Posted by Derek Yu
Fri, 27 Oct 2006 18:23:00 GMT
Are games art?
Teeth responds: “Things become art in at least a couple of different ways. The first is the creator of the work presents it as such, and the second is a work elevated by weight of public opinion to art status. So, under the above terms, one could create a video game as an artistic installation and have people experience it, thereby rendering the answer to the question as ‘yes’. Has anyone done this? Possibly, I don’t know.”
Well, Edgebomber is a video game installation where players use duct tape and scissors to create levels to run and jump around in. Does that count?
Posted in Platformers, Unique / Bizarre, Games and Art? | 29 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Tue, 17 Oct 2006 05:34:00 GMT
Limbo is a game that people have been talking about recently, although I hesitate to call it a game yet, since my impression right now is that it’s nothing more than an idea and some beautiful conceptual artwork. The trailer just doesn’t look like in-game footage. Although it would be awesome if it was!
Word on the street is that Arnt Jensen, the game’s creator, has a grant from the Danish government to work on the game and is currently seeking a C/C++ programmer. What either of those facts says about the status of game’s development is a mystery to everyone.
Posted in Platformers, Previews | 11 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Sun, 08 Oct 2006 15:16:00 GMT
Old news, but for the sake of completeness… I’ll have to be honest, despite the good things I had heard about the game, I avoided Ninja Loves Pirate precisely because because of the ninja/pirate/zombie/robot theme. I understand it was made for a Gamedev.net “4 elements” contest. So I just wish the 4 elements were something else, like old ladies, Willem Dafoe, absinthe, and child soldiers.
The presentation is, of course, gorgeous, but the gameplay is fun but far from perfect. Case in point: there’s this one part during a quest where you’re supposed to hit a switch to create a bridge over a pit, but it looks (falsely) like you can leap over the pit with Ninja. Small unbalances like that add up to make the experience feel sloppier than it should.
But it’s worth a download, certainly!
Posted in Platformers, Windows, Freeware | no comments
Posted by dessgeega
Mon, 25 Sep 2006 06:26:00 GMT
always up to no good, alan gordon (who you may remember as the author of zi) has just released a pair of old projects onto the internets.
vertical is technically unfinished – there are no enemies or encounters. what remains is the architecture of the game, a randomly-generated tower of infinite height that the player scales with wall-jumps and a grappling hook which bears comparison to umihara kawase or turrican, depending on your background. once one becomes comfortable with the controls, the game becomes a meditative experience.
rrrrrpg, on the other hand, is a complete game. unofficially standing for “really really really random role-playing game”, but officially for nothing, rrrrrpg is a jrpg without content. all that’s left is a trio of abstract shapes roaming the countryside, fighting enemies for experience and money, and wandering back to town to buy better weapons and armor. it is the purest distillation of the jrpg.
check professor gordon’s blog for information on the upcoming zombie city survivors, as well as the zombie city games it is based on (now available for mac).
update: vertical now has a speedrun mode, accessible by pressing R.
Posted in RPG, Platformers, Freeware | 9 comments
Posted by Shabadage
Sat, 23 Sep 2006 09:44:00 GMT
Why helllloooo, it’s your favorite sleep deprived, freeware game finding, TIGSource posting madman. And guess what? I’m here to share some more freeware gaming goodness with you. The game up today goes by the name of Acter World; and it’s a puzzle/action/platforming game, similar in feel to Bubble Bobble (Not Puzzle Bobble).
The game is about Lina, the games heroine, trying to rid the floating royal palace of an evil wizard and his goons. Armed only with a magical bubble ring, she sets off through 32 levels of solid, old school fun.
—
On a personal note; the show that MC Chris did up in Fort Collins, CO last night was awesome! If you get a chance to see this guy in concert; then DO IT! Best $12 I’ve spent in the last year or so.
Posted in Platformers, Windows, Action / Arcade, Freeware | 7 comments
Posted by ithamore
Sun, 17 Sep 2006 18:43:00 GMT
The
Maze of Cheese (which won 2nd place last year at
Stanford’s annual student competition for their Intro to Computer Graphics)
is akin to collecting games such as PacMan and Katamari. But instead of
collecting, you must roll the jiggly Baron around to touch every yellow piece of
cheese and turn them blue as quickly as possible. The longer you take the more platforms, corridors, and stairs will grow into
structures similar to M. C. Escher’s
"Relativity" and
"House of Stairs" especially in higher levels.
