Isoball X1 is a level pack for the Isoball game series created by Candyflame Games. Isoball X1, like the others in its series is a puzzle game where the player is required to build the solution from the available blocks that will allow the ball to arrive at and enter the goal.
Summary of analysis
Hopefully unnecessary tutorial elements, very challenging gameplay experience, easily-understandable interface primarily mouse-driven control scheme, simple and effective graphics scheme, decent music and sound.
Tutorial/New player experience
The game demonstrates new blocks in an animation around the point that those blocks first come into play. There's also a similar tutorial animation for the game's basic concept. While the animations can be replayed when they first occur, there appears to be no way to review them later (or at all if the player skips them).
Gameplay experience
There's appears to be a quick escalation of challenge in Isoball X1, whether this was the intention of the game's design or a result of the assumption that players will have experience with the other Isoball games is difficult to determine. In either case, the number of levels combined with the difficulty curve is most likely to result in a hardcore style of play.
An achievement system exists to aid in motivation or rewards of players inclined towards such pursuits.
Interface & Controls
The game's interface consists of the play area, a few menu options, and the tile selection frame. While there are keyboard shortcuts for the tile selections, most players will probably opt for mouse-only controls as the keyboard shortcuts have no notation on the tile selection frame.
Graphics
Yet another game that shows more emphasis on the gameplay design and challenge than on flashy graphics covering up flaws. Isoball X1's graphic scheme gets the point across quite well using basic shapes in an isometric environment.
Music & Sound
There's plenty of sound effects, mostly interface-related, that aid a player in knowing that an action has been performed in addition to level start and finish effects. In addition, the game features a catchy, easy-listening background music (which may require the player to toggle music off then back on to start it).
Commentary
As a primarily casual style player with abundant time constraints, Isoball X1 was a significant investment of time just to play enough to be able to blog about. Thankfully, it managed to remember level progress so I could see more than the first six levels over the course of two days time. There other three Isoball games featured a level scoring system that I'm honestly glad to see removed from this particular title in the series, but I'm certain would be of great appeal to many differently-minded players.
Showing posts with label Hardcore. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Hardcore. Show all posts
Thursday, December 22, 2011
Thursday, December 8, 2011
Game review: Fast Racing League (Wii, Demo)
Fast Racing League is a WiiWare action, racing game by Shin'en Multimedia. Like most racing games, the premise is to arrive at the end of circuit goal three times ideally faster than the opposition.
Summary of analysis
Awkward but decent new player experience, disappointing gameplay experience, multiple control scheme choices, nice graphics albeit overdeveloped in my opinion, well-accomplished background music and sound effects.
Tutorial/New player experience
While adequate, it seems a bit clumsy to have a text window tutorial pop up in the course of piloting a high-speed vehicle, especially from a third-person point of view. Thankfully, there's very few controls and concepts that need to be taught in the game.
Gameplay experience
In a word, aggravating. I'm imagining that the designers at Shin'en Multimedia either missed the concept of a demo, the concept of player rewards, or they actually enjoy cock-teasing a player and think it's a great way to encourage a player to buy the full version. I say the prior sentence because while the game has a demo level to play through, they pull the opportunity to finish it in the last second or two, leaving the player with a "Buy our game" splash screen and no amount of success for their efforts.
But I digress (bitterly), the game featured a mechanic called phasing, which allowed players to swap between black or white color-schemes in order to exploit speed-boosting track features in addition to building up boost energy. The features are track, ceiling, and ramp pads (unless more are introduced outside the demo) with the first two boosting speed (the ceiling one pulling the player onto itself temporarily) and the ramp pad essentially appears to be a phase or die opportunity on the demo track.
Interface & Controls
There's a choice of three control schemes for the game: WiiMote alone, WiiMote with Nunchuk attachment, or Wii Classic Controler. Controller choice basically is a matter of taste or self-imposed difficulty modification. WiiMote operates on a steering-wheel tilt concept, it and the Classic Controller utilize a three-button control scheme (accelerate, phase, boost), the WiiMote with Nunchuk utilizes a two-button scheme (accelerate and phase) with boost functionality changed into shaking the WiiMote.
Graphics
Judging from the test level and the game's official site gallery, there's a lot of well-developed backgrounds. I cannot imagine this being a point of design focus given that there's effectively no time to enjoy it in the course of a race. By comparison, the tracks are decent and the vehicles are passable. They even took the time to put in particle effects of pieces of track tearing off upon vehicular collisions especially every ramp landing.
Music & Sound
The background music was well-accomplished and the sound effects were engaging, kind of forgettable but probably the best accomplished piece of the whole game.
Commentary
Overall, it's a mediocre game that has the distinguishing feature of being a good concept and, from what I can tell, well-debugged. I'm a bit surprised with the extremely high accolades the game cites in its reviews section, but can easily accept them from a stand-alone point of view. There's also the chance that the full game is a lot better than its very disappointing demo, especially in consideration of how much of the game is kept out of the demo's gameplay experience. Final evaluation: promising gamble.
