61 Frames Per Second : braid

The Hardcore Gothic Romance of Judith

John Constantine — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 20:00:00 GMT

It was probably rash of me to accuse the new gaming romantics of pulling a beauty-for-beauty’s-sake routine. Jenova Chen, Jon Blow, and their contemporaries are the stars of the indie movement after all. Not everyone can get their game distributed on Xbox Live and Playstation Network. There are creators out there making romantic games that aren’t just pretty flowers and lost love. A perfect example is Auriea Harvey and Michaël Samyn’s The Path, a game that uses gorgeous color and freeform play to inform its frightening exploration of growing up.

Stephen Lavelle, aka increpare, and Terry Cavanagh of distractionware have also made their names on exploring the darker side of romanticism in games. Their latest collaboration, Judith, doesn’t fall within a classically romantic literary mode, but more to the side. Look past the game’s blocky Wolfenstein 3D-ish impressionism, and you’ll find that this ain’t romantic. It’s Gothic!

Stop rolling your eyes, I’m not talking about those kids in the black tights reading Twilight. I’m talking old school Daphne Du Maurier style business right here, a tale of forbidden love reflected in the secrets and murder of the past! Judith starts you off as a man meeting his mistress at a long abandoned castle, far from their mutual spouses. The game’s minimalist presentation is almost comical at first, but by the time you enter the castle, it’s too sinister to laugh at. After your lady love Emily disappears, the game shifts your perspective to that of the castle’s ancient resident Judith, a trophy wife who dreams of these adulterers and uncovers her husband’s dark side in the bowels of the castle. Cavanagh and Lavelle’s design sense, beyond the simplistic visuals, shares much of the tone in Chen and Blow’s most recent games. At its core, Judith is about the perils of infidelity, how secrets between lovers will ultimately destroy them. It isn’t subtle – Gothic media rarely is – but it’s impressively affecting for a game that’s barely twenty minutes long. Its most powerful moments come when it wrests control away from you; pick up an item, like a shovel to bury a dead body, and the game takes over. You’re in control of your decisions, but you can’t control their results.

Expect great things from these fellas. You can play Judith right here, fo’ free.

Related links:

Rite of Spring: Flower and What’s Lacking in the Romantic Games Movement
The Path is Real, Not A Fever Dream
Indie Dev Moment: i made this. you play this. we are enemies.
Breaking Out of Your Gaming Comfort Zone

Rite of Spring: Flower and What’s Lacking in the Romantic Games Movement

John Constantine — Fri, 20 Feb 2009 02:00:00 GMT

Last week was full of everything you want out of a vacation: a change of setting from urban sprawl to glorious mountain range, rancid air exchanged for clean winter wind, great food, better scotch, and the best company. Of course, there was also a smorgasbord of great portable games. Retro Game Challenge, Atlus’ under-the-radar curiosity My World, My Way, and Kirby Super Star Ultra made for marvelous palette cleansers, washing away the last traces of Epic Holiday Gaming morsels still stuck between my gaming teeth. It was restful, brief, and rejuvenating. When I returned, I knew that it was going to be time for 2009 hardcore gaming to go into high gear what with Street Fighter IV and a Killzone 2 demo waiting, but the first thing I had to spend some time with was Flower. As soon as it had finished installing, well, it felt like my vacation had just gotten an extension.

The game is exhilarating. Having grown up in rural upstate New York, the contrast of Flower’s city-bound preludes and its soaring bucolic playgrounds pulls at very specific heartstrings in me. The game is brief but I’m no less taken with it. Jenova Chen and ThatGameCompany are damn good at eliciting just this sort of emotional response with their games. Their debut Cloud was rich with the same bittersweet catharsis that characterizes Flower. Both are something like the game equivalent of a symphonic poem, their fluid flight-based gameplay replacing music as the visceral informant of a visual/audio narrative. They’re games unified in subject too; Cloud and Flower chronicle escapes to a pure, natural world from metropolitan confinement. They are concerned with beauty and simplicity.

