfying ending...I guess.
Playing this game made me feel similar to how I felt when I played Spec Ops: The Line, and if you've played that game, you know exactly what I'm talking about. Just like in Spec Ops, the area in which Snowfall excels is in player choice. You're given tons of choices throughout the game, most of which have a rather large impact on the story. You're given 3 paths to follow, which I'll call the paths of good, evil, and humanity. Each have their pros and cons, and you're pressured to make decisions very quickly, so your brain is not going to have an easy time getting through this game. Strangely enough, the game manages to make you think that time is of the essence when making decisions, but tends to give you enough time to think things through as much as you need (with one very annoying exception that I'll get to in a bit).
It's rare that I find a DigiPen game that's all about the narrative. The last game I played that I can remember really being all about the narrative was Be Good. Yeah, remember those days? That was a long time ago. Snowfall does nothing objectively wrong, and the things I really disagreed with (for example that there's only one opportunity to die, which will come to you after only a moment of hesitation and completely negate the progress you've made thus far), might be the things that make the game so beautiful in the end (Andrew Nack would probably respond to that criticism by saying I was meant to feel frustrated, and ask me if I enjoyed the game regardless, to which I would have to answer yes, because of how well written and designed the game was).
So yeah, Nack hits that narrative ball right out of the park with this one. The only game on the list that I've played that rivals it in terms of narrative is Oniro (I didn't mention that game before because it was all about the mechanics and puzzle solving at heart. It just had a really good narrative as well). The mechanics do exactly what they need to do and serve the narrative perfectly. Also, I don't even need to tell you about the other aesthetic elements like visual and sound design. Come on...it's Andrew Nack.
This game gets my seal of approval for, if nothing else, boldly going where no game (*cough* except Spec Ops: The Line *cough*) has gone before. If you're tired of playing just another puzzle game or just another shooter or whatever it might be, this game will be the breath of fresh, moldy, smokey air you were looking for, you crazy masochist. All I'll say in terms of criticism, though, is that it wasn't quite as impactful as I think it was meant to be. I mean, what can you expect from a game that's only about 10 minutes long?
Well, that was quite a wild ride I just went on. It's games like these that really make me glad that I took on this project last January. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay unconventional.
Links
Snowfall (DigiPen): https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26418
Snowfall (Andrew Nack's website): http://www.andrewnack.com/snowfall/
Andrew Nack explains his game: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6kn9Z6IecY&feature=player_embedded#t=1
Tuesday, September 3, 2013
Snatch
Boy howdy, do I love me some stealth games. You remember back when you were like 7 years old, you would hide in various corners and crevices of your house while mommy was making breakfast. You'd see how close you could get without her noticing and, if you were feeling particularly mischievous, you'd jump out and see how high you could make her jump. Maybe that was just me, but stealth games capture that same kind of gleeful tension.
Snatch, in this context, is not the minigame in Saint's Row, which is about as far from a stealth game as you can get, but rather a top-down stealth 'em up wherein you play as a dude in a beret who wants to steal some stuff from a highly secure facility. That's about all there is in terms of context. I kept dying before I could learn any more.
As much as I fear doing this may make this review seem more like a haiku in terms of length, I'm going to start out with the one most glaring flaw, which is pretty much my only talking point. There are not enough checkpoints in this game. Not nearly.
Now, it's not secret that I am a huge fan of Deus Ex, and while that game wasn't exclusively a stealth game, if you chose to play it like one, it was some of the best stealthing you've ever done in a game. There are a lot of reasons why the stealth worked so well in Deus Ex. The AI was programmed to perfection (not all too realistically, but who cares), the enemies were laid out perfectly in perfectly designed levels and the whole thing was...well...perfect. Thing is, Snatch has all that. The levels are designed in such a way that everything is conveyed to you exactly when it needs to be conveyed. And you're the one who figures it out. The game doesn't just flash some text in front of you and hope you get it. Seriously, this is a fantastic example of level design that compliments the player's learning of the mechanics.
But what's the one thing Deus Ex had that Snatch doesn't? Save scumming. In Deus Ex, you could have a (pretty much) unlimited amount of save states wherever you wanted. In a stealth game especially, nothing can ruin the flow like long iteration time, so the designer of a stealth game must take every precaution to make sure that the player feels punishment for their mistakes, but can get right back into the game and try again with minimal frustration. That's where Snatch fails. I know how much the DigiPen devs hate the idea of saving a game, but in this game, there really needed to be some way to avoid restarting the entire level every time you die.
All-in-all, though, I still give this game a thumbs up. I'm holding back my ever-coveted seal of arbitrary approval for stumbling upon the aspect that makes good stealth games great, but I still say it's worth checking out. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay quiet.