Summary of analysis
Awkward but decent new player experience, disappointing gameplay experience, multiple control scheme choices, nice graphics albeit overdeveloped in my opinion, well-accomplished background music and sound effects.
Tutorial/New player experience
While adequate, it seems a bit clumsy to have a text window tutorial pop up in the course of piloting a high-speed vehicle, especially from a third-person point of view. Thankfully, there's very few controls and concepts that need to be taught in the game.
Gameplay experience
In a word, aggravating. I'm imagining that the designers at Shin'en Multimedia either missed the concept of a demo, the concept of player rewards, or they actually enjoy cock-teasing a player and think it's a great way to encourage a player to buy the full version. I say the prior sentence because while the game has a demo level to play through, they pull the opportunity to finish it in the last second or two, leaving the player with a "Buy our game" splash screen and no amount of success for their efforts.
But I digress (bitterly), the game featured a mechanic called phasing, which allowed players to swap between black or white color-schemes in order to exploit speed-boosting track features in addition to building up boost energy. The features are track, ceiling, and ramp pads (unless more are introduced outside the demo) with the first two boosting speed (the ceiling one pulling the player onto itself temporarily) and the ramp pad essentially appears to be a phase or die opportunity on the demo track.
Interface & Controls
There's a choice of three control schemes for the game: WiiMote alone, WiiMote with Nunchuk attachment, or Wii Classic Controler. Controller choice basically is a matter of taste or self-imposed difficulty modification. WiiMote operates on a steering-wheel tilt concept, it and the Classic Controller utilize a three-button control scheme (accelerate, phase, boost), the WiiMote with Nunchuk utilizes a two-button scheme (accelerate and phase) with boost functionality changed into shaking the WiiMote.
Graphics
Judging from the test level and the game's official site gallery, there's a lot of well-developed backgrounds. I cannot imagine this being a point of design focus given that there's effectively no time to enjoy it in the course of a race. By comparison, the tracks are decent and the vehicles are passable. They even took the time to put in particle effects of pieces of track tearing off upon vehicular collisions especially every ramp landing.
Music & Sound
The background music was well-accomplished and the sound effects were engaging, kind of forgettable but probably the best accomplished piece of the whole game.
Commentary
Overall, it's a mediocre game that has the distinguishing feature of being a good concept and, from what I can tell, well-debugged. I'm a bit surprised with the extremely high accolades the game cites in its reviews section, but can easily accept them from a stand-alone point of view. There's also the chance that the full game is a lot better than its very disappointing demo, especially in consideration of how much of the game is kept out of the demo's gameplay experience. Final evaluation: promising gamble.
Monday, November 21, 2011
Game review: Mushroom Madness 3
Mushroom Mandess 3 is an action game by Silen Games. The (usual) player objectives is to protect mushroom patches from various critters through a variety of traps and weaponry.
Summary of analysis
Good new player experience, abundant gameplay modes with mostly good gameplay experience, mouse or mouse and keyboard controls on a mildly-burdened interface, mixed bag graphics, very good music and sound.
Tutorial/New player experience
There's a tutorial section available in the main menu and elements of it appear in the objectives screens of the game's adventure mode. Aside from being a bit rushed to learn the basics in the action, the game has a well-accomplished new player experience.
Gameplay experience
The game features nine gameplay modes, allowing players to improve specific skillsets or indulge in their favorite style of play. Each of the levels also features optional objectives, offering replayability and challenging the player to improve in order to maximize rewards (used mostly to upgrade character skills).
Interface & Controls
Primarily mouse-controlled with keyboard hotkeys that may be opted for instead of clicking on interface buttons. The secondary weapons' interface buttons are helpful for someone that wants to focus on using only the mouse, though I found it to be cluttering the game's interface.
Graphics
Cartoon-style graphics are featured in the game. The choice of graphics creates both a semi-comical detachment at the same time as being potentially guilting having to beat up the cute critters.
Music & Sound
The game has a selection of relaxing background musics, an interesting choice given the fast-paced gameplay. There's also a good selection of sound effects.
Commentary
A definite continuation of improvement over the previous two titles. If anything, the game is getting complex enough that it could either go console/handheld or start splitting up into a number of offshot titles of itself due to the various gameplay modes being nearly enough to be a stand alone game each.
Summary of analysis
Good new player experience, abundant gameplay modes with mostly good gameplay experience, mouse or mouse and keyboard controls on a mildly-burdened interface, mixed bag graphics, very good music and sound.
Tutorial/New player experience
There's a tutorial section available in the main menu and elements of it appear in the objectives screens of the game's adventure mode. Aside from being a bit rushed to learn the basics in the action, the game has a well-accomplished new player experience.
Gameplay experience
The game features nine gameplay modes, allowing players to improve specific skillsets or indulge in their favorite style of play. Each of the levels also features optional objectives, offering replayability and challenging the player to improve in order to maximize rewards (used mostly to upgrade character skills).
