hippochippies – Page 31

Game of the Year 2014: #10 – P.T.

Are you ready for a list of arbitrarily ranked games to mark the end of another year? I know I am!

As always, I’ll begin this with the disclaimer that I think ranking things numerically is a stupid, stupid thing to do. Lists always force people to make arbitrary decisions that they’ll regret when they change they’re mind a week later, and the people reading them put way too much stock into what the list “represents.”

I also think that lists are super fun to make, and one of the easiest ways to express intangible feelings and give readers a quick way to see your opinions. Lists, like review scores, may be problematic, but I still think they’re a lot of fun. They’re dumb, but I also spend a dumb amount of time thinking about and shaping them into something I’m happy with using to represent an entire year’s worth of entertainment.

Let’s get listy! (more…)

December 22, 2014
Game of the Year 2014: Best Use of Music

It’s finally here! The end of the year is upon us, and so is award season. At the end of each year, I, as do many others, enjoy taking a look back at the previous months and giving the top-performers their due. Each year at HippoChippies, ten games are awarded in traditional “Game of the Year” fashion, but this year we have some surprises! Along with our top ten, we’re also dolling out awards in some new categories for the site, but ones you’ll hopefully enjoy reading as much as I have putting them together. The top ten will still be rolling out, but will be peppered in with the rest of the year’s recognition. We’re starting off today with 2014’s Best Use of Music.

“Best Use of Music” is a different award than “Best Song.” For the purposes of this award, I’m defining “Use of Music” as a song being used well for a specific purpose, rather than just being a well-made or catchy track. These songs are still good, but there’s a separate “Best Song” award for a reason. These tracks were used in a time and place to establish a mood or evoke a feeling in the player, and were dropped at just the right time to do so. Let’s get started.

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December 18, 2014
The Entire Screen of One Game Will Destroy You

Made for Ludum Dare 31’s “Entire Game on One Screen” theme, Tom7’s The Entire Screen of One Game is a joke. It’s a joke that goes, and goes, and goes until your head hurts and you can’t take it anymore.

You control a tiny colored block that can jump around while the screen is constantly zooming out. Once it zooms out enough, the screen is filled with a different color, your original block is zoomed out to a tiny dot, and the new screen becomes the focus of your control. It keeps zooming out, and you realize you’re in control of several screens, with the game playing out inside each of them. Uhhh…got it?

The whole thing makes about as much sense as the last couple of sentences, but you really have to see it for yourself.

If you want to be left utterly bewildered and a little impressed, check out The Entire Screen of One Game for free. It’s a fascinating concept, and the closest thing I can compare it to is BRICKbricksmashSMASH, which is similarly mind-bending. Keep it up you monsters of design, keep it up.

December 14, 2014
Birdsong is Screen-Sprawling Metroidvania

Ludum Dare always produces some of the year’s most interesting games, and Ludum Dare 31 is already shaping up with some excellent entries. December’s theme, “Entire Game on One Screen,” has already given us Birdsong, a visually striking Metroid inspired adventure. Developer Managore won 1st place Overall in Ludum Dare 29, and this one’s already shaping up to be a top contender.

Birdsong starts off as seemingly a traditional platformer for the first couple of seconds. As you begin to move across the screen, your view is zoomed out and warped, until you can see the entire world map stretching around you to the edges of the screen. It’s a brilliant effect, made better by the shock of the fake-out introduction.

It helps that it’s a well-done Metroidvania as well. You control a little bird, and have it hop through levels, dodging spikes and other obstacles. As you explore, you’ll find items that increase your jump height to expand your traversal skills, and others that allow you to build checkpoints in difficult locations.

The game’s biggest strength is in it’s totally unique visual effect. Every part of the level can be seen from anywhere, and walking simply wraps the screen around in front of where you’re moving. The furthest parts of the level taunt you from the opening moments, and finally making your way there feels like an accomplishment as you look back on where you’ve been.

When the Ludum Dare awards start coming around, I guarantee you’ll be hearing more about this one. Check out Birdsong on its Ludum Dare page, and check out the rest of the several hundred entries based around LD31’s theme. Designing around constraints always brings out creativity, so enjoy the new ideas while they’re fresh!

December 14, 2014
Gravity Bomb is like a Geometry Wars demake

I’m on the record as saying that Geometry Wars’ Pacifism mode is the greatest arcade game of all time. It isn’t hard to lose hours to it, always chasing the next highest score on the leaderboard. You’ll beat that score, you just have to wait until you’re in the zone. Then it’s two hours later and you give up and pass out because it’s 4 am.

It’s incredibly simple, doesn’t take long to fully understand , and impossible to put down once you know the rules. ABA Games‘ newest arcade title, Gravity Bomb, gives me a strikingly similar feeling. (more…)

December 8, 2014
Petrichor – A Rainy Daydream

Petrichor is an experimental point-and-click platformer, and I liked it quite a bit. According to the developers’ TIGSource page, Petrichor refers to “the pleasant smell of rain on dry ground.” Naming the game after such an ephemeral sense may seem odd, but it’s also a really solid name for a game, especially when it’s this apt. Petrichor is dripping (literally) with atmosphere, as you trek through a rainy night on an adventure. I recommend you play through the game before venturing too far into this post, because much of what makes it special is how easy it is to pick up and understand.

You’re a girl of unknown origin who starts off in a cave next to a fire, taking shelter from the drizzle outside. You soon find an umbrella, and a piece of paper outside the cave. Shreds of paper you find give upgrades when brought back to a campfire, so collecting them is the focus of the game to expand your verb set. You begin earning skills like jumping and climbing, and end up with more advanced techniques, that utilize the umbrella to its fullest and sometimes physically impossible abilities. Also, the right-click will always make the girl pull out her umbrella, and you’ll do it like a million times because of how cute it is.

Very little text appears in Petrichor, reminding us that smart game design through, well, playing a game, still exists. When you learn how to play by yourself without the bitter reminder of a developer holding your hand, you’re doing it right. Most of the game is linear with a few puzzles thrown in, and the game has a very chill, relaxed pace that lets you feel reward by each little accomplishment. My biggest complaint comes from the amount of backtracking that’s required, so much so that I ended up getting lost and reaching a game-breaking bug (that has since been fixed) a little over halfway through. I gladly played through again though, and recommend others to do the same.

The atmosphere extends beyond the limited tutorials and elegant art, as the use of sound deserves a special mention. The ever-present sound of rain is always calming, but the music played under it is very reminiscent of the traveling music from Skyrim. It’s soft, wistful, and added to my desire to explore this world. The track also builds as you become more powerful, and fades as your adventure reaches its end. Here’s a small detail that a lesser developer would have overlooked: The rain effect becomes muffled as you go in and out of caves. Neat!

Petrichor is a very interesting little thing that’s hard not to want to share. It’s short, clocking in at around 20 minutes, and leaves you with a desire to talk to someone else about it. I really have no idea what happened in the last 5 seconds. I’m not sure if any of its mysteries have answers, the developers seem to be a fascination with mystical, magical yellow objects for some reason, but the game’s atmosphere is worth your time by itself. The game’s TIGSource page seems to hint at a mystery or two, but I have no idea if there’s more there to find.

You can try Petrichor on PC for free right now, and the game is currently being developed for mobile platforms as well. You can also read more about the development of Petrichor and chat with the developers on its TIGSource page. Go solve those mysteries!

December 8, 2014