I wouldn’t say that Chen and TGC started it, but they’re certainly poster children for what appears to be a burgeoning romantic movement in game design. As much as Jon Blow’s Braid was a commentary on play conventions, it was also a deliberately lyrical game. Trading in pastoral visuals and acoustics to inform its tale of romantic loss and redemption, it shares more than a little with Flower and Cloud. I’m wondering, though, why these new romantics have yet to explore more emotionally troubling and challenging themes. Gamers and critics are constantly citing “dark” themes as a mark of credibility in mainstream game design, but the darkness they refer to is usually tied up in angst driven narrative and violence. Where are the games that are legitimately dark, games that don’t just gain their emotional thrust from beauty or human ugliness? Braid’s ambiguous conclusion and TGC’s exploration of predatory natural selection, Flow, flirt with ugliness and dissonance but never make them their focus. (Flow’s poetic prescript “…life could be simple…” limits the game’s reach from the start.) But why can’t the lyrical style and play of these games be applied to subject matter like Procedural Arts’ Façade, a game that places you directly into a married couple’s complete relationship breakdown?

I’m excited by these creator’s efforts and, yes, moved by them. I was caught up in Flower from the start. But I am anxious and thirsty for the romantic games’ movement to find its Stravinsky, that artist who asks me to look at and hear and play something I’d rather not to make their work that much more powerful.

Related links:

Flower - A Zen de Blob?
Indie Dev Moment: Dyson
Far Out, Man
Ceci N'Est Pas Une 1-Up: The Surrealist Future of Postpunk Gaming

Konjak: Legend of Zelda Platforming the Right Way

John Constantine — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:00:00 GMT

In the past twelve months, much praise has been heaped upon Jon Blow for his time-bending platformer, Braid. Braid defies convention! Braid is an artistic tour de force that’s changed the gaming landscape forever! Jon Blow is mii mee mii mee mii mew! Hell with Jon Blow, I say! The man can’t even make a game by himself. He needs an artist and a musician to help him! Pfft. He’s no Joakim Sandberg, no siree. You want genre redfining platformers, Mr. Sandberg, also known as Konjak, is your man. He also happens to be the man.

I kid about Jon Blow, but I’m all too serious about Konjak. His game Noitu Love 2 was without question the most beautiful and adventurous 2D platformer to come out in 2008, and I say that as a man obsessed with Bionic Commando and Mega Man 9. Thing is, Konjak is responsible for literally every facet of the game, from its propulsive techno soundtrack, to the art, to the batshit insane action.

What’s he up to these days? Oh, just making a sidescrolling homage to Zelda called Legend of Princess. It is, as you might expect, awesome. LoP is only one stage long, but it’s a long stage and its production values are right up there with Konjak’s previous work. The most impressive thing about it is how the game recalls the Legend of Zelda games without directly mimicking them, right down to the melodies in the soundtrack. It’s particularly noticeable in one of the game’s boss fights. There’s a ghostly figure with a curved sword in the background (like the ghost knight from Wind Waker) and you have to trick him into lighting two torches to make him visible (recalling Link to the Past.) The figure’s revealed to be a pig-snouted monster, Ganon-style, who you can only attack after deflecting fireballs at him, much like you do in the classic Aganhim fight in LTTP. But it never feels overt, just knowing. It’s really something.

Play wise, Legend of Princess is a hoot, incredibly fast paced and challenging. You choose two items from the classic Zelda arsenal, each one rated by how difficult it is to use in the game. One item (boomerang, bow-and-arrow, bombchu) is for attacking and the second (Roc’s feather, cuckoo, hookshot) is to aid platforming. You’d be surprised how different the game is depending on which you use.

You can download Legend of Princess at Konjak’s site right here. If you’ve never heard of Konjak or Noitu Love 2, check out this classic 1UP Show interview with the man and bask in the glory.

1UP Specials: Noitu Love 2 Interview

Sorry, Zelda II. You have been dethroned as the best sidescrolling Zelda ever.

(Link: Indie Games.com via NeoGAF)

Related links:
For Love of the Game: The Legend of Zelda – The Shadowgazer
Miyamoto Says Something Was "Missing" From Zelda: Twilight Princess. We Know It, Too.
Chiptune Friday: The Adventure of Link
The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Stupidity
The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask: Why I Let Termina Go Squish

Worst Christmas Ever?

Cole Stryker — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 05:00:00 GMT

Happy New Year, everyone, and welcome back. Hope you had a wonderful holiday. Mine was great, except for one thing: This was the first year in my entire life that I didn't get a single video game!*

That's right, my 25th Christmas has come and gone without the sight of a familiarly rectangular box under the tree. My folks weren't feeling especially grinchy. There just was nothing new for the Wii that I was even slightly interested in.

I have always been a Nintendo apologist. I championed the Wii from the moment it was announced. I didn't like the direction Microsoft and Sony were headed. I thought Nintendo would be the console for hardcore gamers who weren't necessarily graphics fetishists. Boy did I turn out to be wrong. All the cool, quirky games like Nobi Nobi Boy, Little Big Planet, and Braid have been released for the Xbox and PS3.