The game play is simple (maybe too simple) and straight-forward, the Baron never dies, and the levels are infinite in number. It feels much like an Atari 2600 game re-envisioned for the 21st century.
Since no documentation is provided with the game, you might want to continue
reading if you don’t want to hunt for the controls. Movement is made possible by the arrow keys or with
W A S D, the space bar jumps, and
gravity is rotated 90 degrees forward with Tab
and Enter.
Other useful keys that
should be mentioned are R to reset the
Baron to his starting point, holding Ctrl
brings up a map, holding the left or right mouse button and dragging it
moves the camera, L skips the level, P pauses, the
scroll wheel rotates gravity forward and backward (rapid scrolling is useful
for "flying" through large mazes), the -
key flattens the Baron, and the = key
un-flattens him (the other keys: 1-6, H, M, `, and Esc). Flattenning the Baron and warping him around himself by jumping a few
times while rolling will make him mutate and grow into a hypercube-like form that
shows the Maze who’s cancerous.
I like the idea of having extra controls to experiment with and to discover
different ways to play a game. Mutating the Baron just a bit allows him to crawl
madly through large mazes that would take much longer to finish a piece of
cheese at a time, but it can also make him hard to control when he grows too much. What do you think of incorporating such non-traditional controls?
(Source: Slashdot)
Posted in Platformers, Unique / Bizarre, Windows, Competitions, Action / Arcade, Freeware | no comments
Posted by Eos
Sun, 03 Sep 2006 23:10:00 GMT
A retro platform/puzzle game by Monokey made with Allegro, Bollen is simple and clean. The music is good. The goal is to move the pink/purple ball that you control to the red flags in each stage, collecting coins on the way.
The main feature is that your purple ball can only move fowards and backwards. So you must rely on the green Mr. Happy’s or the jump blocks in order to jump higher places. (The more I talk about this game, the more it’s starting to sound like a metaphor for life.)
The red Mr. Evil’s frown at you until misfortune dashes you against them. Then they laugh mockingly at you, pleased that you have failed miserably at life.
Posted in Platformers, Highly Recommended, Puzzle, Windows, Freeware | 24 comments
Posted by Tim
Mon, 14 Aug 2006 18:06:00 GMT
Free Lunch Design of Icy Tower fame is currently working on three new games. One of them is Hodja and the Sleeping Eggplant. If you’re wondering why the screenshot is rather small, it’s because all three games in development are for the mobile platform! Here’s a description snagged from the web site:
“All Hodja’s sister wants for her birthday is a sleeping eggplant; too bad they’re almost impossible find! Hodja and the Sleeping Eggplant is a non-linear platform game of exploration and puzzles, power ups and surprises. Guide Hodja on his adventureous search for the sleeping eggplant, a journey filled to the brim with excitement! “
One player, with a 2006 release date. Could this possibly signal the end of free meals from FLD? Only time will tell, eh…
Posted in Mobile / Handheld, Platformers, Previews | 9 comments
Posted by Derek Yu
Mon, 31 Jul 2006 14:17:00 GMT
Ah, the Metroidvania / Castleroid / Roidcastle / Metrocastle game… when they were in vogue in the freeware community, you’d see announcements for one of these pop up like every month at least. But the projects got scrapped faster than you could say “non-linear platforming action-adventure RPG.” Seriously, where the fuck is Chaos Gate? That game looked pretty sweet.
Skyhammer is another fatality in the now-dwindling (I think) Castlemetro genre. Which is a shame, because like A Game with a Kitty (the creator’s previous release which you can find by the same link), this game boasts some very well-executed gameplay. The ~45 minutes that there is of it, at least. Check it out.
Posted in Platformers, Windows, Freeware | Tags Bernie | 9 comments
Posted by Tim
Sat, 22 Jul 2006 11:29:00 GMT
Does look like Invader, doesn’t it? Though both are charming in their own ways.
Poyo is a platformer consisting of fifty levels, which was created by Lazrael in under one month using Game Maker. Consider this: the only actions available to the titular character are walking, jumping and warping. Yet it will still stump a few players especially in later stages.
Warping is an essential skill to master, and most of the puzzles involve pulling off a succession of moves correctly.
Cave Story. Within a Deep Forest. Eternal Daughter. Poyo comes pretty close to joining this elite circle. Perhaps the author’s next attempt?
Other works include Pozzo – Jello Crusade and Flapper.
Posted in Platformers, Highly Recommended, Windows, Freeware | Tags Lazrael | 11 comments