Links
Gimme yo stuff: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=486
Snatch, in this context, is not the minigame in Saint's Row, which is about as far from a stealth game as you can get, but rather a top-down stealth 'em up wherein you play as a dude in a beret who wants to steal some stuff from a highly secure facility. That's about all there is in terms of context. I kept dying before I could learn any more.
As much as I fear doing this may make this review seem more like a haiku in terms of length, I'm going to start out with the one most glaring flaw, which is pretty much my only talking point. There are not enough checkpoints in this game. Not nearly.
Now, it's not secret that I am a huge fan of Deus Ex, and while that game wasn't exclusively a stealth game, if you chose to play it like one, it was some of the best stealthing you've ever done in a game. There are a lot of reasons why the stealth worked so well in Deus Ex. The AI was programmed to perfection (not all too realistically, but who cares), the enemies were laid out perfectly in perfectly designed levels and the whole thing was...well...perfect. Thing is, Snatch has all that. The levels are designed in such a way that everything is conveyed to you exactly when it needs to be conveyed. And you're the one who figures it out. The game doesn't just flash some text in front of you and hope you get it. Seriously, this is a fantastic example of level design that compliments the player's learning of the mechanics.
But what's the one thing Deus Ex had that Snatch doesn't? Save scumming. In Deus Ex, you could have a (pretty much) unlimited amount of save states wherever you wanted. In a stealth game especially, nothing can ruin the flow like long iteration time, so the designer of a stealth game must take every precaution to make sure that the player feels punishment for their mistakes, but can get right back into the game and try again with minimal frustration. That's where Snatch fails. I know how much the DigiPen devs hate the idea of saving a game, but in this game, there really needed to be some way to avoid restarting the entire level every time you die.
All-in-all, though, I still give this game a thumbs up. I'm holding back my ever-coveted seal of arbitrary approval for stumbling upon the aspect that makes good stealth games great, but I still say it's worth checking out. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay quiet.
Links
Gimme yo stuff: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=486
Smiley Face all Over the Place
What can I say about Smiley Face all Over the Place? Well, It's a top-down Asteroids-ey shooter wherein you play as one of three very different stereotypical characters (kind of like in the "Zombies" mode of Call of Duty: Black Ops but without all the chemistry that made it worth putting up with their nonsense), each with different weapons, to take down hoards of triangles, squares, and one of those beach duck things from Super Mario Sunshine.
The characters are all designed fairly well. Their "bombs" all serve their purpose in a team situation; there's the shield, the buff and the destroyer. The 2 player mode is integrated well, too. At any time, you can simply press enter to have player 2 join. Of course, he will be controlled by the arrow keys, so he will be immediately hindered with the inability to move diagonally, but he also gets the mouse, which is much better for aiming than the "IJKL" keys. I imagine it works well that way. After all, I can't think of any way to avoid the arrow keys in this case, so giving the poor sap who got stuck with them a different advantage balances out the gameplay interestingly.
On the subject of balance, though, solo players will find that there's not much of it. One of the character's descriptions is that he is, quote, "BLOODY AWESOME," so the game is pretty much telling you outright who's the man to choose. Granted, I didn't try playing with the blue man who shoots arrows everywhere except where you aimed, but I think it's fair to take a character with that description out of the running.
The game looks fine, I guess. Nothing much to comment about on the aesthetics, but that still leaves the burning question: is it fun or interesting? Well, there's a bit of the former to be had, at least. Slow movement speed is a thorn in my side as always, and there are pretty much only two strategies in this game: circle strafe around the enemies and blast them to Valhalla or don't and die.
I haven't yet beaten the duckbill circle of death in the fifth wave, so at least this game has given me a reason to keep playing. All-in-all, it's a game. Yeah. One of those. That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay smiley
Links
pretty faces and smiley places: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24634
The characters are all designed fairly well. Their "bombs" all serve their purpose in a team situation; there's the shield, the buff and the destroyer. The 2 player mode is integrated well, too. At any time, you can simply press enter to have player 2 join. Of course, he will be controlled by the arrow keys, so he will be immediately hindered with the inability to move diagonally, but he also gets the mouse, which is much better for aiming than the "IJKL" keys. I imagine it works well that way. After all, I can't think of any way to avoid the arrow keys in this case, so giving the poor sap who got stuck with them a different advantage balances out the gameplay interestingly.
On the subject of balance, though, solo players will find that there's not much of it. One of the character's descriptions is that he is, quote, "BLOODY AWESOME," so the game is pretty much telling you outright who's the man to choose. Granted, I didn't try playing with the blue man who shoots arrows everywhere except where you aimed, but I think it's fair to take a character with that description out of the running.