And that's why my Wii is headed for eBay.

*I did get a set of Wustoff Ninja Kitchen Knives though, so there's that.

Derrick's Top 13 Games of 2008 - Part 3

Derrick Sanskrit — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 19:30:00 GMT

Catching up? Read part 1 and part 2.

5 - The World Ends With You (DS):
The insanely ambitious action-JRPG probably makes the most use of all the DS hardware has to offer of all DS software with the possible exception of The Legend of Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, and even then The World Ends With You does it with so much more style and flair that the comparison seems woefully unfair. It's clear that Square Enix's Kingdom Hearts team put years of thought and research into what the DS could and could not do and the result is a game that breaks all expectations like so many angsty teenage hearts. It takes a truly great game to affect me outside of my gaming time, and much like Wii Fit got me thinking about jogging to the train every morning, The World Ends With You got me wearing pins on my bag for the first time since college, picking out just the right ones that may, someday, save my life in heated battle. Oh lord, did I love that dual-screened battle system...

4 - PixelJunk Eden (PS3):
2008 will go down in the history books as the year that downloadable games finally caught on. Okay, maybe not, but it sure feels like they finally delivered on the promise we'd heard for so long: fantastic independent games delivered straight to your home console, no retail environment required, at competitive prices. I loved echochrome and Cubello, and there is no denying the charm and brilliance of Braid and World of Goo, but the one that completely stole my heart and my thumbs was PixelJunk Eden. Not since Chibi-Robo: Park Patrol have I so enjoyed making flowers bloom. Not since Circus Atari have I so enjoyed soaring upwards into monochromatic point markers. Not since spring break have I so enjoyed atmospheric techno and pulsing colors.

3 - Super Smash Bros. Brawl (Wii):
The biggest-selling game of the year was easily one of the most anticipated, and while it may not be as fondly remembered as its Gamecube predecessor, Super Smash Bros Brawl delivered everything expected of it and then some. The frenetic multiplayer brawling was back, as always, with more characters than ever, including unlikely new faves like Lucas and Diddy Kong and first-time-ever non-Nintendo characters Snake and Sonic. Adventure mode came with an epic, if somewhat vague, storyline complete with luscious CGI cutscenes and gameplay and level design in no way dissimilar to the SNES classic Kirby Super Star (one of my all-time favorites). Classic, All-Star, Multi-Man, Events, Target Smash, pretty much every feature of Super Smash Bros Melee came back bigger and more beefed-up. Of course, the big feature of Brawl was access to the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection, being able to fight people from around the world, either total strangers or your own friend lists, sending your friends video replays of your greatest battles, receiving new stages that your friends built in the surprisingly engaging stage builder, even betting on the brawls of total strangers in Spectator mode. What was my favorite feature? Taking snapshots, of course:

2 - LittleBigPlanet (PS3):
It is hard not to fall in love with LittleBigPlanet. The art direction, the music, the narrative and general use-your-imagination, make-whatever-you-want gestalt is sometimes intoxicating. I've already written at length about the charming adventures of Sackboy, so I won't reiterate the points of my review found here and here. I will say this: LittleBigPlanet so far is the only disc-based game that has made me happy I own a PS3 rather than an XBox or PS2. The endless potential of user-generated content guarantees that LittleBigPlanet will always be exactly as fun and exciting as you want it to be, if not moreso.

1 - de Blob (Wii):
Yes, my absolute favorite game of the year is on the Wii. No, that game was not made by Nintendo. No, I'm not messing with you. de Blob is, without a doubt, the happiest a game has made me since I first played Yoshi's Island on the Super Nintendo and relished in its blatant disregard for flashy CGI and polygons in favor of engrossing gameplay and a unique and heartwarming aesthetic. As a young progressive, I rally behind its anti-corporate, pro-independent artist storyline. As an audiophile, I bliss out to the interactively escalating soundtrack, as I've mentioned before, twice. As a solo gamer, I delight in the variety of challenges. As a social gamer, the multi-player paint-fests get my teeth gritting in a ferocious grin. If you have a Wii and enjoy playing any games that do not involve simulating sports/exercise/music playing, get de Blob. There, that's my review, just flippin' play de Blob because it's the best damn game that came out all year, and 2008 was an amazing year for games.

