Game design 101 time, kids. Question: What's the fastest way to completely break down a game experience...Billy?
"Remove control from the player?"
Very good, Billy! Come up and get your cookie. Everyone else, sit your buts down, play Rust and tell me how long it takes for you to become so bored that you decide the best course of action is to kamikaze into one of the raiding enemies.
So here's how this game works: you circle around the small map and pick up scrap metal. You then throw that scrap metal at turrets and towers to upgrade their health and ammunition so that they can survive the onslaught of alien invaders.
The biggest problem with this is that you have no power other than to throw metal at things, so the game very quickly devolves from feeling like you're actually defending stuff to feeling like exactly what it is: quite literally running around in circles, mindlessly and routinely picking up metal and putting it in a place. I've had a more engaging experience putting furniture into a moving van.
Really, do you need anything more than that? The game could pull everything else off flawlessly and it would still be a less than enjoyable experience. People will tell me I just don't like tower defense games and that my opinion is biased, but I had a great time with other tower defense games on this list. Remember Base Invaders? That was fun. You know why? It actually let you do stuff!
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay defensive
Links
Crust: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=25891
Saturday, August 17, 2013
Runeshift
Hey, remember slide puzzles? Those infuriating little toys you would get at street fairs with 8 pictures that form a big picture? Hands up, everyone in the room whose experience with those toys didn't end when you threw them into a tree and watched them shatter into a million pieces. What's that? Nobody? That's because they're pretty much the most obnoxious things ever conceived. Toys like these have their place in gaming history, but it perplexes me how someone aiming to make a "relaxing and positive experience" would choose this as their central mechanic.
I will say this, though: this is probably the best one can make a game about slide puzzles. It is very clear where each block is supposed to go, the difficulty curve is fair and challenging, and the visuals are pretty enough. The only criticism I have in the aesthetic department is that the sound track is a tad annoying. You can, of course, turn off the sound and just run your favorite song in the background, but you can't turn off the music without turning off the sound effects as well, which ruins the atmosphere of the game somewhat.
The only other criticism I have is one that I make all the time, but it's especially apparent in a game like this. Why, why, WHY is there no save feature? I'm just gonna go ahead and say it, this game actually made slide puzzles relaxing and positive. I enjoyed playing around with it, but a game like this is best suited as a stress reliever, and being required to start from the beginning every time you fire it up is not a good quality for a stress reliever to have. At least throw in a level select or something, jeez.
All-in-all. Eh. 'Sgood. If you're having a bad day, give it a shot, but it's only good for one 5-minute relaxation session. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay slidin'
Links
Slippidy do-da: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=18574
I will say this, though: this is probably the best one can make a game about slide puzzles. It is very clear where each block is supposed to go, the difficulty curve is fair and challenging, and the visuals are pretty enough. The only criticism I have in the aesthetic department is that the sound track is a tad annoying. You can, of course, turn off the sound and just run your favorite song in the background, but you can't turn off the music without turning off the sound effects as well, which ruins the atmosphere of the game somewhat.
The only other criticism I have is one that I make all the time, but it's especially apparent in a game like this. Why, why, WHY is there no save feature? I'm just gonna go ahead and say it, this game actually made slide puzzles relaxing and positive. I enjoyed playing around with it, but a game like this is best suited as a stress reliever, and being required to start from the beginning every time you fire it up is not a good quality for a stress reliever to have. At least throw in a level select or something, jeez.
All-in-all. Eh. 'Sgood. If you're having a bad day, give it a shot, but it's only good for one 5-minute relaxation session. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay slidin'
Links
Slippidy do-da: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=18574
Friday, August 16, 2013
Run Like Heck (crashed + update)
I can't get this game to stop crashing, though I'll keep trying and hopefully have a real review up by the end of the day. I wouldn't get my hopes up, however.
I would like to take this time to fill you in on what's going on in my life for the next week. I'm taking a road trip down south to look at colleges on Sunday, and I won't be back for a while. I can't guarantee I'll always have internet connection, so I'm going to do the same thing I did when I stayed at my grandma's house and just release a glut of reviews when I get back.
