I only got around to playing these games at 9:30PM due to work and personal obligations; plus, neither of these games is terribly substantive, so today seems like a good day for speed-blogging
Origami is up first:
I'm getting rather sick of all these platformers, I've got to say. I've got nothing against them when they try something new, but the noble platformer seems to be the go-to genre for anyone who just learned how to put sprites in their game and wants to try their hand at making something that kind of resembles physics.
That said, Origami does try something new; it just works like absolute rubbish. The gimmick (notice: not "unique gameplay mechanic," "gimmick.") this time around is that you can conquer air, land and sea by morphing into either a boat, person or crane with the "A," "S," and "D" buttons, respectively. This seems like a good idea in theory, but the controls are just unresponsive. I press a button and nothing happens.
See, that's what I would be saying if I didn't go back and replay the game to make sure I wasn't missing something. turns out, I was. The game just blocked those functions for the first level because the level was designed around traveling in human form. That way, the game could introduce you to the other forms in later levels. Then...may I ask...Why in the name of holy hell would the tutorial tell me about those functions if the game didn't want me to use them? It's completely self-contradictory design. Not the kind of quality I would expect from a game design student.
And oh god, I haven't even talked about the sound direction yet. It's a reasonably cool 3-second loop that sounds very "origami," but it repeats over...and over...and over...and over until all you want is to get it out of your brain!
Even past that, there are some technical issues with the game. It's easy to get stuck on walls, the hitboxes are a bit too large, and the good old "leap of faith" makes about 50 too many appearances. All in all, it's just not a very well designed game. It just feels like they made a platformer, added in a gimmick, gave it a decent visual style and called it a day. Video games are way more complex than that, and it breaks my shriveled little heart to see the supposed future of game designers not treating them as such.
Alright, let's move on to Overload.
I'm a bit more impressed with this one, though there's really not that much to talk about. Ever played Zuma? Well then, you've played Overload. The only difference between the two games is that Overload is in a 3D, first-person perspective, which I think is a nice touch. Since you're aiming along the z-axis, it's a lot harder to judge the distance between your projectile and its target. Some may consider this annoying, but I consider it an extra dose of icing on this already unfairly addictive cake.
aaand, that's where the review ends. Good thing I bundled these two reviews, or the one for Overload might seem really pathetic. It ain't my fault, though. As I said, there's nothing else to talk about.
So yeah, that's all I got for now. Until next time, stay inventive
Links
Original Me: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24632
Creativity Underload: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=503