The game looks fine, I guess. Nothing much to comment about on the aesthetics, but that still leaves the burning question: is it fun or interesting? Well, there's a bit of the former to be had, at least. Slow movement speed is a thorn in my side as always, and there are pretty much only two strategies in this game: circle strafe around the enemies and blast them to Valhalla or don't and die.
I haven't yet beaten the duckbill circle of death in the fifth wave, so at least this game has given me a reason to keep playing. All-in-all, it's a game. Yeah. One of those. That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay smiley
Links
pretty faces and smiley places: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24634
Monday, September 2, 2013
Slug 'Em Up
What is it with snails these days, anyway? This game came out during the 2010-2011 academic year, which I bet is around the time production started on Turbo. What is so fascinating about the idea of duct taping machine guns and v8 engines to snail shells? Back in my day, the most complicated you could get with the creatures is to have them say "meow," and that's the way we liked it.
In all seriousness, though, Slug 'Em Up is a 3D third person shooter but with snails. That's about as complicated as it gets, really, and you know what? I love it. Why not snails? Why do terrorists and CTU keep stealing the spotlight? To me, there are 4 points to this game really worth talking about, 2 good and two bad, which is basically every reviewer's dream. I'm suitably excited, so let's get this show on the road.
I'll start off with the bad stuff because I kinda want to end this review on a high note (which is not something I usually do, so that should already speak volumes of my opinion on this game). First off, why on Earth would anyone think it's a good idea to limit the input on a third person shooter exclusively to the keyboard? This is what the mouse does best, aiming and clicking. Instead, we have to deal with the notoriously finicky arrow keys, so good luck trying to turn to the left and shoot at the same time. What bugs me most is that you can only use two weapons at a time, and guess how many buttons a mouse has on it?
The second thing that bugged me, though to a much lesser extent, was how the game went about conveying its controls. Normally, when I complain about conveyance, I complain that a game holds my hand too tightly and is so terrified that I may have recently undergone a full frontal lobotomy that it has to explain every last detail to me in a way that doesn't allow me to spread my creative wings and fly into a few brick walls. In this game, however, it's the exact opposite. Here, you're not given enough indication of how the mechanics work. I played three full matches before I realized that the little snail things that follow you are in fact your ammunition, which I guess makes sense for that one weapon that makes one of them grow to a gigantic size and crush your enemies, but how exactly does one take two slug creatures and convert it into a bomb in less than a second? A simple picture of a snail next to the number underneath the weapon denoting how much ammo one round eats up would have gone a long way for me, and that's just one example. It's not a huge problem, as I had a firm enough grasp on the controls to be competitive in the second round, but still. Just because too heavily conveying your mechanics is bad doesn't mean you get to forget the idea of conveyance as a whole.
All right, now for the good stuff. Unfortunately, since I'm such a hypercritical little snark biscuit, these paragraphs won't be nearly as long as the previous two, but that doesn't mean I didn't value these qualities as much as I resented the others. As I said, I want to end this review on a high note because I'm so impressed by the game.
First off, the visual design. High poly count? check. stylized characters and world? check. Loads of bright, pastel colors to keep everything looking interesting? check. Characters leave a little trail of goop behind them, which is not only cute and fun to look at, but is a tremendous help when seeking out your enemies? check. This game is definitely up there for the best visual design of any game on this list. It's no Nitronic Rush, mind you, but I think it could nuzzle itself safely somewhere in the back end of the top 10.
Second off, the gameplay. What's not to love? The weapons are all very well designed and extremely satisfying to use and, more importantly, to have used on you. Blowing someone across the map would swiftly lose its appeal if it weren't just as fun to be blown across the map yourself. This game demands just the right amount of diligence in order to not get your slimy rear handed to you, and if you disagree, you can just modify the number of opponents to chance the difficulty in an impactful way.
Long story short, this game is good. Great, even. It definitely earns my seal of approval. Nice work, guys. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay salient.
Links
Squishy Vengeance: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24673
Sunday, September 1, 2013
Short Circuit and Skip Lancer
Yeah, you can probably tell by looking at the title that there's at least one review today that's going to be rather anemic. I've always held that a critic should never be forced to contrive things to say for the purpose of meeting a certain length, but one sentence reviews just aren't fair to the reader, and I'm afraid I only have one sentence worth of review for Short Circuit. That sentence is "It's a tower defense game." I find myself feeling now a very similar emotion to the one I felt when my father asked me to discuss the tastes of 3 different wines when I was in my early teens. To me, they all tasted like grape juice gone bad, but there was apparently a wide discrepancy in the tastes that I just couldn't discern. If you've played any tower defense game on Newgrounds.com, you've played Short Circuit. It's probably a fine tower defense game, but to me, that's like saying it's not a badly prepared bowl of piss and vinegar.