In terms of tomorrow, I hope to get at least 2 reviews out.
Thanks for hanging in there, guys. Peace and love.
Links
https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=432
I would like to take this time to fill you in on what's going on in my life for the next week. I'm taking a road trip down south to look at colleges on Sunday, and I won't be back for a while. I can't guarantee I'll always have internet connection, so I'm going to do the same thing I did when I stayed at my grandma's house and just release a glut of reviews when I get back.
In terms of tomorrow, I hope to get at least 2 reviews out.
Thanks for hanging in there, guys. Peace and love.
Links
https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=432
Thursday, August 15, 2013
Rumblebox
Rumblebox takes place in a horrible nightmare world wherein any impact more severe than that of a raindrop upon your head causes you to crumble into a pile of death and disappointment. The residents of this horrifying world entertain themselves by putting a whole bunch of themselves inside tiny roofless boxes and beating the crap out of each other until they can climb out of the box on the corpses of their friends and neighbors.
For a game this dark, the aesthetic sure is charming. Everything is colored in delightful pastels and the characters all consist of basic shapes, giving them the kind of derpy appeal demonstrated by the things in Sumotori.
Now, hold on a second. Did I just say that characters composed of the same basic shapes crumble at such great rates that you literally climb upon them as if they were part of the floor? Yes, I did. Wouldn't that make for an absolute mess of a visual experience, leaving you with no idea where you or anything else resides? Yes, as a matter of fact. It does. To the game's credit, it tries to avoid this by coloring your character in blue, whereas blue is only a secondary color in some of your enemies. It helps a bit, but the game is still painful to look at. Couldn't my character consist of pyramids, the enemies of cubes, and the dead people of disembodied parallelograms or, I don't know, something?
You are given two methods by which to dispatch your enemies, a percussive attack (space) and a grapple (ctrl or alt). The control scheme holds up well, and while it may seem anemic, your character has different attacks depending on what angle your target is standing at and where you're moving and how fast. This keeps the spectacle from getting old, or at least it would if I didn't end up staring at my health bar 90% of the time because it's the only thing that doesn't make me nauseous and gives me a clear idea of when I get hit.
The gameplay is varied enough to keep your attention. The main game has bonus levels in between its regular levels, all of which are difficult and surprisingly not frustrating. I mean, it's still a pain when a pile of cubes you thought was dead punches you in the back, but it happens far less than one might expect. There's also challenge mode, which, as far as I can tell, is just the main game but with a bazillion times more enemies, which makes the whole thing even more of an incomprehensible mess.
Final verdict: If the idea of mashing space and the arrow keys until the game tells you you've died sounds fun to you, then go right ahead and give this game a shot. It's expertly crafted and commits no unforgivable sins. If you're the kind of gamer who values direction and clear motivations, like I am, this one's probably not going to satisfy.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay pugnacious.
Links
you're dead, you're dead, I'm dead, you're dead: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=505
For a game this dark, the aesthetic sure is charming. Everything is colored in delightful pastels and the characters all consist of basic shapes, giving them the kind of derpy appeal demonstrated by the things in Sumotori.
Now, hold on a second. Did I just say that characters composed of the same basic shapes crumble at such great rates that you literally climb upon them as if they were part of the floor? Yes, I did. Wouldn't that make for an absolute mess of a visual experience, leaving you with no idea where you or anything else resides? Yes, as a matter of fact. It does. To the game's credit, it tries to avoid this by coloring your character in blue, whereas blue is only a secondary color in some of your enemies. It helps a bit, but the game is still painful to look at. Couldn't my character consist of pyramids, the enemies of cubes, and the dead people of disembodied parallelograms or, I don't know, something?