Interface & Controls
Primarily mouse-controlled with keyboard hotkeys that may be opted for instead of clicking on interface buttons. The secondary weapons' interface buttons are helpful for someone that wants to focus on using only the mouse, though I found it to be cluttering the game's interface.
Graphics
Cartoon-style graphics are featured in the game. The choice of graphics creates both a semi-comical detachment at the same time as being potentially guilting having to beat up the cute critters.
Music & Sound
The game has a selection of relaxing background musics, an interesting choice given the fast-paced gameplay. There's also a good selection of sound effects.
Commentary
A definite continuation of improvement over the previous two titles. If anything, the game is getting complex enough that it could either go console/handheld or start splitting up into a number of offshot titles of itself due to the various gameplay modes being nearly enough to be a stand alone game each.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Game review: Realm of the Mad God
Realm of the Mad God is an fast-paced action game and self-described MMO (presumably Massively Multiplayer Online game). Realm of the Mad God is by Wild Shadow Studios. The player's objective is to slaughter the infinite hordes of Oryx in an attempt to 'call out' the game's end boss and then slay them.
Summary of analysis
Underdeveloped new player experience, gameplay experience lacking in depth and of debatable entertainment value, keyboard and mouse controls and bulky interface, basic and effective graphics, barely adequate music and sound.
Tutorial/New player experience
The game's tutorial elements are outlined with the writing on thewall floor of the tutorial level. While learning to play the game seems easy, cautiously remind yourself that it's intended to be an MMO and that the tutorial level is a pale representation of the rest of the game. After completing the basic lessons, a new player is dropped into an open game world with at least hundreds of players, pointed to a random 'quest creature' and forced to rush to meet objectives before someone else randomly gets it first. But refrain from worrying, there will always be another random objective to chase after should one fail to reach it in time.
Gameplay experience
If you've come to grind in an anarchic collective, kudos on your choice of game. If you've come for anything else... expect disappointment and confusion. Though there may appear to be an economic system in the game, the game currency is only there for non-essential items or account upgrades (in other words, don't bother picking something up unless your character can and will use it).
The game has a guest account system, meaning that a player doesn't need to go to the trouble of registering for an account if they just want to try the game out, the game also seems to randomly assign a character class to guest account players and the rest are unlockable through gameplay.
Interface & Controls
The game's interface takes up about a third of the screen but is probably going to be ignored more than half of the time playing the game. There's also a few menu screens but little reason to reference those outside of learning the hotkeys or changing controls or options. The game's control scheme utilizes both mouse and keyboard controls.
There's also a chat system, though I'd be hesitant to call that a good feature.
Graphics
The game utilizes sprite graphics which can become confusing in highly player-populated areas but will have a very low system demand.
Music & Sound
To the designer's credit, they skimped on background music making the game's file size manageable for flash, so bring your own unless you can stand a tedius grind on the ears to go with like gameplay. The sound effects are okay, much better than the music.
Commentary
Having played a lot of MMOs, Realm of the Mad God appears to be more an attempt at satirizing the genre rather than a legitimate attempt at good game design. While I'll give them points for the attempt of launching an MMO in flash, it's painful to watch the way the game 'works'. There's overabundant player clutter, an overly complicated inventory and class systems, I'd say it's easy to get lost, but the game lacks direction and appears to be ninety-seven percent grind. While there is a replay value, it's more grinding in a barely different character class trying to unlock yet more grind.
Summary of analysis
Underdeveloped new player experience, gameplay experience lacking in depth and of debatable entertainment value, keyboard and mouse controls and bulky interface, basic and effective graphics, barely adequate music and sound.
Tutorial/New player experience
The game's tutorial elements are outlined with the writing on the
Gameplay experience
If you've come to grind in an anarchic collective, kudos on your choice of game. If you've come for anything else... expect disappointment and confusion. Though there may appear to be an economic system in the game, the game currency is only there for non-essential items or account upgrades (in other words, don't bother picking something up unless your character can and will use it).
The game has a guest account system, meaning that a player doesn't need to go to the trouble of registering for an account if they just want to try the game out, the game also seems to randomly assign a character class to guest account players and the rest are unlockable through gameplay.
Interface & Controls
The game's interface takes up about a third of the screen but is probably going to be ignored more than half of the time playing the game. There's also a few menu screens but little reason to reference those outside of learning the hotkeys or changing controls or options. The game's control scheme utilizes both mouse and keyboard controls.
There's also a chat system, though I'd be hesitant to call that a good feature.
Graphics
The game utilizes sprite graphics which can become confusing in highly player-populated areas but will have a very low system demand.
Music & Sound
To the designer's credit, they skimped on background music making the game's file size manageable for flash, so bring your own unless you can stand a tedius grind on the ears to go with like gameplay. The sound effects are okay, much better than the music.