Part 1
Part 2

Related Articles:
10 Games Nadia Played Instead of Working: The World Ends With You, Super Smash Bros Brawl
Bob's Top 10 of 2008 in No Particular Order: Audiosurf, Braid, Grand Theft Auto IV
Joe's Top 10 Games of 2008 - Special Jury Prizes
What Amber Didn't Play in 2008
Time Magazine's Top 10 Games of 2008

My Top 10 of 2008 in No Particular Order: Braid

Bob Mackey — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 01:00:00 GMT

It's the end of another year, and that can only mean one thing: it's list season. Inevitably, you're going to see top ten lists by the thousands; and, as an official member of the enthusiast press, I'm afraid I can't violate my directive. But, to make things a little more interesting, I've decided to assemble my 10 favorite games of this year in non-hierarchical form because--let's face facts--it's hard to pick a favorite. And unlike other top 10 lists, this one will be doled out to you in piecemeal over the next several excruciating days! Please enjoy.

As far as downloadable games go, Braid was a pretty big deal; I don't think a day in August went by without me reading several blog posts by people caught up in creator Jonathan Blow's amazing world--oh yeah, except for those days in August when Braid wasn't out. Nevertheless, there's really nothing else on XBox Live Arcade--or any other platform, really--that's like Braid; though its originality would be irrelevant if the game played like crap. Luckily, Blow's deconstruction of the platformer is an immaculately-design work of genius, a mechanical, visual, and aural delight from start to finish. And somehow, even with my embarrassingly poor competence at video game puzzle logic, I stuck through to the game's mindblowing ending.

Please stop me if you can't take all of the well-deserved hyperbole.

What amazes me most about Braid is that no one--as far as I can tell--has actually figured out what the game is about--and Blow ain't telling. A somewhat recent--and very extensive--interview with Blow on 1UP FM shot down a few of the more popular interpretations of Braid, and gave all of us a greater insight into the function of Blow's brain matter. It's a must-listen if you're like me and plan on digging into the Braid once again during the holidays to try to pull out something that might resemble a definitive meaning. What other games out there deserve a second playthrough just for their philosophical substance alone? Answer: not many. And that's what makes Braid so great.

Related Links:

My Top 10 of 2008 in No Particular Order: Audiosurf
Derrick's Top 13 Games of 2008 - Part 1
Ceci N'Est Pas Une 1-Up: The Surrealist Future of Postpunk Gaming

For Indie Games, These are the Salad Days

Joe Keiser — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 18:00:00 GMT

Good news, everyone! MSNBC.com is reporting that somehow, the beautiful, excellent labor of love World of Goo actually made a good amount of money for its innovative creators.

This is probably the most heartening story of the long list of heartening stories that have come out about indie games this year. World of Goo managed to make money with a slim marketing budget of approximately $0.00. Other things, like Braid and Castle Crashers, had a minimal marketing push—yet the most accurate predictors we have for this kind of thing (VGChartz might usually be wildly inaccurate, but their XBLA chart is based on information pulled from a massive collection of real GamerTags and is generally considered to be as close as we can get to true XBLA sales numbers) believe these games generated millions of dollars in revenue, each.

We are talking games that were made by no more than two men, games that were built on laptops in coffee shops. Could it be possible this era of HD gloss and budgets approaching nine figures could also be indie gaming’s greatest days?

It’s entirely possible. Back at the beginning of the medium most games were made by single renaissance programmers, but the money we’re looking at now is much better than what Richard Garriott and Roberta Williams made selling plastic baggies to their local software retailers.

And while it may be digital distribution that’s responsible for the most profitable parts of this trend, it’s not the sole factor. Remember that whole Limbo of the Lost plagiarism debacle? That story was so hilarious it actually got fully researched, revealing that the game’s “creator” Majestic Studios were really just three guys who concocted the whole thing in a bar. Had they not stolen every single bit of background artwork for their game, that three-man work (give or take a few, maybe fictional outsourcers) would have gotten an international release to actual, physical stores.

That a sprawling indie scene is creating its own commercial hits says that this is the healthiest the medium has ever been, with a large enough player base to support nearly any kind of well-executed crazy idea. Forget the success of the AAA titles and the Wii—if you want to see if an industry is truly mainstream, you have to look to the strength of the works at the fringes. They’re doing great, and, so long as we keep getting things like Mac Ports of Aquaria and WiiWare versions of Cave Story, we are too.

The Eternal Question: Why Is Super Mario Bros. Fun?

