Idle Thumbs 233: World of Blanks

[eot]

Just a reminder to Spaff that Steam has refunds now. Buying a game and finding out it doesn't run on Mac is exactly what those are for, even though $3 isn't the end of the world.

edit: New game god cliffy b? Did Jake reference a random issue of PC Gamer in passing? I remember that issue but that's pretty obscure.

Also, my version of alt-f4 is: tilde-q-tab-enter

Opens up the console and types quit in a lot of games, especially those with an id engine heritage.

[Salacious Snake]

edit: New game god cliffy b? Did Jake reference a random issue of PC Gamer in passing? I remember that issue but that's pretty obscure.

 

I'm sure it's come up here before.

 

[eot]

Oh, I didn't know it was a thing. Or maybe I forgot.

[Astro Zulu]

When I was kid one xmass my grandparents bought me The Makings of Queen's 'The eYe'. (which is a nuts game btw link here) It came with a CD which I think they mistook for the game. After investigating I found out my PC wasn't up to running it anyway. I went over and over that book, until one day I apparently forgot all about this game existing.

This thread just reminded me about the whole experience. 

As far as I can see, it's not available digitally yet (although it's getting votes on GOG) and now... in 2015 I don't have a sodding cd-drive anymore. There is of course a lets play... I mean, just look at it.

[Urthman]

As a perfect example of the discussion imagining Han Solo tea-bagging Darth Vader, I noticed when this Star Wars Battlefront video of Luke Skywalker getting stomped by an AT-AT went viral on Facebook that the player controlling Luke Skywalker had the classy username "deepthroated".

 

[SecretAsianMan]

For my pedantic post of the week:

 

Downwell is currently only on iOS and PC, but an Android version is coming.  So Jake's assumption isn't entirely off.

[allenibrahim]

I'm glad you guys talked about Downwell, I apprecaite hearing the Spelunky fanatic angle. I never got into Spelunky but I love Nuclear Throne, and this game feels a lot like that(obviously from a visual standpoint) but also from the the way I gravitate towards specific weapons and perks, rather than feeling like I have to grasp everything. There's also some Luftrausers in the use of wacky 3 colour schemes (Pastel and Vivid are particularly great! Grandma a close 3rd).

 

The combo stuff is really cool, but I'm not sure how I feel about how it's presented. I wonder how many people play a little bit and bounce off before they figure out the fun of chaining a bunch of bounces, or before they get to try Levitate which really makes combos a lot easier to do. The Levitate perk only changing the physics of your character without changing any other balance makes me wonder if high level players would stop using it. World 3 does introduce a time-based mechanic, but I haven't gotten there enough to know if dropping faster would make that easier or tougher.

As a weird aside, I play most of my 2d games on an arcade stick, as long as I can get the buttons to work out. It feels particularly great with Downwell, since it's uses 3 digital inputs. It also has a very arcade style presentation with a very narrow vertical field of play, reminiscent of a lot of early arcade vertical shooters. I might try that vertical monitor trick if I can figure out how to do it later.

I didn't even consider the combo chaining stuff until Chris mentioned it on the podcast. I spent my early runs just trying to use every upgrade and get a feel for the controls. Soon as I got Levitate and heard about combos, the game became all about that. I no longer care if I even get to World 2, I just need that constant combo sensation.

 

As for the World 3 question, I got there once and felt super jazzed. For the few seconds that I survived, I figured out that you get more air by killing enemies, so a combo run there with Levitate would probably be fine. 

 

My kneejerk reaction to Chris/a lot of people online swearing by PC over iOS was "Come on! You can progress completely fine with the iOS controls" but as soon as you start doing combo runs, you realize that you really do need that finesse to juke back and forth quickly.

[feelthedarkness]

I love the term "physics hell" unrelated but also "for Spelunky fans who can't find a vein." That should be a box quote. 

[jimtwo]

Titanic: Adventure out of Time!

 

That's one of those games where I owned a copy, but I really don't know where it came from. If I had to guess, it's because because my dad, a big Titanic buff, wanted to check out the mode where all of the "game" portions were stripped out, and you could just walk around on the Titanic. My only adventure game experience up to that point was Monkey Island 1 and 2, so between new (to me) mechanics, presentation, and the fairly in depth alternative history, this game was an engima to me (but that didn't stop me from pouring dozens of hours into it, like most of us did with our limited game library back then).

 

Here's a good PC Gamer article from last year about it, for those who might want to know more about it: http://www.pcgamer.com/saturday-crapshoot-titanic-adventure-out-of-time/

 

I think it's time to go drag it up and give it a try, now that I've played The Last Express, and passed high school level European history.