You are given two methods by which to dispatch your enemies, a percussive attack (space) and a grapple (ctrl or alt). The control scheme holds up well, and while it may seem anemic, your character has different attacks depending on what angle your target is standing at and where you're moving and how fast. This keeps the spectacle from getting old, or at least it would if I didn't end up staring at my health bar 90% of the time because it's the only thing that doesn't make me nauseous and gives me a clear idea of when I get hit.
The gameplay is varied enough to keep your attention. The main game has bonus levels in between its regular levels, all of which are difficult and surprisingly not frustrating. I mean, it's still a pain when a pile of cubes you thought was dead punches you in the back, but it happens far less than one might expect. There's also challenge mode, which, as far as I can tell, is just the main game but with a bazillion times more enemies, which makes the whole thing even more of an incomprehensible mess.
Final verdict: If the idea of mashing space and the arrow keys until the game tells you you've died sounds fun to you, then go right ahead and give this game a shot. It's expertly crafted and commits no unforgivable sins. If you're the kind of gamer who values direction and clear motivations, like I am, this one's probably not going to satisfy.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay pugnacious.
Links
you're dead, you're dead, I'm dead, you're dead: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=505
Wednesday, August 14, 2013
Ruin
This is another game geared toward the multiplayer crowd, so I don't have much to say about it....Brace yourselves for disappointment, folks.
While nothing to gawk at, the visuals are competently done. It's immediately apparent what all the objects are and there's a fair use of bright and happiness-inducing colors. The attack effects are another story. The left-click laser is an utter disaster of particle effects that, when fired from multiple players at multiple angles, clogs up the screen like nobody's business. It gets worse when you add to that the fact that you always shoot a little bit lower than the targeting reticule would have you believe; and by the way, that was an almost acceptable problem in Claustrophere when the attack moves so slowly that the reticule is basically there for decoration anyway, but in Ruin, the laser is an instantaneous attack with no travel time, so the reticule is actually important.
And on the topic of the two basic attacks, what the heck does the right-click bomb even do? All that seems to happen when I use it is that it shines in the air for a second before disappearing. That's the main problem with this game; it doesn't convey when things happen well enough. It took me way longer than it should've to figure out whether I was playing team deathmatch or free-for-all. The addition of some hit sparks would've helped, as would've a death animation, like a little explosion or something.
Other than that, the game is fine and I gather it would bring a good laugh to a group of friends who played it. I wish I had more pointed praise than that, but there's nothing in the game that's done especially well, it's all just slightly above average. Give it a shot if you're into shooting things, especially if you have a bunch of PCs on the same LAN and you can organize a quick game with your friends and/or family.
Links
Robot Murder: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=1412
While nothing to gawk at, the visuals are competently done. It's immediately apparent what all the objects are and there's a fair use of bright and happiness-inducing colors. The attack effects are another story. The left-click laser is an utter disaster of particle effects that, when fired from multiple players at multiple angles, clogs up the screen like nobody's business. It gets worse when you add to that the fact that you always shoot a little bit lower than the targeting reticule would have you believe; and by the way, that was an almost acceptable problem in Claustrophere when the attack moves so slowly that the reticule is basically there for decoration anyway, but in Ruin, the laser is an instantaneous attack with no travel time, so the reticule is actually important.
And on the topic of the two basic attacks, what the heck does the right-click bomb even do? All that seems to happen when I use it is that it shines in the air for a second before disappearing. That's the main problem with this game; it doesn't convey when things happen well enough. It took me way longer than it should've to figure out whether I was playing team deathmatch or free-for-all. The addition of some hit sparks would've helped, as would've a death animation, like a little explosion or something.
Other than that, the game is fine and I gather it would bring a good laugh to a group of friends who played it. I wish I had more pointed praise than that, but there's nothing in the game that's done especially well, it's all just slightly above average. Give it a shot if you're into shooting things, especially if you have a bunch of PCs on the same LAN and you can organize a quick game with your friends and/or family.
Links
Robot Murder: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=1412
RS-6
I got a bit worried when this game touted its "five insanely difficult levels," because games that are "insanely difficult" tend to have that become their most memorable, if not only, defining characteristic. What do you remember about Battletoads or Ikaruga, for example? Wait a minute...Ikaruga...oh, no...not again...