John Constantine — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 17:00:00 GMT

No, seriously, take a minute to think about it. Pour yourself a stiff drink or brew up a nice cuppa tea, put on your thinking cap and try to summarize your conclusion in a single sentence. It’s a peculiar question, really. I found myself trying to answer it late last night after spending some time with Mirror’s Edge. DICE’s platformer shares a lot of the same fundamentals as good ol’ SMB and, concerning the question at hand, both are fun for similar reasons. Super Mario Bros. lets you go wild on a playground where the laws of gravity are paying only loose attention and injury is not a threat. You can run and jump to your heart’s content, and if you see something, like a shiny coin or glowing box that might hide unknown treats, you can hit it with your fist and never worry about bloodied knuckles. Super Mario Bros. is fun because running and jumping, whether in real life or on a screen, is fun, and it’s this maxim that’s fueled platforming as a genre for twenty-five years. But the greatest platformers, the Marios and the Mega Mans, owe their success to more than just running and jumping. They also let you change their world. In Mario, especially in later series entries that allowed flight, crushing bricks opens new ways to move through the Mushroom Kingdom’s surreal landscapes. Mega Man has to destroy robots to ensure safe landings after a jump. If jumping and running was all you did in Jon Blow’s Braid, it could barely be called a game at all.

When you settle into Mirror’s Edge, when you trust yourself to move through the level properly and let DICE’s carefully laid out obstacle courses subtly guide you, it manages to transcend the natural abstraction that comes from making things on TV move. It is physically and mentally affecting. It is fun. But, and mind you I’ve only played the first three levels of the game, all you do is run, jump, and climb. It is purely a jungle gym, and when you’re confronted by hostile elements, your chief task is to avoid them, not eliminate them from the play field (at least, not unless it’s absolutely necessary to do so.) As I continue through the game, I find myself stopping to wonder if there’s something else I’m supposed to be doing, some other facet of the challenge that is going to change the rules after you’ve learned how to run. What is its platformer hook and, more importantly, does it need one?

I’m beginning to suspect that Mirror’s Edge isn’t revolutionary because of its presentation, perspective, or control. It’s revolutionary because it’s redefining the plumber’s definition of fun.

Related links:

Mirror’s Edge: Everything You’ve Heard Is True
Trailer Review: Mirror’s Edge
E3 Day 4: No Blades, No Bows. Leave Your Weapons Here.
Mario Will Not Retire. He Will Outlive Us All.
Super Mario World is Terrifying!

Handjobs for Homebrew: Mario Paint Composer DS

Derrick Sanskrit — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 17:00:00 GMT

There's never been a better time to be an independent software developer. College students are designing original concepts that are then developed by established publishers into big games like Portal and de Blob. Small teams working in bedrooms or coffee shops are developing downloadable console games like Braid and World of Goo. And then, of course, there are the homebrew developers, releasing their software often for free or a small donation. Widely seen in less-than-100%-legal light, homebrew software is often a means of "hacking" the platform of choice to add functionality that had not originally been intended. While there's never any guarantee of quality when it comes to these things, there are some fantastic pieces of homemade software out there, and we hope to spotlight a few of them here on "Handjobs for Homebrew" (this is Nerve, I can say "handjobs," can't I?)

Originally demoed just about a month ago, BassAceGold's homebrew of the Mario Paint Composer for the Nintendo DS was released to the internet masses last week. There have already been a number of homebrew applications to add the painting and animation components of the Super Nintendo classic Mario Paint to the touch-screen handheld, but MPC emulates the feature that always seemed to me (and, apparently, the YouTube community) to be the most engaging element, its cartoonish music composition score.

For those who've never played Mario Paint, allow me to explain... A series of wacky icons each represent a different voice in the song, so many instruments could share a single staff in the musical score. Still don't get it? Check out this YouTube video of Yoshi's Theme played in Mario Paint:

Well BassAceGold's Mario Paint Composer translates that delightfully unique musical interface to the DS. Saving and loading various songs is a breeze if you're working with SD memory cards (which most Nintendo DS flashcards do in order to utilize such software), the touch screen is perfect for adjusting notes, and this homebrew has even gone ahead and added four new voices, the distorted horn blast piranha plant, the warm piano coin, the soft strings shy guy and the fuzzed harp boo. Check out this demo by the programmer on a beta of the program playing Boston's mega-hit "More Than A Feeling":

Of course, the software is not perfect. I'd love to see some tighter timeline controls and something aside from a title graphic on the top screen (maybe a zoomed-out view of your whole arrangement) but Mario Paint Composer is still an excellent addition to the DS's growing library of musical production tools, ranging from retail software like Jam Sessions, Korg DS-10 and Electroplankton to other excellent homebrew like Nitrotracker, Groovestep and the ever-popular LSDJ (run it on a Gameboy emulator, it plays like a sweet dream on the DS). If you have the appropriate equiptment to run homebrew DS software, feel free to download Mario Paint Composer here and start kicking out the jams!

