Link Dump Friday
November 21, 2008
So what if I told you I know a secret that you don't know? And what if I told you there was no way you could ever find out? Not even if you played every game below to completion, found some sort of hidden message at the end, compiled them into a single word and wrote that word on a piece of paper and put it in a bottle and tossed it out to sea. Nope, that would never work. The secret is mine!
Robo-Evolution - From the creator of the Moai games comes another simple (but less wacky) arcade-style time waster. Roll over items to add them to your queue, eventually building new parts for your body. Once you grab a few legs items (combs, RAM chips, etc.), for example, you get a nice set of workable legs! Very Katamari-esque.
Super Stacker - A fun little physics puzzle game where your only goal is to stack shapes and keep them stable for a set amount of time. Pieces appear at your cursor in the order shown at the top of the screen. Gently place them and, when the last block is set, the clock starts ticking. Cross your fingers and hope gravity is on your side.
The Short Term Memory Checker - From the creator of the room escape game Vision comes a simple, no-frills brain teaser. You are shown a handful of items. When you've memorized them, click "OK" to fill the screen with tons of other objects. Now pick out the ones you memorized. As you progress, more and more items appear for you to commit to memory. You'll come up with some great mnemonic stories for this one!
Stack'Em - A Javascript remake of the classic Columns puzzle game based on code created for the Intellivision version. It's tiny, the blocks are so small and cute, and, well, that's about it. Nothing new to show off gameplay wise, but for nostalgia's sake, it's pretty neat.
Patchworkz! new levels - Originally reviewed back in March, the jigsaw-esque game of pattern completion is back with brand new levels to complete. Compete against other players trying to fill in their own "quilts" at the same time to see who is the fastest.
Robo-evolution is, interesting. It has a great concept, but feels incomplete. Perhaps it was just the way I was playing but it seemed like the crab was the top tier of evolution, despite its shortcomings.
Stack'Em is not in Java, it's just javascript, that's what makes it nice.
The Short Term Memory Checker is interesting in that, cognitively, people can generally only hold about 5 to 7 bits of information at one time. Of course, one strategy is to lump several things together into 1 bit of information, but that takes work.
Is anybody else having issues with Safari and games affiliated with Game Jacket? Super Stacker gives me a security error similar to that given by Phantom Mansion (1&2). Game Jacket really doesn't seem to like Safari at all. In the case of Super Stacker, it says "Game Jacket security test failed. This may be a temporary problem. Please try again later." The game is satisfied, however, if I change Safari's user agent, so it identifies itself as FireFox (for example). PM wasn't so forgiving.
I had to use FireFox to play that one.
Anyone?
Robo-evolution is interesting but short and I don't understand. It seems that the point is to do it fast? I don't seem to be able to stray from the topmost path, either, and crab form is pretty slow and weird!
With roboevolution, I managed to make a squid, which was AWESOME. It was incredibly fast and moved much more smoothly than the crab. No idea how I made it, though...
I have found out how to choose your type of robot on Robo-Eveloution.
speed = blue = advancing right
power = red-orange = advancing diagonally
leg = green = neutral (I don't know if it helps you advance or not, but it doesn't make you go a certain direction.)
Super Stacker is fun. I like these physics - and balance - based games a lot. This one is easy to understand and play, it's straightforward, the levels I'm thru at the oment weren't too hard but not too easy to keep doing it.
I dunno if I utilised a bug aor it was part of the concept, but twice i won levels by having pieces in the air, falling off but not yet reaching the bottom when the clock ticked off :)
I like it a lot.
Agreed, bioLarzen. Super Stacker is great fun :)
I, too, have won a level with my piece in the air (it was actually off the bottom of the screen, probably another millisecond or so and I'd have lost)
I actually won at least four levels in such a fashion - for example the very last one :)
Here are the rules for Robo-Evolution as I have come to figure them out:
At the first stage you just evolve into the first legged robot after collecting a certain number of parts.
At the second and thrid Evolution stage you evolve along the lines of what you are domainte in (speed or power)
if you are even (ex. 6 speed : 6 power) you evolve "up" toward power.
You evolve after collecting a certain number of part (not sure how many).
So to make a crab: collect more power than speed at every stage
For a squid: collect first more power and then more speed at the next stage
For an incect: collect first more speed then more power at the next stage
For a spider: collect more speed at every stage.
Yay, new patchworkz levels! But boo, playing on that site again. It always "forgets" me, sometimes after a few levels, sometimes after dozen, putting me right back to the start again. Dunno what it is; I don't clear any cookies.
Also loving super stacker, though occasionally frustrated! :)
i finally figured out how to control the evolution of your creature in Robo-Evolution
the evolution progresses according to the amount of power and speed you have. i was able to get the squid by keeping leveling out the two and always having one more of a certain group to advance in that direction
Gah! I clicked the wrong button in Super Stacker and it took me back to the menu. It needs a level select to let me go back to the level I was on!
the short term memory checker gets hard once you have multiple objects that are alike; I messed up by clicking the wrong coin.
Robo Evolution was great!!
Squid was the best, maneuverability DREAM.
Get 2nd form
then Power 3rd and jack on the speed.
Squid is awesome ^.^
Squid Egg is more awesomer.
I'm sure patchwork used to remember me - but now I have to start at the beginning if I go back to it - anyone else have this problem?
Dunno if it's just me, but on Super Stacker, triangles seem to only drop when they feel like it. It's making it hard to get past level 7.
Umm....how in the world do you upgrade on Robo-evolution, is there a button? because I always end/finish after the second hurdle for some reason. I think I don't understand the rules? Not knowing Japanese might be the reason.
Yay! I did all the "Short term Memory" levels. I'm really proud I got all the items right the first time on the last level.
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