toblix

If any of you need to chat while playing and don't want to use Skype for whatever reason, but you want to use Mumble, there is a Idle Thumbs server you could use for that: Mumble Download client: http://mumble.sourceforge.net/ Location: Europe Max users: 25 Address: idlethumbs.mumble.com Port: 8302 Password: wizaaaaaaaard (that's 8 a's) I shut down the server!

This is really exciting! According to Polygon, they're launching a Kickstarter for something I hope is either another Myst game, or something else related to non-violently exploring beautiful, immersive locations. They're also doing an ARG here, which I haven't looked at yet.

Anyone know if this will have a "previously on" sequence? I like the idea of continuing the storyline from the first game, but I cant' remember anything. I think I played as a man who was rude to everyone except hot space chicks.

In case you had all forgotten, this game is awesome. I've been working on a level I unfortunately promised my little sister I'd make for her, and I've been doing it on and off for a couple of months now. It's just so amazing whenever I'm done with a section and can start fresh with some new concept. I quickly get bogged down by the ugly, rickety shit my amateur hands bring forth, but it's still awesome fun. I'd like to be able to listen to the game's superb soundtrack while I make my levels but for some reason I can't. Also, I wouldn't mind not having to create fragile, physical contraptions to represent simple logical structures. For example, to give my vehicle two-way controls I've made a box with dark matter, glass cubes and a couple of pistons, both wrestling for control over a three-way switch. It's very rickety and half-assed, but at least it works most of the time. But it's just so good, the way the physics are almost perfect, the way the materials look and act so real. I just want to reach into my screen and gently squeeze and caress all these little pieces of felt and rubber and glass. So far I've made a tower that builds itself as you climb it, each new room causing those farther down to break and crumble. It got so tiring having to do the whole thing from the start each time I wanted to test a little change, and also the whole thing got so unpredictable, what with the whole thing collapsing under its own weight (probably the huge solid concrete room didn't help), I just ended that whole project. So I built an awesome car that has wheels all around (so it never lands the wrong way) and a pretty retarted romp through some sort of burning cardboard lava thing, I dunno. I even added an Indy-style collapsing rubble escape sequence. Anyway, just finished a HL2-esque sequence where you have to leave the vehicle and do some precision jumping to lower a bridge. I'm thinking about doing a Super Mario World style part where everything's moving up and down and left and right. ... anyway, if you haven't tried making some cool LBP shit yet I suggest you do.

Hey, it's me toblix! I never post here, so you must think this is probably important! You're right: I want to tell you all about these four amazing puzzle games: Hexcells, Hexcells Plus, Hexcells Infinite and, as of just the other day, Squarecells! If you haven't already bought these, you should just go ahead and get the Hexcells Complete Pack on Steam right now, because these are the best logic puzzle games you are ever going to play. If you think it's a bit much, at least get just Hexcells. Okay, so all these games are very similar, the difference being the actual puzzles you have to solve. In each of them you're presented with a board of cells, and you have to use clues such as how many cells in this row are marked, or how many neihgboring cells are marked, and so on, to mark/clear the right ones. No guessing, just pure deduction and logic. It's like Picross or Sudoku, only even better, and there's ambient music while you play! If you pay close attention, you can hear your skull literally creaking to accommodate your growing brain. And so cheap, I cannot believe it!!! Do like me, and get these games and play them. I had never been addicted to anything before I played Hexcells, and now I am frustrated that I'll have to wait months for the next Squarecells game. Speaking of which, does anyone know of any other great logic puzzlers I can play while I wait for Squarecells Plus?

Oh yeah, I can definitely see it being a fun game to watch.

It's been one hell of a ride, but it looks like the server hasn't been used (very much) in ages, so today I shut it down.

This is a cool jam!

So this was announced yesterday: I watched this and thought hey, this art style is pretty damn neat, and then I felt a little uncomfortable at what looks like killing a bunch of innocent bystanders. It's obviously a syndicatelike, and I remembered I also found the gleeful massacring of little people in Syndicate a bit offensive (Ugh, now I remembered the Peter Molyneux GDC thing where he laughed as he described how you could set fire to ladies w/prams) and then I remembered that it reminded me of how I felt watching the infamous church scene in Kingsman. So I guess I'm just a wuss when it comes to gleeful massacres. Anyway, this trailer is popping fresh.

Oh, so I have a question for anyone who's been keeping up with this game. A couple of months after release I sort of gave up on the game because of how unintuitively the traffic behaved, and how you had to follow special rules, hot tips and specific templates («all of my city is a giant one-way off-ramp!») to get traffic to work. There was a lot of rumbling about this on forums («why do all the cars line up in a single lane, while all the others are empty?!»), and some minor improvements, but it very much looked like they wouldn't be able to do much with how traffic behaved (apparently this was to do with some core characteristics of the traffic system, and performance stuff) So, is traffic still as weird and nonsensical as it was at release?