Commentary
Having played a lot of MMOs, Realm of the Mad God appears to be more an attempt at satirizing the genre rather than a legitimate attempt at good game design. While I'll give them points for the attempt of launching an MMO in flash, it's painful to watch the way the game 'works'. There's overabundant player clutter, an overly complicated inventory and class systems, I'd say it's easy to get lost, but the game lacks direction and appears to be ninety-seven percent grind. While there is a replay value, it's more grinding in a barely different character class trying to unlock yet more grind.
Wednesday, October 26, 2011
Game review: Lab of the Dead
Lab of the Dead is a strategy game sponsored by Newgrounds. It was programmed by Evil-Dog, features the artwork of SickDeathFiend and music by Symphony of Specters and Evil-Dog. The game's premise is to perform research on zombies, meaning the player will be testing the effects of various objects upon the living dead. Fair warning, the game is considered mature audiences only, likely due to subject matter and gritty content.
Summary of analysis
Comprehensive and well-accomplished new player experience, interesting but over-padded gameplay experience, complex menu-driven interface, decent graphics which lose their appeal over time, competently-accomplished music and sound.
Tutorial/New player experience
Lab of the Dead features a relatively comprehensive amount of tutorial elements, every object has its own data which can eventually be brought up for review and hints and the game keeps track of a lot of stats for the player. Given the premise of the game, it's actually very appropriate to let the player discover how to do things through trial and error.
Gameplay experience
Most of the early gameplay flows very quickly and manages to be interesting, but this diminishes almost as fast as it begins with a dawning realization that the game is a multiple hour commitment to be able to see all the game's features and content. I'm going to give it to you straight, the game involves a lot of task grinding which becomes exponential as more features are introduced. Thankfully, newly-discovered reactions and achievements help take some edge out of the research point farming by rewarding the player more than the actions normally would. But the game relies far, far more on character skill than player skill and it pads its length with wait times while "researching".
Interface & Controls
As a mouse-controlled, menu-driven game, there's a lot of interface to handle. Luckily, elements of the interface are introduced over the course of play and there's very few ways that the player can accidentally screw up their gameplay experience (one discovered so far by me is lack of a save game feature, which may be site specific to where I'd first tried my hand at it).
Graphics
I'm a bit torn in opinion on the game's graphics. On one hand, there's a good deal of detail and work put into this game. On the other hand, the game's duration gives a player the chance to see where corners were cut and templates were applied. For someone with experience in the industry, it's likely to be obvious, quickly, where elements were recycled. Still, those first-time discoveries of reactions are made a bit more rewarding by the monotony of the grinding (at least when they're significantly different from the usual animations).
Music & Sound
The background music seemed minimal in part due to being a much lower volume level than sound effects and also due to a lot of gameplay time spent without any music playing, leaving the player in an almost eerie, sterile quiet. Whatever the case may have been with the design, it seems a decent choice of avoiding annoyance factor of hearing cyclical music over the course of multiple hours. Sound effects are a mix of interactive occurrence, ambient zombie sounds, and interface sound effects. Some of the interface sound effects seem a bit overly dramatic with sharp-sudden effects accompanying "neutral" reactions.
Commentary
While an interesting gameplay experience, there's way too little emphasis on player skill to this title. The game really just plays itself with suggestions from the player. For the most part, this seems to be a seasonal title that likely started out as being just for fun but wound up being overly-complicated and ultimately wasteful design. That's not to say that it isn't a well put together piece, but that the gameplay experience is unlikely to be able to support the sheer mass of the game's features. There's a diminishing appeal to players over time and Lab of the Dead's gameplay length outlives the length of appeal.
Summary of analysis
Comprehensive and well-accomplished new player experience, interesting but over-padded gameplay experience, complex menu-driven interface, decent graphics which lose their appeal over time, competently-accomplished music and sound.
Tutorial/New player experience
Lab of the Dead features a relatively comprehensive amount of tutorial elements, every object has its own data which can eventually be brought up for review and hints and the game keeps track of a lot of stats for the player. Given the premise of the game, it's actually very appropriate to let the player discover how to do things through trial and error.
Gameplay experience
Most of the early gameplay flows very quickly and manages to be interesting, but this diminishes almost as fast as it begins with a dawning realization that the game is a multiple hour commitment to be able to see all the game's features and content. I'm going to give it to you straight, the game involves a lot of task grinding which becomes exponential as more features are introduced. Thankfully, newly-discovered reactions and achievements help take some edge out of the research point farming by rewarding the player more than the actions normally would. But the game relies far, far more on character skill than player skill and it pads its length with wait times while "researching".
Interface & Controls
As a mouse-controlled, menu-driven game, there's a lot of interface to handle. Luckily, elements of the interface are introduced over the course of play and there's very few ways that the player can accidentally screw up their gameplay experience (one discovered so far by me is lack of a save game feature, which may be site specific to where I'd first tried my hand at it).
