Classic: Q-Lat 2

By: Derek Yu

On: June 2nd, 2009

QLat-2

shockedfrog writes:

Though they’re better known for Pekka Kana 2, Q-Lat2 is my favourite thing by Piste Gamez. Again, simple enough objective (hit balls together in an attempt to make them all the same colour), but addictive gameplay with great presentation. Though the gameplay does rely on a fair bit of luck with what bonuses appear, it’s one of those games that makes me want to keep trying to do a little bit better, whether it’s completing a certain number of levels, getting a better score, or surviving a bit longer. I think it’s a real sign of fun that I’m setting myself targets, which is something that’s been lost with the focus on rather artificial ‘achievements’ in more recent games.

Unfortunately, most of the games from Piste (which I’m pronouncing “pissed”), including Q-Lat 2, do not seem to fair well on Windows XP/Vista and modern graphics cards and suffer from slowdown and graphical glitches. But those of you with old computers are in luck! For everyone else, the developers are thankfully still active and are purportedly working on Pekka Kana 3. The game, which can be seen in the background of the group’s blog (last updated December 2008), looks like it maintains the high quality of graphics from all of their releases.

TIGdb: Entry for Q-Lat 2

  • shockedfrog

    At this point I’d normally complain about the capital S in my name, but I’m just happy to see this up :) I’ve noticed however that the current download has a different SONG04.XM (the default intro/menu music) and while it’s nice to hear another tune I think the old one fits better. I’ve uploaded it to http://www.shockedfrog.com/misc/SONG04.XM for anyone else who shares my fussiness :)

  • shockedfrog

    Actually, seems all the songs have been changed for updating the credits, but that one (in the previous post that needs moderator approval) is the only one that’s actually changed.

    I’m playing it fine on XP at the moment. The main cause of slowdown seems to be the shadows, set them to black and everything else should hopefully run smoothly.

  • Gainsworthy

    Ah, how could I forget about this game? It is indeed a classic. Fun and slick, good music, pretty colours. It still runs fine on my XP cpu too, so… there is hope!

  • Nikica

    Now that really is classic, I have this game on my PC for over 6 years and it’s fantastic, I still play it.

  • ptoing

    Runs perfectly fine here unde XP with a Gforce 9600 GT.

    I reckon a fast processor helps.

  • stank-hamature

    it’s actually pronounced “peest”

  • Lim-Dul

    By the way – I just wanted to note somebody has been running through the TIGDB entries and handing out ones left and right.

    It’s fine if it’s just a troll because community voting will correct the scores (even if they will be slightly lower) – I’m just wondering if this isn’t some kind of vote bot.

  • James Monkman (RGCD)

    Hey – I remember this one! Nice digging guys! :)

  • XFactor

    Nice to see PisteGamez getting some review for their games. I am actually one of the developer, We are not only working on Pekka 3 but we are also going to be releasing Q-Lat 3 which is currently in beta right now. We will not be releasing until August After the Assembly Compo.

  • XFactor

    Also i forgot to mention, if you check the site out, you will notice that we have an new engine and a new editor. Pekka 2 and all of our previous games were done in DirectX7. The new engine is DirectX9 with full shader support, so expect to be amazed for Qlat 3 and Pekka 3.

  • shockedfrog

    Reading that news just made today awesome, thanks. :)

  • Jii

    Damn you XFactor, you’re ruining our big surprise! ;)

  • XFactor

    Oh crap, i am sorry about that. I got to excited and cannot keep my mouth shut.