So now let's get into the main course: Skip Lancer. I was delighted to see that Skip Lancer took a few cues from Starfox 64, which is the first runner up in my personal "best games of all time" list. Unfortunately, Skip Lancer seems to think that the best part about Starfox 64 was when it sort of resembled Superman 64, and decided to cook us up the former game from a different angle, but with a very generous portion of the latter game's strangely odorous garnish.
Alright enough with the food analogies. I'm making myself hungry. Skip Lancer is one of those "great premise, poor execution" kinds of games. There are a variety of levels, each testing a slightly different skill, which juice the game mechanics until they are nothing but rinds and you, the player, are left with a nice, tall glass of deliciousness...Damn it!
What I'm trying to say is that the foundation for Skip Lancer couldn't be better. My personal favorite level is the final boss, which is a lesson in absolute frustration, but never stops being fun because of its low iteration time and high-adrenaline gameplay. The game only really soils itself in the control aspect.
Much like in Starfox 64, you can do certain aerial tricks (boost, somersault, brake, barrel roll, etc), but doing so eats up your trick meter, which can only be replenished by running into balloons. The problem is that many of these tricks, braking in particular, take up so much trick energy with so little result that they barely seem worth it; yet it leaves me with the terrible feeling that if I would just torture myself for long enough to learn how to use these terribly implemented mechanics, I would have a much easier time meeting the merciless level completion requirements.
It also doesn't help that good ol' Skip apparently decided to down a few bottles of Captain Morgan before taking flight, because his responses to your commands are so incredibly delayed. Someone set the inertia way, WAY too high. I'm not sure how accurate a depiction of aerial mechanics this is, but it's about as fun as playing Starfox 64 with a controller with broken joystick and jelly beans instead of buttons.
The final nail in the coffin, however, is the hit detection on the rings. Sometimes I'll fly straight through the middle of the bastards only to have them linger there and taunt me with "missed me missed me now you gotta kiss me." Dealing with these rings is like dealing with that kid on the playground who always refused to admit that you landed a perfect shot on him with your invisible gun. "You missed," he would say. No I did not miss, you obnoxious snotsack, and this time I have FRAPS to prove it!
That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay sober.
Links
Short Attention Span: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26146
Crip Dancer: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=407
So now let's get into the main course: Skip Lancer. I was delighted to see that Skip Lancer took a few cues from Starfox 64, which is the first runner up in my personal "best games of all time" list. Unfortunately, Skip Lancer seems to think that the best part about Starfox 64 was when it sort of resembled Superman 64, and decided to cook us up the former game from a different angle, but with a very generous portion of the latter game's strangely odorous garnish.
Alright enough with the food analogies. I'm making myself hungry. Skip Lancer is one of those "great premise, poor execution" kinds of games. There are a variety of levels, each testing a slightly different skill, which juice the game mechanics until they are nothing but rinds and you, the player, are left with a nice, tall glass of deliciousness...Damn it!
What I'm trying to say is that the foundation for Skip Lancer couldn't be better. My personal favorite level is the final boss, which is a lesson in absolute frustration, but never stops being fun because of its low iteration time and high-adrenaline gameplay. The game only really soils itself in the control aspect.
Much like in Starfox 64, you can do certain aerial tricks (boost, somersault, brake, barrel roll, etc), but doing so eats up your trick meter, which can only be replenished by running into balloons. The problem is that many of these tricks, braking in particular, take up so much trick energy with so little result that they barely seem worth it; yet it leaves me with the terrible feeling that if I would just torture myself for long enough to learn how to use these terribly implemented mechanics, I would have a much easier time meeting the merciless level completion requirements.
It also doesn't help that good ol' Skip apparently decided to down a few bottles of Captain Morgan before taking flight, because his responses to your commands are so incredibly delayed. Someone set the inertia way, WAY too high. I'm not sure how accurate a depiction of aerial mechanics this is, but it's about as fun as playing Starfox 64 with a controller with broken joystick and jelly beans instead of buttons.
The final nail in the coffin, however, is the hit detection on the rings. Sometimes I'll fly straight through the middle of the bastards only to have them linger there and taunt me with "missed me missed me now you gotta kiss me." Dealing with these rings is like dealing with that kid on the playground who always refused to admit that you landed a perfect shot on him with your invisible gun. "You missed," he would say. No I did not miss, you obnoxious snotsack, and this time I have FRAPS to prove it!
That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay sober.
Links
Short Attention Span: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26146
Crip Dancer: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=407
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