Related Articles:
Through the Fire and Flames on Mario Paint
Make The Music With Your Games, Kids!
World of Goo: The Art, The Design, The Anticipation!
Jonathan Blow Your Mind
Indie Dev Moment: A Game A Month From Kloonigames
Indie Dev Moment: Eegra Shindig Ends, No One Got Laid, Awesome Games Got Made
Indie Dev Moment: Scarygirl

Soulja Boy on Braid: "BWOOOOOOOP!"

Bob Mackey — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 21:30:00 GMT

It's been said that some games actually improve under the influence of various substances.

Braid isn't one of them.

Or is it? Rapper Soulja Boy--who I was completely unaware of due to being afflicted with an extreme, violent case of whiteness--has his own half-baked take on Jonathan Blow's brainy, postmodern platformer that may just change your mind. Watch it with someone you love:

Now, Braid was one of those games that took me a while to finish due to my love of sitting down with a nice, cold beer when I play video games. One microbrew(I warned you, I'm very white) is all it takes to completely throw me out of the proper Braid state of mind and make me reach for something like EA's Explosion City 2009. So while I'm not sure that I quite understand Soulja Boy's nuanced take on the game, according to the Worthington Scale, he is a much better person than me, so I at least have to respect him.

One thing, though: if Jonathan Blow ever takes his own life, we won't have to search very hard for a reason.

Related Links:

On Beating Braid
Jonathan Blow Your Mind
Yahtzee Says, Support Your Local Independent Developer (He's Right).

Jonathan Blow Your Mind

Bob Mackey — Fri, 29 Aug 2008 14:00:00 GMT

The Onion A.V. Club recently put up an extensive and excellent interview with Jonathan Blow that's sure to piss some people off and make others fall deeper in love with the outspoken game designer. I'm leaning more towards the latter, even though he mocks my chosen profession--hey, at least I was smart enough not to even attempt an analysis at Braid's storyline and pass my word off as law. Which is why the following inflammatory quote really doesn't bug me. Honest:

What’s interesting to me is that in terms of people who I feel are getting what it’s about – and here I’m not even talking about what the elements of the story mean, like, whatever symbolism and metaphors and things are in there. But even the structure of the game, like, there’s a fundamental structure and reasons in the way things are laid out, and parts of the game that are meant to draw people’s attention to certain things, regardless of what’s contained in that structure. And what’s interesting to me is that some people get that, and some people don’t. But that’s completely decorrelated from people’s claimed positions in the sphere of commentary. By which I mean, there are lots of random blog posters on places like Gamespot or NeoGAF or whatever who show a clearer understanding of the game than people who are all, “I’m all about games, and narrative and meaning, and I write a blog just to tell you about how I analyze all these things.” Those people have the same hit rate as your general forum poster. So that’s given me a cynical response to that whole community, which is just that, “Guys, are you sure you’re qualified to do this?” And that sounds asshole-ish, and mean and snarky, but that’s just how I’m feeling right now.

More good stuff: Blow mentions other variations of the time-altering mechanic that never made it to the final game:

There were some other levels, like a turn-based one, where the idea is that time is always paused until you make a decision, and then time goes forward by a second or two seconds based on what decision you made, and then time stops for another decision. So it’s like a turn-based strategy game, but in the same platformer world. That one I actually got as far as programming, and making a couple of levels for, and there were some neat consequences to it. But there weren’t 12 puzzles’ worth of neat consequences that were of the same quality as the other worlds. And I just decided it didn’t quite fit.

Go check out the whole thing here. And don't feel guilty if you come away from the interview thinking that Braid was thiiis close to being named after one of Neitzsche's books.

Related Links:

On Beating Braid
Yahtzee Says, Support Your Local Independent Developer (He's Right).

On Beating Braid

Bob Mackey — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 19:00:00 GMT

I hate to be late to the party--or whatever the lingo is for when you don't finish a game 48 hours after its release--but I finally got around to beating Braid. Yeah, it's been about three weeks, but this was a game I really wanted to savor.

Also, when it comes to logic puzzles, I suck on toast. If there's a Hell and I end up going there, Satan will lock me in a tiny room with nothing but The Adventures of Lolo trilogy for all eternity.