Graphics
I'm a bit torn in opinion on the game's graphics. On one hand, there's a good deal of detail and work put into this game. On the other hand, the game's duration gives a player the chance to see where corners were cut and templates were applied. For someone with experience in the industry, it's likely to be obvious, quickly, where elements were recycled. Still, those first-time discoveries of reactions are made a bit more rewarding by the monotony of the grinding (at least when they're significantly different from the usual animations).
Music & Sound
The background music seemed minimal in part due to being a much lower volume level than sound effects and also due to a lot of gameplay time spent without any music playing, leaving the player in an almost eerie, sterile quiet. Whatever the case may have been with the design, it seems a decent choice of avoiding annoyance factor of hearing cyclical music over the course of multiple hours. Sound effects are a mix of interactive occurrence, ambient zombie sounds, and interface sound effects. Some of the interface sound effects seem a bit overly dramatic with sharp-sudden effects accompanying "neutral" reactions.
Commentary
While an interesting gameplay experience, there's way too little emphasis on player skill to this title. The game really just plays itself with suggestions from the player. For the most part, this seems to be a seasonal title that likely started out as being just for fun but wound up being overly-complicated and ultimately wasteful design. That's not to say that it isn't a well put together piece, but that the gameplay experience is unlikely to be able to support the sheer mass of the game's features. There's a diminishing appeal to players over time and Lab of the Dead's gameplay length outlives the length of appeal.
Tuesday, October 11, 2011
Game review: Bastion (Demo)
Bastion is a smash-'em up style action roleplaying game by Supergiant Games. Unlike many games hailing themselves a part of the roleplaying genre, Bastion prominently features a narrative story where the player character's actions have the most significant impact on the world and the story.
Summary of analysis
Mixed delight/disappointment new player experience, mostly positive gameplay experience which is likely to be improved by playing on primary release platform, adequately accomplished interface and control scheme that really emphasizes a reason to play it on Xbox rather than PC, graphically appealing style that comes to life in the moment, excellent music & sound (especially the third-person narrator element).
Tutorial/New player experience
The new player experience of Bastion is an equal helping of discovering a delightful innovation and unfortunate disorientation. Right from the beginning, the player gets to experience having a fully-voiced narrator guide them along and give them hints. Unfortunately, they're left to learn the controls without ever being taught and often amidst a hostile environment or opposition. Note: this may have been a particular failing of the demo version. In any case, I cautiously respect the way Supergiant Games chose to try and keep the theme of discovery even though it impacts upon tutorial elements of the gameplay.
Gameplay experience
As a disclaimer, I strictly recommend playing the Xbox version instead of the PC, as the gameplay revealed that to be the target platform with the PC version being a notably buggy after thought. Aside from development focus, the gameplay experience was largely entertaining and flowed nicely; there was clearly a lot of thought in the level design with the player being able to have a good idea of current obstacles and dangers due to the third-person narrator present at all times. One particularly amusing point was my first time falling off the world and the narrator playing it off as a joke they were telling instead of what really happened; sadly, later accidents of that nature felt more like being unjustly scolded as I'd never been doing it on purpose.
Interface & Controls
The interface elements, while on hand since starting are learned much like everything else: in the moment and experimental trial and error. Thankfully, some of the elements first become active in contextual pair with learning some of the game's mechanics. The control scheme is why I recommend only ever playing the Xbox version, as being told to hit trigger buttons on a keyboard and mouse scheme is an infuriating and counter-productive issue that really only gets resolved by having to pause and bring up the controls section of the menu. In addition, having to play a 3/4 perspective game when directional keys are running tangent to the entire layout scheme means having to make a lot of over correcting and more than a little accidental occurrences of falling off the world and additional risk of death by key locking..
Graphics
A lot of work went into the game's particular style and themes through the graphics of Bastion. All the active and passive elements blend together to create an appealing experience that greatly aids a desire to explore the game world. As the player progresses through a level and explores optional side-paths, the world literally comes into view, rising out of the infinite expanse beneath the player and arranging itself emphasizing that feel of a narrated story coming into being as it's been described to an audience.
Music & Sound
Bastion's background music helps evoke the game's exploration and survival themes, but it is (pun warning) instrumental as back up to the game's narrator. As mentioned a number of times by this point, the game's fully-voiced narration is a key element of gameplay and is a masterful attempt of innovation. Even with all the detracting points I encountered in the demo, I'd still recommend playing this game just for the narrated story. The game has a number of triggered nodes that push the narration as the player progresses and also reacts to the player's actions during the course of play.
Commentary
I sincerely hope to have an opportunity to play through the full Xbox version of the game one day but I have no intention of putting myself through the PC experience of Bastion again. It should be applauded any time a game attempts to innovate. When they succeed in contributing to an enjoyable experience and help lend those new elements into the standard, the game studio should be making news in the industry with both player and developer communities alike. As noted in the game's official site, this is the company's first game, lending even more weight to the arguments of why the big studios should be looking to independent studios for hints on how to do things rather than gambling on the ever diminishing appeal of series sequels.
