It's worth pointing out that this game's title stands for "Physics Has Limitless Observable Possibilities," which is ironic for 2 reasons.
First is just the simply fallacious nature of the title. I don't know much about physics, but I do know that there is in fact a finite set of observable phenomena and anyone who says differently is just a Michio Kaku wannabe who tries to sound smart with fancy semantics.
But before we get too off-track, on to point two: this game's physics engine (which is what the entire game is based on) is broken. At any given moment, the marble that you're trying to guide to a goal can drop straight through the tracks you've set up with no warning. So I guess in the contrived world of P.H.L.O.P, physics has a still limited, but vastly less so, set of observable possibilities.
But if the game were playable, how would it hold up? Not badly, I suppose. It's a puzzle game where there is more than one right answer to any given problem, which is always a plus in my book. With the exception of the partially intangible blocks, everything behaves like you'd expect it would, so I guess this game is pretty well put together otherwise.
and...that's it. It was a clever concept with good overall design that just needed a little more polishing and playtesting before it was ready to be called a "good game."
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay limitless
Links
Unfortunately Named Flop (see what I did there?): https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=410
Sunday, June 30, 2013
Friday, June 28, 2013
Origami and Overload
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
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
Thursday, June 27, 2013
Orblitz
So this game is literally unplayable without a mouse, and while this has been a perfectly good excuse for me to not review a game in the past, I figured since my last post was a not real exe, I owed it to you guys to find an old junker mouse and play. Appreciate me!
Ehh, even after that, this game is supposed to be played multiplayer....we've been through this song and dance before...
well anyway, this is a game that I can appreciate only from the perspective of a video game aficionado. Kind of in the same way food critics are required to speak well of certain types of full bodied yet utterly repulsive cheese, I feel obligated to give this game a nod because it's "really good if you're into that."
This game works rather similarly to a 3D Luminaria. Instead of guiding beams of light to certain goals via angled blocks, you're guiding quantized spheres. Insert physics joke here.
So why is this game so "good?" well I think it's because they had a lot of opportunities to screw up, but didn't take them. For example, most games that want you to rotate the world instead of the camera to adjust your viewpoint allow you to do so by holding RMB and moving the mouse around. This one, however, simply lets you use WASD, which is much easier to control.
The design is also laudable. There's not much to talk about here, but the 3D is pulled off nicely. Some may complain that the overgrown grass may get in the way of the spheres, but that annoyance is your own fault because of the ease with which you can fix your view.
In general, the game really makes you feel as if you have full control over whatever goes on. Any misstep is your fault and your fault alone. Of course, I'm saying this as a guy who played the game as if it were singleplayer, which essentially reduced the game to a couple of really easy puzzles, so maybe my opinion isn't really indicative of the final product.
Well whatever. I reviewed a game that ought not to be reviewed. My challenges for the day have been overcome. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay bouncy.
Links
to blitz or not to blitz: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=493
Ehh, even after that, this game is supposed to be played multiplayer....we've been through this song and dance before...
well anyway, this is a game that I can appreciate only from the perspective of a video game aficionado. Kind of in the same way food critics are required to speak well of certain types of full bodied yet utterly repulsive cheese, I feel obligated to give this game a nod because it's "really good if you're into that."
This game works rather similarly to a 3D Luminaria. Instead of guiding beams of light to certain goals via angled blocks, you're guiding quantized spheres. Insert physics joke here.
So why is this game so "good?" well I think it's because they had a lot of opportunities to screw up, but didn't take them. For example, most games that want you to rotate the world instead of the camera to adjust your viewpoint allow you to do so by holding RMB and moving the mouse around. This one, however, simply lets you use WASD, which is much easier to control.
The design is also laudable. There's not much to talk about here, but the 3D is pulled off nicely. Some may complain that the overgrown grass may get in the way of the spheres, but that annoyance is your own fault because of the ease with which you can fix your view.
In general, the game really makes you feel as if you have full control over whatever goes on. Any misstep is your fault and your fault alone. Of course, I'm saying this as a guy who played the game as if it were singleplayer, which essentially reduced the game to a couple of really easy puzzles, so maybe my opinion isn't really indicative of the final product.