While I'm slightly ashamed, I was able to get through Braid with only a minimal amount of cheating. I managed to finish Portal unaided through sheer willpower alone, but Braid kinda broke me. The puzzles--save for one with an autonomous key--are all pretty watertight. My only problem with the game arises in a few of the later levels, when designer Jonathan Blow's penchant for non-intervention robs you of the tools you need to get some of the trickier pieces.

If you haven't finished the game, beware: spoliers lurk below.

The minimal amount of bitching I have to do mainly deals with the "time bubble" element in the last set of levels, which really should have been developed more before you're required to use it in some trickier ways. It took me hours--and a lot of experimenting--before I broke down and went to YouTube for help and realized that Tim's time bubble can actually drop to lower levels under the right circumstances.

There's also a puzzle piece very late in the game that requires you to know that Tim's glowy-green time-immune status exists for a few seconds after he jumps off of a time-immune object--which is something that never comes up before this point. These two examples aren't necessarily "bad" puzzles, but the rest of Braid is so immaculate that they kind of stick out.

The most common complaint about Braid that I'm hearing has to do with the inclusion of eight super-secret stars hidden in the game that can only be obtained through sheer tedium. I like to think that Blow put these collectables in the game as punishment for gamers obsessive enough to turn the game into an interminable collectathon, AKA, "YOU'RE PLAYING IT WRONG." An adorably dickish move like that is right up Blow's alley. Personally, I love it.

I was looking forward to Braid's final moments, since they've been hyped to hell and back by just about everyone; but at the same time, disappointment was possibly imminent. Even though I walked into the finale with grand expectations, they were mostly met; imagine if David Lynch directed the climax of a Die Hard movie, and you'll get the satisfying tone of Braid's final moments. Needless to say, this is a game worth finishing. And even if you can't understand what the hell happened, know that someone out there does and he's waaay smarter than you. But it's not me.

Related Links:

Yahtzee Says, Support Your Local Independent Developer (He's Right).

One Crazy Summer of Arcade

Bob Mackey — Thu, 28 Aug 2008 00:00:00 GMT

Today's LIVE Arcade release of Castle Crashers and the recent trend of incoming college freshmen gathering in front of me to learn writing can only mean one thing: summer is over. But man, what a summer it was. So many memories made while only moving slightly to avoid bedsores.

Of course, I speak of Microsoft's five-week-long "Summer of Arcade," an event that saw the back-to-back release of five awesome Xbox Live Arcade titles: Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2, Braid, Bionic Commando: Rearmed, Galaga Legions, and Castle Crashers. Sure, it started a little late, and it neglected to include a few of the more recent remakes (Commando 3 and 1942: Joint Strike got just a little bit screwed by the timing), but I can't remember a time that so much multi-genre awesomeness was packed into such an affordable month.

More importantly, though, I think it's a look at things to come for the future of gaming.

I'll admit that I haven't gotten around to getting Galaga and Castle Crashers yet--blame the deviousness of both Braid and Bionic Commando for this. But the thing is, I plan on eventually getting all of the Summer of Arcade titles because they're perfect for my life right now. It's not that I'm exceptionally busy--I'm just suffering epic-induced burnout that might have been brought on by playing Grand Theft Auto IV far past the point of enjoyment. Really, the thought of any game taking up more than 10 hours of my time makes me long for the simple joys that XBox LIVE has brought me over the past month. April was the last time I bought a full-priced 360 game, and I really can't see myself doing it again until the holidays.

All of this has made me ponder the following discussion-worthy question: is XBox LIVE Arcade making us rethink the current philosophy of bank-breaking, world-destroying, blockbuster games? I'm content to live in a world where a new (ostensibly) NES Mega Man is a celebrated certainty, rather than the dream of a ROM-hacking madman.

Related Links:

Yahtzee Says, Support Your Local Independent Developer (He's Right).
Bionic Commando is Love: Bionic Commando Rearmed is Out. It Matters.
Mega Man 9 Goes Back To Your Roots. Way Back.

Yahtzee Says, Support Your Local Independent Developer (He's Right).

Nadia Oxford — Wed, 27 Aug 2008 22:42:00 GMT

If you're 1) a gamer and 2) not insane, then one of your favourite all-time games is Cave Story. Cave Story was planned, designed and developed by one demigod, the radiant Pixel. One of the greatest games of all time came from two arms, two eyes and one brain.

Cave Story works so well because the graphics, sound, story and gameplay all compliment each other beautifully. But what if Pixel had proposed the title to, say, EA and had a hive mind work on the game? For starters, it would look and sound radically different because players today are all about the big noises and shiny things according to the Big Men In Charge (which is why Mega Man 9 has everyone leaping like dogs at a lambchop). The aesthetic shift alone would have sent Cave Story's delicate feng shui swirling down the toilet.