So yeah. You all know the drill by now, so I don't feel the need to tell you that I've grown a bit tired of bullet hell games centered around changing colors to not die. Whatever, though, as long as the mechanics hold up, this game is fine by me.
I'm glad to say that "insanely difficult" ended up not being the game's only defining characteristic. In fact, it's hardly a characteristic at all. I only played the first level, so it's possible they were just trying to wean me onto the more ball-crunching levels with baby's first bullet hell, but the only difficult part about it was the boss fight, which I dare say was nigh impossible, so there goes the notion of a difficulty curve.
You know what bothers me most, though? The boss didn't need to be as infuriating as it was. The attacks follow a near perfect pattern, being just unpredictable enough to keep you on your toes, but not so much to the point where it becomes random. I actually had a lot of fun with the boss fight until I realized what gave it the name "insanely difficult." It seems one of the developers added a few extra '0's to the boss's health, because the bastard simply does not die. I shot at the thing constantly for five minutes and I was only able to destroy one of its many segments. Its possible I was just doing it wrong, but how complex can a bullet hell boss be to kill? I shot at literally everything it had for as long as I could. I'm not saying I should've beaten the boss no problem, but I should've at least come close. I wasn't just screwing around, I was trying. I was making a lot of mistakes, yeah, but not enough to warrant killing only 4% of the boss.
"lazy" is not a word I like to throw around (especially not to a dev team that includes pictures of themselves at computers, captioned 'hard at work,' which was a nice tough). "Lazy" is a soul-crusher of a word that declares that not only did your project fail, but it failed because you didn't love it enough. It's a cruel word to use and one that I've made people my mortal enemies for using on me, but I have to be honest and say that simply giving the boss more health than Sardinia if it went to CrossFit is a cheap and...*gulp*...I'm sorry...lazy way of increasing the difficulty.
This game didn't need to be "insanely difficult." It could have been a really fun, if simplistic, shoot 'em up, but it tried to be something its not. This game was a pleasant, unathletic kid who occasionally dabbled in Magic the Gathering, but snubbed the nerdy crew to go hang out with the jocks, but the jocks ended up just giving him wedgies and calling him names. Or, if that analogy's a bit too obtuse for you, here's an overview of the game as a whole: It looks good, feels good and sounds good, but artificial difficulty is its downfall.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay modest.
Links
Letter, Letter, Hyphen, Number: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=521
So yeah. You all know the drill by now, so I don't feel the need to tell you that I've grown a bit tired of bullet hell games centered around changing colors to not die. Whatever, though, as long as the mechanics hold up, this game is fine by me.
I'm glad to say that "insanely difficult" ended up not being the game's only defining characteristic. In fact, it's hardly a characteristic at all. I only played the first level, so it's possible they were just trying to wean me onto the more ball-crunching levels with baby's first bullet hell, but the only difficult part about it was the boss fight, which I dare say was nigh impossible, so there goes the notion of a difficulty curve.
You know what bothers me most, though? The boss didn't need to be as infuriating as it was. The attacks follow a near perfect pattern, being just unpredictable enough to keep you on your toes, but not so much to the point where it becomes random. I actually had a lot of fun with the boss fight until I realized what gave it the name "insanely difficult." It seems one of the developers added a few extra '0's to the boss's health, because the bastard simply does not die. I shot at the thing constantly for five minutes and I was only able to destroy one of its many segments. Its possible I was just doing it wrong, but how complex can a bullet hell boss be to kill? I shot at literally everything it had for as long as I could. I'm not saying I should've beaten the boss no problem, but I should've at least come close. I wasn't just screwing around, I was trying. I was making a lot of mistakes, yeah, but not enough to warrant killing only 4% of the boss.