This adds yet another name to my list of companies to keep an eye on in hopes of seeing what they'll accomplish in the future.
Summary of analysis
Mixed delight/disappointment new player experience, mostly positive gameplay experience which is likely to be improved by playing on primary release platform, adequately accomplished interface and control scheme that really emphasizes a reason to play it on Xbox rather than PC, graphically appealing style that comes to life in the moment, excellent music & sound (especially the third-person narrator element).
Tutorial/New player experience
The new player experience of Bastion is an equal helping of discovering a delightful innovation and unfortunate disorientation. Right from the beginning, the player gets to experience having a fully-voiced narrator guide them along and give them hints. Unfortunately, they're left to learn the controls without ever being taught and often amidst a hostile environment or opposition. Note: this may have been a particular failing of the demo version. In any case, I cautiously respect the way Supergiant Games chose to try and keep the theme of discovery even though it impacts upon tutorial elements of the gameplay.
Gameplay experience
As a disclaimer, I strictly recommend playing the Xbox version instead of the PC, as the gameplay revealed that to be the target platform with the PC version being a notably buggy after thought. Aside from development focus, the gameplay experience was largely entertaining and flowed nicely; there was clearly a lot of thought in the level design with the player being able to have a good idea of current obstacles and dangers due to the third-person narrator present at all times. One particularly amusing point was my first time falling off the world and the narrator playing it off as a joke they were telling instead of what really happened; sadly, later accidents of that nature felt more like being unjustly scolded as I'd never been doing it on purpose.
Interface & Controls
The interface elements, while on hand since starting are learned much like everything else: in the moment and experimental trial and error. Thankfully, some of the elements first become active in contextual pair with learning some of the game's mechanics. The control scheme is why I recommend only ever playing the Xbox version, as being told to hit trigger buttons on a keyboard and mouse scheme is an infuriating and counter-productive issue that really only gets resolved by having to pause and bring up the controls section of the menu. In addition, having to play a 3/4 perspective game when directional keys are running tangent to the entire layout scheme means having to make a lot of over correcting and more than a little accidental occurrences of falling off the world and additional risk of death by key locking..
Graphics
A lot of work went into the game's particular style and themes through the graphics of Bastion. All the active and passive elements blend together to create an appealing experience that greatly aids a desire to explore the game world. As the player progresses through a level and explores optional side-paths, the world literally comes into view, rising out of the infinite expanse beneath the player and arranging itself emphasizing that feel of a narrated story coming into being as it's been described to an audience.
Music & Sound
Bastion's background music helps evoke the game's exploration and survival themes, but it is (pun warning) instrumental as back up to the game's narrator. As mentioned a number of times by this point, the game's fully-voiced narration is a key element of gameplay and is a masterful attempt of innovation. Even with all the detracting points I encountered in the demo, I'd still recommend playing this game just for the narrated story. The game has a number of triggered nodes that push the narration as the player progresses and also reacts to the player's actions during the course of play.
Commentary
I sincerely hope to have an opportunity to play through the full Xbox version of the game one day but I have no intention of putting myself through the PC experience of Bastion again. It should be applauded any time a game attempts to innovate. When they succeed in contributing to an enjoyable experience and help lend those new elements into the standard, the game studio should be making news in the industry with both player and developer communities alike. As noted in the game's official site, this is the company's first game, lending even more weight to the arguments of why the big studios should be looking to independent studios for hints on how to do things rather than gambling on the ever diminishing appeal of series sequels.
This adds yet another name to my list of companies to keep an eye on in hopes of seeing what they'll accomplish in the future.
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Game review: Depths of Peril (Demo)
Depths of Peril is a ambitious action-adventure game combining elements of hack and slash action, roleplaying-style character equipment and stat management, tower defense game's home outpost with defenses, factional real-time strategy, and a rich backstory narrative all with an explorable world. Depths of Peril was developed by Soldak Entertainment and is available to run on Windows and Mac PC platforms.
Summary of analysis
Poorly implemented new player experience, fast-paced and challenging gameplay with hordes of monsters, the lurking threat of factional warfare but the most frightening element is the narrative elements, complicated but rewarding interface and controls, well-detailed graphics with minor obstacles of object distinction, mediocre music with mostly satisfying sound effects.
Tutorial/New player experience
I imagine that the one thing that got me through this part of the game was an abundance of comparable game experience, the new player experience was bordering on painful.
After creating a character I was dropped into the game without a clue about the controls and considerable curiosity about what I was supposed to do first. Within the first ten minutes of gameplay, I was over my head with a long line of tutorial help windows waiting for my attention and in need of industrial machinery to deal with all the walls of text I was expected to read through. If you're new to this style of game, I recommend its competition first, they'll ease a player into the game much better than Depths of Peril does.
I can understand that there's a lot to teach the player as there's a lot to manage in the game and quite a bit of mechanics and interactions that they'll need to learn (kind of quickly, too, lest they fall behind the opposition), but more succinct explanations and walking a player through things is an art, not a chore list.
