October 2008 Archives

You never quite know what to expect from Edmund McMillen. The neurotic dreamworlds of Aether. The cryptic poetry of Coil. The sheer tingling grossness of Meat Boy. McMillen consistently dances on the outside edge of predictable Flash gaming, with a unique and recognizable art style, and dark themes that bite close to the psychological bone. Here he is collaborating with Tommy Refenes, author of the highly anticipated Goo! (no relation to World of Goo) and a bit of an experimental gameplay maverick in his own right. The result is one of the best action games I've played in Flash, although its appeal may be limited for casual game fans.

Grey Matter is an anti-shooter, which means that you can't actually shoot. You are the bullet, and you attack by directly colliding with the exposed brain-meats of your enemies. Control your movement with the [Arrow Keys]. The [Space Bar] gives you a short burst of speed, and [Shift] slows you down, which is very useful for weaving through tightly-packed enemy fire. Various creepy-crawlies will attack from all sides of the screen, and although their bodies are vulnerable, their bullets, tails, teeth, and lasers are deadly. Basically anything flashing brightly can kill you. (By the way, if you're sensitive to flashing light patterns, skip this one.)

Press [P] or [Esc] to pause the game and enter the power-up screen, where you can spend points on shields, shields, and some other bonuses that are a lot less important than shields. Naturally the higher your score, the faster you can max out your bonuses, so it pays to master the combo system. Ram three sequential enemies of the same species to increase your score multiplier. This also triggers a Trinity Attack, which destroys anything caught inside the triangle formed by the last three baddies you killed. (Tip from the comments: "If you've purchased the "Options" power-up, holding down Shift will not only slow you down, it will extend the options away from you, so you have a larger kill range." Thanks, LSN!)

You'll need nimble fingers to play Grey Matter, because of the small moving targets you have to hit, and the sheer volume of bullets they'll send at you. Apparently, you can play using an XBox controller using a program called FlashJoystick (also by Refenes), but I don't have one, so I don't know if it makes the game any easier. Please let us know if you can get that feature to work.

Analysis: Grey Matter looks great and sounds even better, thanks to the music of Danny Baranowsky, who also composed for Meat Boy and Gravity Hook. The gameplay has all the depth of a modern professional shoot-'em-up, thanks to the combo system. Grey-Matter is perfectly playable without using the Trinity Attacks, but if you do employ them, it becomes almost like a hyperactive, twitchy puzzle game.

There are only a handful of levels, but they get real intense real fast. Beating the game repeatedly unlocks a few extra modes, including direct access to the battle with the incredibly dangerous and aggressive final boss. I can't say there's a lot of replay value beyond that, but like all the best action games, the pleasure here is in mastering the technique, rather than merely surviving.

Most of the neurological nightmares you'll fight can only fire when they are facing you, so try to attack from behind. You can travel on the decorative border on the edges of the screen, while they can not. So one possible strategy is to make calculated blitzing runs and return to relative safety. You'll probably die anyway, but at least you'll have a strategy.

The most interesting thing about Grey Matter for me, though, is the theme of mental illness threaded through it, in the form of ambiguous quotations at the loading screen and between levels. Initially these quotes may seem like window-dressing, but they left a footprint on my mind long after I shut down the game. McMillen has left the connection between the theme and the gameplay deliberately vague, but anyone who has had experience with depression or schizophrenia will find echoes of that darkness in Grey Matter's weird, abstract brain-scape. It's an intimate stamp on a memorable shoot-'em-up. If you can handle the difficulty, this comes highly recommended.

Play Grey Matter

If the game runs slowly, you can also download it here.

Use your point-and-clicking skills to locate items, and use those items to help you make your escape. Simple and fun, just right for everyone.

Play The Great Basement Escape

Celebrating 0.25 years of Link Warble Dump Friday, bringing you banana boxes full of games wrapping 6.5 times wah a year. (Note: Due to an unfortunate alignment of Jupiter and Mars, you must multiply every calendar-based figure I speak of by eight and ignore all words that begin with the letter 'W'. Except for "words".) Oh, and happy Halloween!

• HDOS Databank request 01 - A simple tile-flipping puzzle game clothed in a government computer hacking program. One description says the game is a tribute to Tetris Attack / Planet Puzzle League / Panel De Pon / Puzzle Frenzy / Yoshi's Island / Pokemon Puzzle Challenge / Half-Life / Portal. Play it and you'll see what that means!
• Boombot 2 - A follow-up to Ninja Kiwi's original Boombot, the sequel features better level design, new items to play around with, and, well, BOMBS. Simply place bombs and blow the happy little guy to the exit. This time a level editor is built right into the game, so you can destroy and create with minimal amount of effort.
• Air Battle - Pilot your steampunk-inspired craft around the stage, collecting coins and avoiding obstacles that can pop the balloons keeping you afloat. Use the mouse to fire your cannon to combat baddies, or just hover over and pop their balloons first!
• Orchestrated Death - A short point-and-click game of sorts where you play the invisible role of Death trying to... well... kill people. Some puzzles require proper timing, others just the right sequence of events to take place. It's morbid and pretty gruesome, but hey, today is Halloween.
• Daruma Game - Based on a traditional Japanese game, simply pull back the ball and smack the tiles to bring the face block safely down to the floor. Knock the face off the screen and it's game over. Scroll down a bit to find the embedded game.

A new Bart Bonte game has just been released, this one a sequel to an entry from our "ball physics" competition a year ago.

Factory Balls 2 is a unique and original puzzle game in which you must match a target ball by adding elements from those given, one at a time. Just drag one of the balls from the rotating bin and drop it over top one of the tools shown. Order is important, and so you must plan your moves carefully.