Well whatever. I reviewed a game that ought not to be reviewed. My challenges for the day have been overcome. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay bouncy.
Links
to blitz or not to blitz: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=493
Wednesday, June 26, 2013
Operation Stop Core
Well, this was different...
I actually didn't get the chance to finish this game. I played it for over an hour (in that time I could've played 2 or 3 of the average DigiPen game) and I think I've concluded that it is, in fact, a quirky adventure game that feels a lot like Resident Evil without the zombies.
I found myself really impressed by how clever the game managed to be at times, and how clever I felt for figuring certain things out. As a game, Operation Stop Core succeeds in delivering a fun experience that will keep players coming back. It's silliness compensates for its lack of technical prowess in my opinion, but some people might not be able to put up with the graphics.
My favorite part of this game is how it doesn't take itself too seriously. As far as I can tell, some actions and items are utterly useless. My favorite example of this is being able to murder your partner and then resurrect him as if nothing happened.
There are very few mechanical problems with the game, but there's one in particular that bugs me. Cycling through your items is a pain and a half. Not only do they move unbearably slowly, but your inventory always starts in the same place. For example, if you need to use 2 keys, one after another, even though they are right next to each other in the inventory, you'll have to cycle through the whole thing again just to get to them.
So we know this game is good, but what makes it DigiPen good? What about it advances our understanding of the video gaming medium? Well, nothing. And you know what? I'm just fine with that. At the end of the day, I had fun. A lot of fun. I can't give it my seal of approval, since I haven't finished it, but check this game out if you like to think. You won't be disappointed.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay investigative.
Links
irrelevant name: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=502
I actually didn't get the chance to finish this game. I played it for over an hour (in that time I could've played 2 or 3 of the average DigiPen game) and I think I've concluded that it is, in fact, a quirky adventure game that feels a lot like Resident Evil without the zombies.
I found myself really impressed by how clever the game managed to be at times, and how clever I felt for figuring certain things out. As a game, Operation Stop Core succeeds in delivering a fun experience that will keep players coming back. It's silliness compensates for its lack of technical prowess in my opinion, but some people might not be able to put up with the graphics.
My favorite part of this game is how it doesn't take itself too seriously. As far as I can tell, some actions and items are utterly useless. My favorite example of this is being able to murder your partner and then resurrect him as if nothing happened.
There are very few mechanical problems with the game, but there's one in particular that bugs me. Cycling through your items is a pain and a half. Not only do they move unbearably slowly, but your inventory always starts in the same place. For example, if you need to use 2 keys, one after another, even though they are right next to each other in the inventory, you'll have to cycle through the whole thing again just to get to them.
So we know this game is good, but what makes it DigiPen good? What about it advances our understanding of the video gaming medium? Well, nothing. And you know what? I'm just fine with that. At the end of the day, I had fun. A lot of fun. I can't give it my seal of approval, since I haven't finished it, but check this game out if you like to think. You won't be disappointed.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay investigative.
Links
irrelevant name: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=502
Tuesday, June 25, 2013
Operation: Chicken
I really don't have much to say about this one. It's just another 2.5D platformer, really.
The game starts with a coloring-book style series of drawings featuring a cat stealing eggs from some very Angry Birds (hmm...did I mean to italicize that?). After that, you've got to navigate through a platform-riddled world, moving down every last chicken in your path.
Visual style is nice. There are (barely) enough polygons to keep graphics-centric players reasonably quiet, but I have to say that there are way, way too many shadows. It's almost as if the designers didn't want to show off their work, so they just hid it behind a thick wall of shadow.
The game handles decently, but I got to say, it's unbelievably floaty (hmm...a platformer starring an orange cat with annoyingly floaty controls...that sounds familiar)...
The game starts with a coloring-book style series of drawings featuring a cat stealing eggs from some very Angry Birds (hmm...did I mean to italicize that?). After that, you've got to navigate through a platform-riddled world, moving down every last chicken in your path.
Visual style is nice. There are (barely) enough polygons to keep graphics-centric players reasonably quiet, but I have to say that there are way, way too many shadows. It's almost as if the designers didn't want to show off their work, so they just hid it behind a thick wall of shadow.