Gameplay experience
After getting the hang of everything, things ran much more smoothly, though the feeling of having to outrace impending doom never went away. Personally, I love being able to multi-task in a hardcore style game and managing a constant flow of quests, preparing for invasion from opposing forces, managing a main character and companion, and slaughtering hordes of monsters in exploration really let this game shine after the grueling new player experience. This game appears to be designed to keep a player going, unrelentingly, so keep an alarm handy if you have any upcoming plans while playing.
Probably the major detractor to ongoing gameplay are the tomes, which are an interesting read and show that the designers really wanted to draw players into the game's world, they're just cumbersome and out of place given the game's pacing and themes. If they could have implemented a telling of these narratives through high-level or epic quests in which the player character is transported back to participate in the events depicted, I would applaud the narrative, but they wound up being the most dreaded usable item a player would come across (whatever you do, don't right click the tomes... just stuff them in the bookshelf for their bonuses) and did more to break immersion than was really tolerable.
Interface & Controls
Complex interface relying on a sizable number of windows to manage (thankfully some of them pause gameplay while active). Primarily mouse-driven controls with abundant, and life-saving, keyboard hotkeys. It takes a significant investment of time to master the gameplay and the interface interactions, but it pays off exponentially with ongoing gameplay and especially in higher difficulty levels.
Graphics
2.5D top-down, angled, third-person perspective with moderately detailed character, object, and environment artwork. While certainly more visually appealing to a seriously-themed game, the interactive elements' graphics have a tendency to blend in with the non-interactive elements causing the targeting system to be an unnecessarily high level of nuisance (in fact, there's a whole keyboard hotkey just to highlight objects that can be picked up and it's probably going to be used more than any other). But even without the distraction-prone environment elements, a mouse-based targeting system in third-person perspective is clumsy at best. Thankfully, death by camera-angle or targeting system never became an issue (so far).
Music & Sound
I think there was background music, but between the rapid pace of gameplay and the sound effects, it may as well have been turned off for all I ever noticed it. The implementation of sound was quite a lot more satisfying, save that damnable knocking of factional management that honestly tempted me to embrace savage massacre of my in-game neighbors.
Commentary
Diablo-esque and it shows; the interface, controls, quite a lot of mechanics, and even some bits of narrative and premise illustrate a high likeliness of inspiration by the works of Blizzard Entertainment. There were also a number of moments where I felt the need to pause and question a few of the game's elements, such as a factionally-divided tribe of barbarians which somehow valued hefty (though abridged) tomes of lore in a hostile environment nearly pouring in on them from all sides. It was also a bit jarring to see the most-used currency was actually a coin-based economy as opposed to the frequently cited crystals of the tutorial and help windows.
To the game's credit, it was mostly well put together and it excels as a hardcore-style game by how it manages to keep a player engaged with only moments of downtime to give the player breathing and strategy time, eventually aiding in the desired player skill development rather than letting inventory management and spreadsheet-planning to detract from the pace.
Summary of analysis
Poorly implemented new player experience, fast-paced and challenging gameplay with hordes of monsters, the lurking threat of factional warfare but the most frightening element is the narrative elements, complicated but rewarding interface and controls, well-detailed graphics with minor obstacles of object distinction, mediocre music with mostly satisfying sound effects.
Tutorial/New player experience
I imagine that the one thing that got me through this part of the game was an abundance of comparable game experience, the new player experience was bordering on painful.
After creating a character I was dropped into the game without a clue about the controls and considerable curiosity about what I was supposed to do first. Within the first ten minutes of gameplay, I was over my head with a long line of tutorial help windows waiting for my attention and in need of industrial machinery to deal with all the walls of text I was expected to read through. If you're new to this style of game, I recommend its competition first, they'll ease a player into the game much better than Depths of Peril does.
I can understand that there's a lot to teach the player as there's a lot to manage in the game and quite a bit of mechanics and interactions that they'll need to learn (kind of quickly, too, lest they fall behind the opposition), but more succinct explanations and walking a player through things is an art, not a chore list.
Gameplay experience
After getting the hang of everything, things ran much more smoothly, though the feeling of having to outrace impending doom never went away. Personally, I love being able to multi-task in a hardcore style game and managing a constant flow of quests, preparing for invasion from opposing forces, managing a main character and companion, and slaughtering hordes of monsters in exploration really let this game shine after the grueling new player experience. This game appears to be designed to keep a player going, unrelentingly, so keep an alarm handy if you have any upcoming plans while playing.
Probably the major detractor to ongoing gameplay are the tomes, which are an interesting read and show that the designers really wanted to draw players into the game's world, they're just cumbersome and out of place given the game's pacing and themes. If they could have implemented a telling of these narratives through high-level or epic quests in which the player character is transported back to participate in the events depicted, I would applaud the narrative, but they wound up being the most dreaded usable item a player would come across (whatever you do, don't right click the tomes... just stuff them in the bookshelf for their bonuses) and did more to break immersion than was really tolerable.