"lazy" is not a word I like to throw around (especially not to a dev team that includes pictures of themselves at computers, captioned 'hard at work,' which was a nice tough). "Lazy" is a soul-crusher of a word that declares that not only did your project fail, but it failed because you didn't love it enough. It's a cruel word to use and one that I've made people my mortal enemies for using on me, but I have to be honest and say that simply giving the boss more health than Sardinia if it went to CrossFit is a cheap and...*gulp*...I'm sorry...lazy way of increasing the difficulty.
This game didn't need to be "insanely difficult." It could have been a really fun, if simplistic, shoot 'em up, but it tried to be something its not. This game was a pleasant, unathletic kid who occasionally dabbled in Magic the Gathering, but snubbed the nerdy crew to go hang out with the jocks, but the jocks ended up just giving him wedgies and calling him names. Or, if that analogy's a bit too obtuse for you, here's an overview of the game as a whole: It looks good, feels good and sounds good, but artificial difficulty is its downfall.
That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay modest.
Links
Letter, Letter, Hyphen, Number: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=521
Tuesday, August 13, 2013
Rouger
My cousin: "Shitty graphics, good plot"
Me: "What was the plot?"
My Cousin: "Killing people."
Me: "Ah."
My Cousin: "All the birds looked sad, though."
Welp, that's basically Rouger in a nutshell. I have no idea why it was called Rouger, when even the name suggested for the main character is "Falconator" or something...My cousin and I ended up dubbing him "Shuffles McGee" because of his hilarious walk cycle.
Anyway, Rouger is a top-down, Realm of the Mad God-esque killfest with no real direction to speak of. You have 3 basic attacks: melee, magic, and arrows. You use these attacks to kill stuff. That's it. That's the game. But hey, as long as the killing is fun, who am I to judge, right?
And the killing is fun...especially when you kill your white-feathered allies desperately searching the woods for their sister...MWAHAHA. After you've killed a certain number of your friends...I mean enemies who threaten the fabric of society and...yeah, your friends...you get to upgrade your strength, dexterity, intelligence and luck. My prior experience with RPGs lead me to take an educated guess as to what these all do, but to the inexperienced player, a bit more conveyance would be nice.
Some enemies drop equipment that you can use, but each item only has one stat to it. For example, a dagger and a sword will be identifiable only by one having +12 attack and another having +11, so this mechanic is pretty brainless, as all you're ever doing is swapping out certain equipment for objectively better equipment.
All-in-all, it's a good time-killer if you don't think about it too much. Nothing about this game will wow you, for better or for worse. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay avian.
Links
Ca-caw! You die: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26663
Me: "What was the plot?"
My Cousin: "Killing people."
Me: "Ah."
My Cousin: "All the birds looked sad, though."
Welp, that's basically Rouger in a nutshell. I have no idea why it was called Rouger, when even the name suggested for the main character is "Falconator" or something...My cousin and I ended up dubbing him "Shuffles McGee" because of his hilarious walk cycle.
Anyway, Rouger is a top-down, Realm of the Mad God-esque killfest with no real direction to speak of. You have 3 basic attacks: melee, magic, and arrows. You use these attacks to kill stuff. That's it. That's the game. But hey, as long as the killing is fun, who am I to judge, right?
And the killing is fun...especially when you kill your white-feathered allies desperately searching the woods for their sister...MWAHAHA. After you've killed a certain number of your friends...I mean enemies who threaten the fabric of society and...yeah, your friends...you get to upgrade your strength, dexterity, intelligence and luck. My prior experience with RPGs lead me to take an educated guess as to what these all do, but to the inexperienced player, a bit more conveyance would be nice.
Some enemies drop equipment that you can use, but each item only has one stat to it. For example, a dagger and a sword will be identifiable only by one having +12 attack and another having +11, so this mechanic is pretty brainless, as all you're ever doing is swapping out certain equipment for objectively better equipment.
All-in-all, it's a good time-killer if you don't think about it too much. Nothing about this game will wow you, for better or for worse. That's all I got for now. Until next time, stay avian.
Links
Ca-caw! You die: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26663
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