The game handles decently, but I got to say, it's unbelievably floaty (hmm...a platformer starring an orange cat with annoyingly floaty controls...that sounds familiar)...
Dun Dun Dunnnnnn
Seriously, though, this game's only saving grace is its Contra-esque focus on killing everything in your path. Like in Contra (and, ironically Bubsy), you die in one hit. This worked reasonably well in Contra and, you know what? It actually works decently here, too. The only problem is that enemies and their projectiles are impossible to see all the time. For instance, I once jumped off a platform and right into a sea of enemies that turned the entire floor into a dead zone. Because of things like that, this game is no stranger to the cheap death. That's what really held it back in my opinion.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay bubsalicious
Links
Monday, June 24, 2013
Onoma
The first thing I want to talk about with this one is the options screen. It's quite an interesting design choice that there are no options in the options screen...hmm...got a good feeling about this one.
So the main thing with this game is that I absolutely hated it in the beginning, but then it grew on me. I would notice a certain design choice and say "why would anyone do that? that's asinine," but then I would realize what it accomplished and I'd let out a big "ooooh now I get it."
For example, let's talk visual style. Everything is made up of neon shapes like you'd find in Asteroids, which is a tad on the unoriginal side. Both you and certain enemies emit these ridiculously long particle trails that look terrible at first, but then you see a little bit of an enemy's trail at the edge of a screen and go "oh now I know where to go. That was clever."
The mechanics are like that, too. I was just about ready to denounce this game because you move so unbelievably slowly; but then you get into a dogfight with a purple triangle and find yourself scrambling to out-maneuver it.
There's also this really cool mechanic where you are surrounded by an aura, and if an enemy gets inside that aura, your score multiplier goes up. That way, you as the player have to choose between staying away from dangerous enemies and going near them to get more points.
All in all, it seems like the developers knew what they were doing with this one. It's the kind of design a critic loves because everything seems to have a purpose...mostly. There are some things that I just don't understand about this game. For example, the music is really dark and scary but the sprites are all colorful. What kind of mood were they trying to set here? Because the "fight for your life/inevitable demise" mood the music seems to be going for just doesn't work. Also, you can't shoot through enemies, but other enemies can. I learned that lesson after one really enraging game over.
All in all, this game was kinda fun, but nothing to brag about. You can definitely appreciate the design and you can certainly learn from Onoma, but if you're just looking to have a good time, your time is probably better spent elsewhere. Good job altogether, though.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay thoughtful
Links
Oh no, ma: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24647
So the main thing with this game is that I absolutely hated it in the beginning, but then it grew on me. I would notice a certain design choice and say "why would anyone do that? that's asinine," but then I would realize what it accomplished and I'd let out a big "ooooh now I get it."
For example, let's talk visual style. Everything is made up of neon shapes like you'd find in Asteroids, which is a tad on the unoriginal side. Both you and certain enemies emit these ridiculously long particle trails that look terrible at first, but then you see a little bit of an enemy's trail at the edge of a screen and go "oh now I know where to go. That was clever."
The mechanics are like that, too. I was just about ready to denounce this game because you move so unbelievably slowly; but then you get into a dogfight with a purple triangle and find yourself scrambling to out-maneuver it.
There's also this really cool mechanic where you are surrounded by an aura, and if an enemy gets inside that aura, your score multiplier goes up. That way, you as the player have to choose between staying away from dangerous enemies and going near them to get more points.
All in all, it seems like the developers knew what they were doing with this one. It's the kind of design a critic loves because everything seems to have a purpose...mostly. There are some things that I just don't understand about this game. For example, the music is really dark and scary but the sprites are all colorful. What kind of mood were they trying to set here? Because the "fight for your life/inevitable demise" mood the music seems to be going for just doesn't work. Also, you can't shoot through enemies, but other enemies can. I learned that lesson after one really enraging game over.
All in all, this game was kinda fun, but nothing to brag about. You can definitely appreciate the design and you can certainly learn from Onoma, but if you're just looking to have a good time, your time is probably better spent elsewhere. Good job altogether, though.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay thoughtful
Links
Oh no, ma: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=24647
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