Interface & Controls
Complex interface relying on a sizable number of windows to manage (thankfully some of them pause gameplay while active). Primarily mouse-driven controls with abundant, and life-saving, keyboard hotkeys. It takes a significant investment of time to master the gameplay and the interface interactions, but it pays off exponentially with ongoing gameplay and especially in higher difficulty levels.
Graphics
2.5D top-down, angled, third-person perspective with moderately detailed character, object, and environment artwork. While certainly more visually appealing to a seriously-themed game, the interactive elements' graphics have a tendency to blend in with the non-interactive elements causing the targeting system to be an unnecessarily high level of nuisance (in fact, there's a whole keyboard hotkey just to highlight objects that can be picked up and it's probably going to be used more than any other). But even without the distraction-prone environment elements, a mouse-based targeting system in third-person perspective is clumsy at best. Thankfully, death by camera-angle or targeting system never became an issue (so far).
Music & Sound
I think there was background music, but between the rapid pace of gameplay and the sound effects, it may as well have been turned off for all I ever noticed it. The implementation of sound was quite a lot more satisfying, save that damnable knocking of factional management that honestly tempted me to embrace savage massacre of my in-game neighbors.
Commentary
Diablo-esque and it shows; the interface, controls, quite a lot of mechanics, and even some bits of narrative and premise illustrate a high likeliness of inspiration by the works of Blizzard Entertainment. There were also a number of moments where I felt the need to pause and question a few of the game's elements, such as a factionally-divided tribe of barbarians which somehow valued hefty (though abridged) tomes of lore in a hostile environment nearly pouring in on them from all sides. It was also a bit jarring to see the most-used currency was actually a coin-based economy as opposed to the frequently cited crystals of the tutorial and help windows.
To the game's credit, it was mostly well put together and it excels as a hardcore-style game by how it manages to keep a player engaged with only moments of downtime to give the player breathing and strategy time, eventually aiding in the desired player skill development rather than letting inventory management and spreadsheet-planning to detract from the pace.
Monday, October 3, 2011
Game Review: Fault Line
Fault Line is probably the first game in a long time I'd played where I had become obsessed with trying to figure out how to reverse engineer its mechanics. It's an Action-Puzzle style flash game which leans more into hardcore play style (especially in later levels), but still has casual appeal.
As indicated in the credits, the art is by Stefan Åhlin, it's programmed by Chris Burt-Brown, with music by Dave Cowen, and is part of the Nitrome games network.
The game's goal is to bring its protagonist through dynamic environments akin to mazes via manipulation of space.As indicated in the credits, the art is by Stefan Åhlin, it's programmed by Chris Burt-Brown, with music by Dave Cowen, and is part of the Nitrome games network.
Summary of analysis
Minimal interactions/mechanics to teach the player, resulting in a quick and in the action tutorial, excellent mix of challenging puzzles and learning how to use the mechanics creatively but lacking replay value, well accomplished music and sound, and uncluttered/non-distracting interface with largely accommodating and simple controls.
Tutorial/New player experience
By the end of the first level, all the game's interactions have been shown to the player, the challenge from that point forward is learning how to use them to solve the various levels ahead.
Gameplay experience
With experimentation and creative logic, I'd have to say that the game is at just the right mix of challenge and learning that really makes a puzzle game shine. The game also forgoes narrating a story and lets the player's own imagination wander if they're so inclined to find a premise that ties together the events of the game.
Levels are timed and scored, but outside of playing the game with an attitude of testing the limits of the mechanics, there's fairly little motivation behind replaying them except to get a few more points.
Interface & Controls
A minimal interface lets the player focus better on the tasks at hand. The most notable part of the interface and controls is the mouse-driven detachable hands of the character, which pull together special node points in the environment, thereby bending the level's space in order to create pathways, avoid or destroy obstacles, navigate the maze, and even have a little fun distorting objects. Character movement consists of keyboard keys for moving left, right, and jumping (with some accommodation of multiple layouts).
Graphics
Sprite-art character and objects/environment with a futuristic style. No character death, relying on a rewinding time to most recent checkpoint mechanic when hazardous conditions are met (including bending the environment into a collapse on the character).
Music & Sound
Unlike a lot of futuristic-style games, the music was neither fast-paced, nor annoyingly repetitive (at least by my tastes and standards). The music and sound evoked a sense of mystery, possibly being meant to entice a player to keep pressing to finish every challenge.
Commentary
As stated earlier, this game has left my designer tendencies working overtime theorizing possible methods of implementing similar mechanics. From incredibly well-written object-draw programming tied together with an adaptive surfaces interpretation to interchangeable level maps to more complicated object-merging interactive systems, this game was engaging as a player and inspirational as a game designer. Also, Fault Line is a testament to breaking away from convention and trying to innovate by making the level itself the focus instead of the character or the character's movements.
Finally, it never hurts to take a mechanic and show how it can be iteratively used to exponential degrees.
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