This is a take I agree with: http://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2016-02-16-my-spoilery-firewatch-theory

I really liked this game. Loved the beautiful and unexpected Twine intro, both the contents and the implementation of it. I had high expectations from hearing James Benson doing (all of?) the animation, and I was not disappointed. Lots of little touches, and the way stuff moved is unlike anything I can remember seeing in a video game. Between this and The Witness, I bet I'm not the only one having caught a glimpse of what looked like a secret puzzle, stopping and starting to back up to adjust the camera for half a second before realizing they were playing the other game. I never really got used to the controls, always trying to run with shift I (think) I would have loved even more stuff in the «several months pass» montage, as it felt a bit brief to me. I am very bad at paying attention to title cards with dates, so at least I'm glad they counted the days for me. I also found myself meta-managing my fear at points, thinking no way would they spend a ton of time and money on a scary monster coming out of those bushes. I love creepy stuff and things that are a bit off, and there was plenty of that, with the sometimes weird radio conversations, dream sequences, fenced-off areas, abandoned cabins and camps, etc. Even though I was expecting more of an explicitly open world game, I never really explored a lot, and usually headed for my next mission target goal. Not sure how much optional stuff I missed, but regardless of my linear playthrough the world really felt vast and open, which added to the experience. I always assumed I was taking one of several available paths. Almost needless to say, the game was very beautiful. The camera integrated with that fact very well. Now I'm just wondering what Campo Santo's next game will be.

Yes, apparently dungeons are rad (they are/were in the beta?) but there's already so much in this update I'm not sure I could handle even more stuff. Orteil's really been struggling with this constantly growing update, and at times it seemed like it would never come. Really happy he managed to nail down all of this and release it. Very impressed. Hopefully he'll be able to stick to his plan of more frequent, more focused updates going forward. Oh, and I really love the golden switch, which will do wonders for when I'm not at work to tend to my game. And Krumblor, again ... damn.

Wow, Campo Santo blatantly shipping this game with that cube there is pretty disappointing. Expected more tbh :/

This update is just ridiculous. I really like the rebalancing, as I'm now back to actually playing the game rather than just resetting and maxing out in a few hours, then clicking cookies for a bunch of weeks. Krumblor also throws a million exploding wrenches into my plans, which is great. Dragonflight is just out of control.

Oh, and after deciding not to go after the monoliths, I made a discovery that changed all that. This makes the secret puzzle hunting a lot more manageable for me, so now I've started on those. Already got all the ones on the monolith by the monastery.

It's a type of puzzle you'll use to unlock other lasers, though.

I just finished this (433+67), and get the slightly depressed feeling I always get after finishing a great huge thing I've been waiting for forever, with tons of stuff still left unfinished. Once I've seen the/an ending, I never have the patience to go back and look for hidden stuff all over, especially having heard how ridiculous some of the stuff is. Just like with the GTA games, I just have to let the completionist stuff go, and in time I'll remember this as the Myst sequel I never thought I'd see (also can't wait for Obduction) It was fun while it lasted, and I'm very proud of finishing without ever looking up hints. I rarely have the patience to actually let something lie for a night and come back to it, but I did a number of times with The Witness, and the feeling of having an understanding click into place is incredible.

Happy birthday, Errki!

I was sure we had a thread for this. Some hot child rearing action in this new trailer: http://www.shackvideo.com/?id=15004 I think it's quite possible this will be one awesome looking game indeed. Just the portrayal of stuff that's not enchanted forests, old townes, high-tech bases or evil dungeons is pretty great.

Hexcellent!

Haha ... I am a real person. Maybe we have a bad connection? Hexcells is now is a such cheap available on Steam now! http://store.steampowered.com/app/265890/

This is a great comic. It has it all: Penny Arcade, infinite nesting loops, motorboating ... A+++ will play again!

Korax, that's a great tip. Also a good reminder I need to finish that Layton Phoenix Wright game so I can play picross!

I agree it's wery much in the wein of Sudoku, in that you combine a number of simple rules and data in order to eliminate possible solutions, and that it's always solvable without guesswork (at least I assume that's a requirement for a proper sudoku puzzle!) When playing the first game I also expected it to require increasingly greater leaps of logic, and reach a point where I would be unable to keep all the information in my head, requiring me to start taking notes or sketch out different «moves ahead» to eliminate possible solution paths or whatever. What I found (which is also the reason I consider these games particularly great,) is that it doesn't really do that. It definitely gets harder and more demanding, but not really in that way. It really just keeps forcing you to reason and think in new and unexpected ways. My brain's not that great, and I've been able to solve all the puzzles in each game without ever guessing or taking a note or keeping track of a bunch of stuff at a time.. The challenge is always identifying the one data point you're missing that resolves or unravels a bunch of stuff on the board in a very satisfying way. You can stare at a board for hours (I literally have) without seeing a way forward, and then come back the next day with a fresh mind, glance at it and go «well obviously that cell has to go» and it's more satisfying than most AAA video game endings.