Jumper 3

By: Derek Yu

On: August 24th, 2008

I just played Jumper 3 from beginning to end and oh, it was good. If you’re a fan of Matt “YMM” Thorson’s other challenging platform games, like FLaiL, you should enjoy this one immensely. But even the Jumper-challenged should have a go at ‘er – one of Matt’s major goals with J3 was to reduce the inherent frustration of the tough platforming by letting you switch between up to 5 different Ogmos to complete the game (each one has its own unique characteristics and abilities). You can also find coins in each level, which can be spent to skip any areas you find too extreme. It’s a great way of integrating a difficulty system naturally into the game.

By finding the right Ogmo to use for each level, you can get through the main game fairly readily, but completists will want to find every coin and obtain every medal (by beating the ridiculously tough completion times). Ultimately, I think this game was made for them… I can only imagine what kind of hedonistic delights await the players who accomplish this monumental task!

TIGdb: Entry for Jumper 3

Posted in Freeware, Highly Recommended, Platformers, Windows | Tags: YMM

Paul Eres

“You can also find coins in each level, which can be spent to skip any areas you find too extreme.”

Woah, he actually implemented that idea?? It was one of my suggestions :D

I have to replay it now, cause I got stuck on 3-9 last time.
Skofo

Oh wow, he made another one.

Looks fun, like the other ones.

*And by fun I mean “Oh god please help me I want to stop playing this but I can’t because I’ve gotten so far already!”*
http://www.casualexplosion.com Uesugi

It’s fun but I wouldn’t want to be trapped inside it screaming and beating hopelessly against the other side of my monitor.
ins

very, very frustraiting..
and very, very good :)
Advenith

I.
Love.
This.
Game.

And damn you Matt. Now I won’t leave the house for a week. D:
Name

I liked it, but I enjoyed FLaiL a bit more.
Trotim

Yeah, the hedonistic delight is like, uh, nothing.
Craig Stern

â€œYou can also find coins in each level, which can be spent to skip any areas you find too extreme.â€

That’s an odd design choice…YMM mentioned on the forums that collecting coins was a way to challenge players who might otherwise find the levels too easy. I don’t understand why you’d want to make it difficult to lower the difficulty for players frustrated by the difficulty. You know?
YMM

“Thatâ€™s an odd design choiceâ€¦YMM mentioned on the forums that collecting coins was a way to challenge players who might otherwise find the levels too easy. I donâ€™t understand why youâ€™d want to make it difficult to lower the difficulty for players frustrated by the difficulty. You know?”

Hope it isn’t out of line for me to answer this question here… feels kind of awkward posting a comment on my own game but I feel it’s an interesting discussion to have.

Anyways, here’s my reasoning:

Not all coins are more difficult to collect than the stages are to beat. For example, a lot of coins in sector 1 are easier to grab than it would be to beat a stage in sector 5.

I did use coins to include all the more “hardcore” stage design ideas I had, but not every single coin was placed for that reason.

In addition to this, trying something different (along with a change of scenery) can often reduce frustration, even if that something different is slightly harder. The ability to spend coins to skip stages just gives the player more options so they don’t feel trapped when one stage is too tough for them.