Play all the Factory Balls games:

Nion is a stylish arcade-style game that incorporates a number of gameplay modes, including puzzle, accuracy, speed, survival, and several combinations of the above. It's built around the simple mechanic of shooting shapes that hover around the top of the screen. The order, how they're disposed of, how fast and accurately you must work, and the number of shots you use change depending on the game mode you're in. It's a very well-done game that keeps everything simple while offering up a number of different experiences.

The first game mode, Puzzle, introduces you to the basics and serves up a nice and calm experience. Your goal is to eliminate all of the shapes using as few shots as possible. When a shot strikes a shape a small shockwave emanates from the impact point that will destroy nearby objects. Aim true and time your clicks just right and earn a Gold ranking for each level.

Once you complete the bulk of the Puzzle levels you'll gain access to Arcade mode which, as the name suggests, focuses on action rather than puzzle solving. In the first mode you'll need to eliminate all of the shapes within the specified time period without missing. Later you unlock Color mode that features the same rules, only now you have to change the color of your shots to eliminate like-colored shapes.

There are a few more game modes to play beyond Puzzle and Arcade, but they'll only become available once you complete most of the first two areas. You'll also come across a good variety of shapes, each with its own behavior. Stars fade in and out of existence, triangles and circles like to slide around, and "S" blocks explode when you strike them, sending flak out in a small radius and taking care of any stray shapes in the area. My personal favorite are the purple arrows that, when shot, fire out their own blast in the direction they point. It helps to make pewpewpew noises when that happens, trust me.

Analysis: Nion wins points in my book for its simple audio/visual style and the way it integrates a variety of gameplay styles into one package. The atmosphere set by the sparsely-colored screens is dark and a bit intense, drawing you in even further. The ability to skip and choose levels keeps frustration at bay, though I still found myself stumped a few times.

My only complaint with Nion is that it requires a little too much time and effort to unlock more advanced game modes. I like the concept of having to earn them, but working through two thirds of the first few modes is tougher than it may seem, and while the game is extraordinarily forgiving when it comes to unlocking things, I still wanted to experience the last few modes much earlier in the game.

A simple game with a simple setup that rewards you with varied gameplay. With six modes of play and 144 stages in all, Nion is just what I like to see in a casual game.

Play Nion

Halloween, in part, has its roots in the ancient celtic festival of Samhain. On October 31st, ancient Gaels believed that the border between the worlds of the living and the dead disappeared, and for that night ghosts were a real, tangible threat. Is it true? Probably not. But we can pretend, and get into a deliciously spooky mood, with Ghostscape.

Ghostscape, a new escape game by Psionic, is just chock full of supernatural goodness. You play a veteran investigator of the occult who, upon hearing rumors of a haunted house, cannot stay away...and what a paranormal gold mine it turns out to be! Chairs and cups move as if grasped by some invisible hand, mysterious diary entries litter the floor, grotesque paintings adorn every room. And then, of course, there are the ghosts. But who would believe you? Luckily, you have your trusty camera to provide proof. You'll spend much of your time photographing phenomena and collecting evidence, but along the way you'll begin to unravel the story of a very disturbing crime... and, as the door has conveniently slammed shut and locked behind you, you'll need to calm the restless spirits before making your escape.

Ghostscape is very good-looking. The environments are heavily atmospheric, draped with shadow and splattered with blood, and evoke a wonderfully creepy aura. The game is not very difficult; there's zero pixel-hunting (which I appreciate), and the solutions to most of the puzzles are basically handed to you. This doesn't make it any less enjoyable, however. It's a ton of fun to play ghost hunter, and your many tasks keep you constantly engaged even as you learn of the house's terrible past. The game's interface is simple and user-friendly; clicking on the inventory button leads to a handy to-do list of things to photograph and provides access to the occult items you've collected, whereas more generally helpful items (such as a crowbar and your camera) are kept on the main screen. Nothing fancy here.

In the end, really, the plot of the game becomes secondary to the overall experience of moving through such a fun and fantastic setting. More than anything else, Ghostscape reminds me of an extremely well-executed haunted house, one you might visit with your friends; the environment is way too over-the-top to be truly terrifying, and the scares are more thrills than chills. Which, in my opinion, is perfect for the Halloween season!

I ain't afraid of no ghosts:

Play Ghostscape

Boohbah Zone is a surreal journey— wait, no, it's not really a journey. It's more of a... thing. A thing with lots of colors. Well, it's kind of like a webtoy, but you actually do stuff in some parts of it. Interactive art? You know what, forget classifying it, Boohbah Zone is an extremely bizarre collection of game-like scenes where you play with color, sound, and flobby-looking hippopotamus-like people things. That sounds about right. Oh, and it's based on the Boohbah television show created by the folks behind Teletubbies, so be sure and bring the kids in on this one.

Boohbah Zone is made up of a few dozen simple mini-game-like scenarios where you can interact with the mouse and watch stuff happen. Similar to Blue Suburbia in some ways (yeah, that's a bit of a stretch there), Boobah Zone drops you in different locales and leaves it up to you to figure out what to do. Maybe you click on the swirly rainbow thing to change its color? Maybe you'll arrange hippopotamus people to face the same direction? Or maybe you'll just watch the strange dance while you turn bits of the music on and off. Who knows. It's Boohbah.

From the opening screen you can either click the bubbles in the sky to visit different mini-games or make the rainbow swirl fill in at the bottom and click the present to select a few more. One consistent element in Boohbah Zone is the "back" icon at the lower left of each screen. Click this and you'll return to the previous screen, just in case what you've stumbled across was too "out there" for your human mind to handle.

So... yeah. Boohbah Zone. Whether the mini-game has a goal or not, you'll have a lot of fun trying to find out.

Play Boohbah Zone