Yahtzee talks about the importance of indie games this week, specifically Braid on XBLA. His argument for indie titles against corporate titles is that too many cooks spoil the broth—or rather, too many faceless men in suits destroy the original intent. Sometimes we all need to step back and clear our heads with games that don't stray far from the man or woman who originally thought up the idea.

I don't feel guilty for playing the likes of Mario or Metroid or God help me, Mega Man.. I also very clearly remember a time when developers had a lot of creative control over their games and still managed to mass-produce a lot of cock-ups that clogged the industry's arteries and eventually felled it. I'm a person of balance; things like crooked picture frames drive me insane. Thus, I understand that corporate regulations are sometimes an evil necessity...but I wholly support the independent scene with my enthusiasm, love and moolah (since that's ultimately what it needs instead of the former).

I r dumb. I didn't really “get” Braid when I played the demo, but I will buy the game in full and try harder. Nothing thrives on homogenisation, the game industry least of all. It needs all the creative infusions it can manage.

Related Links:

Indie Dev Moment: A Game a Month from Kloonigames
Yahtzee on E3: Are We Gaming in an Age of Uncreativity?
Yahtzee and the Webcomics Plague

Whatcha Playing: Cleaning House, Finding Roots

John Constantine — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 20:00:00 GMT

It has been well over a month since my last Whatcha Playing here at 61 Frames Per Second. The vicious truth of the matter is that I haven’t been playing that much since the beginning of July. The summer will do that to you. When the weather is as nice as its been here in the northeastern United States (mild, sunny as hell, great thunderstorms), its hard to devote eight hours of a Saturday to grinding RPG characters, engaging in manic shoot-outs, or even just taking in some classics (especially if your apartment isn’t air conditioned.) Last Thursday, though, I finally downloaded Bionic Commando Rearmed, a game I may have mentioned anticipating. Those first delicious minutes I spent grappling around the vibrant world GRIN created signaled one undeniable fact: come the weekend, it was time to play some freaking videogames.

But first I had to clean house. Twice a year, I take a look at my game library and growing collection of consoles and peripherals to take stock of what needs to stay, what can be tossed, and what needs to be reorganized. The process is cathartic. Old games in dire need of revisiting reclaim your attention, it’s determined what unbeaten titles need finishing, and old consoles end up reconnected to the TV for the first time in ages.

Cleaning house also reveals just what your predilections are. By the time I’d finished, the library was a bit lighter, and I had a nice smorgasbord put together for Saturday and Sunday. The Playstation 3 was going to get put through its paces with Bionic Commando, PixelJunk Eden, and Lair, the 360 would get love from Too Human and Braid, and the freshly reconnected Gamecube would play host to Metroid Fusion and a little Ninja Five-O.

What did I find out? Well, clearly, I have some kind of grappling hook obsession I need to work out. It also looks like my absence from playing games subconsciously drove me to get back to my platforming roots. I never did fire up Lair and played only a smattering of Too Human (more on those beasts later this week.) The craving for two-dimensions and precision jumps was undeniable. But it occurred to me that the games I was playing, Braid, Eden, and Bionic Commando, aren’t just relics of yesteryear but brand new games, full on fresh ideas. Seems developers broadly are cleaning house themselves these days and rediscovering just what works again.

Summer is in the home stretch now and fall’s bringing cool weather and games to match; the cutting edge of current technology and design will be our hands. A few months back, I felt rabid for the future and the evolution of three-dimensional, narrative driven design. But now that I’m finally playing on the regular again, I’m wondering just what it is I’ll be craving when the fall’s blockbusters arrive. Will I want the meaty story, the deep 3D space? Or will I just want to run and jump?

More Whatcha Playing:

Whatcha Playing: The New Adventures of the Nintendo DS
Whatcha Playing: Fallout (Metaphorically Speaking)
Whatcha' (Wish You Were) Playing: How Does Your Garden Grow?
Watcha Playing: Loving/Hating Mario Kart Wii
Whatcha Playing: How Many Buttons Do I Gotta Push?
Whatcha Playing: Fire Emblem is Pretty Hard
Whatcha Playing: Keeping the Beat, Drum Master Style
Whatcha Playing: A Little Singin’, a Little Dancin’
Whatcha Playing: Another Slice of Cake
Whatcha Playing: BS Zelda
Whatcha Playing: With a Little Help From My Friends