By Kieron Gillen on January 25th, 2010 at 10:03 am.

Let’s start the week with a little pre-release Indie-hype. You may remember Closure from us posting about it exactly a year ago (minus one day). You can still go and play the flashgame now. However, Messrs Glail and Schubbe are working on a full commercial downloadable version (The scale of difference being, to steal their metaphor, the difference between the first Mario Bros Arcade game and Super Mario World for the SNES). It’s already picked up an Indiecade innovation award, and has been shortlisted for 3 IGFs – in Technical Innovation, Sound and the Nuovo Innovation Award. More on their site and the first trailer below…
Except it won’t be out until 2011. Man!
Still – I’m reminded I should go and judge as many finalists as I can, as I haven’t started that. Perhaps some kind of round-up feature interviewing them all? It may be worth a shot, I figure.



25/01/2010 at 10:21 Richard Clayton says:
I played this when you first blogged about it and liked this a lot.
Would be a really interesting 3d (first-person) project too. Particularly if the puzzles could be solved using light and physics combined.
Thanks for reposting – I’ll take another look.
25/01/2010 at 10:24 MadMatty says:
Yo Kieron:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gE9TcY_bcEg
25/01/2010 at 10:31 Kieron Gillen says:
MadMatty: Yeah, I covered Indie games before. The Consolevania guys did a documentary about it.
KG
25/01/2010 at 11:56 MadMatty says:
Aww that was beeeeuttiiiful K.
Also, the guys at Mega64 play both sides of the fence, so heres the pro-indie one:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=617lGZjYyNo&NR=1
25/01/2010 at 11:58 MadMatty says:
“Watch Indie movies” LOL
25/01/2010 at 12:02 Kieron Gillen says:
MadMatty: I’d seen that one before, and it’s still funny.
I was also pleased to discover the Indie-movies gag still got a laugh from me.
(Also: “Forgive them lord – for they know not how to review”)
KG
25/01/2010 at 12:33 AndrewC says:
If you’re not Indie, F**K YOU!
Made Possible by Microsoft & Sony
I mean, That’s not a ‘Gotcha! U R Hippkrites!’ thing, but more a good glimpse into the actual world of Indie (which I’m guessing is pretty co-dependent?).
25/01/2010 at 13:10 MadMatty says:
checked out Consolevania, and it was super-sweet- how could i miss it? and now its gone!
good things can be said of advertisement- twas nice to see Cliffski and some others doing the rounds for their games.
Good thing i hooked up with RPS, coz i was starting to get the big-brother creeps from IGN etc.
Mega64 hypocritical? no such insinuation meant.
As long as theyre good at taking the piss, i hardly care what the subject might be.
Artists-Fans are a typical co-dependancy- how could it b otherwise?
You find somewhere / something that has the stuff youre looking for, and if they keep delivering it, you keep coming back.
25/01/2010 at 10:37 Scott says:
On a related note, I found today, If you haven’t seen it take a gander, rather excellent procedural platformer.
25/01/2010 at 10:38 Scott says:
WHY IS THERE NO EDIT BUTTON D:
25/01/2010 at 11:12 Jim Rossignol says:
Log in for edit button.
25/01/2010 at 11:27 CMaster says:
@Jim – I’m logged in (to WordPress) and have no edit button.
Edit: Ah, correction – I have no edit button to the posts made using my Gravatar account when not logged in.
Shame that being registered doesn’t prevent you from being impersonated really.
25/01/2010 at 18:04 Kieron Gillen says:
CMaster: You learn the RPS-secret code well.
KG
25/01/2010 at 10:44 CMaster says:
It really was a very clever game, the flash part of closure.
Here’s hoping that in a full version they make the controls a little better (jumping was a real chore) and capitalize on that creepy atmosphere a bit more.
25/01/2010 at 11:50 terry says:
You’re intending to play and cover all of them? Or a modest selection?
If the former I applaud your lunacy, there’s hundreds.
25/01/2010 at 11:51 Kieron Gillen says:
Terry: 3 of us are abstractly judges, so we played a bunch for selection. We should play the shortlist if we’re judging them too.
I’m thinking just hitting everyone who’s been shortlisted up for a brief, standard interiew. An Indie game a day, etc.
KG
25/01/2010 at 12:04 Richard Clayton says:
An Indie Game Interview-a-day sounds excellent. I think that the Indies are by far the most interesting sector of game development at the moment.
25/01/2010 at 12:14 CMaster says:
@KG I think this has taught us that when you say “abstractly” it doesn’t mean a good thing.
25/01/2010 at 23:01 Rosti says:
Re: “Abstractly” – Sure, it might not be precisely a good thing but hilarity will ensue. And that’s why I’m here, certainly.
25/01/2010 at 12:51 Saul says:
Due 2011?? The world might have ended by then.
Looks really interesting, though. I got a Dark Castle vibe, if I may venture outside the rubber room of the PC for a moment.
25/01/2010 at 13:43 Mistabashi says:
Now you mention it it does look rather Dark-Castle-ish doesn’t it? I’m not just talking about the obvious black & white angle, but the character animations and shading style are quite similar in places.
Anyways, this looks good, I enjoyed the flash version for a while but sadly puzzle-platformers just can’t hold my interest for long anymore. I picked-up Braid in the steam sale for about a quid fifty and have still barely touched it. I still very much appreciate it when new and interesting ones come along though, although I’m not certain why…