By Adam Smith on September 10th, 2012 at 9:00 am.
Hotline Miami may have been our game of the show at Rezzed, the galaxy’s foremost PC festival, but I recently found my personal top ten scrawled on the back of a beermat that was secured in the pocket of a faded corduroy jacket. qrth-phyl was on the list and as the game has now been release, I thought I’d share wot the beermat told me: “serpents dance, coil, vibrate and effervesce on every possible plane of psychotropia but it is unclear if they are the same snakes we once knew, now liberated from the sharp angles of dotty digestion; a bass line shudders, tangled tail becomes gobstopper, the rainbow evaporates and the sky turns in on itself”. It was a massive beermat. Launch trailer below.
Most people who played Leave Home (demo available), Hermit Games’ previous release, will probably already be looking forward to seeing what wonders await. As well as looking and sounding sumptuous, qrth-phyl is likely to have some thematic explorations in its kaleidoscopic evaluation of the Snake-shape.
Available now. Three dollars/one pound and ninety four pence.
10/09/2012 at 09:13 baby snot says:
Oh it looks like I’m having one less coffee tomorrow.
10/09/2012 at 09:15 RobF says:
You can get all Matt’s “for sale” games for less than four quid at the moment too, including QRTH PHYL. If you’ve not played the others, get in whilst they’re this cheap, they’re so so good.
Been playing QRTH PHYL lots since last night and it’s his best yet. It’s so coherent, so well realised and bloody confident with what it’s doing, it’s hard not to be impressed. The 3d space stuff is amazingly well realised too and the adaptive difficulty works a treat. Every time you hit start you’re faced with a new challenge because you never quite know what configuration it’s going to throw at you.
And the transitions! GOSH. So good and silly prices.
10/09/2012 at 13:11 FunktionJCB says:
Thanks for the tip, I didn’t notice there was a pack available.
Bought. ;)
10/09/2012 at 13:22 Shadowcat says:
Ditto. Admittedly I couldn’t care less about the bullet-hell shmup, but “Leave Home” looked interesting enough for an additional $2. As it turns out, QRTH PHYL is even more fun than I was hoping for, so I won’t even mind if the other game isn’t my cup of tea.
10/09/2012 at 09:26 SuperNashwanPower says:
Brings back the days spent not talking to my friends in the pub because I was playing Snake on their dayglo nokias.
11/09/2012 at 19:44 TechnicalBen says:
That’s terrible socials skills (still better than mine, I never got the social skills to convince them to lend me a phone, so had to use my own… ;) ).
10/09/2012 at 09:41 Zeewolf says:
Looks cool. It’s on Greenlight too. http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=92940165
“This game has attained 0% of necessary positive ratings so far”
Yay Greenlight! :-/
10/09/2012 at 09:57 Muzman says:
Is there a no chiptune version?
10/09/2012 at 10:21 RobF says:
They’re not tunes.
10/09/2012 at 10:50 Muzman says:
A no ‘chip audio based slap in the face with gratuitous nostalgia’ version perhaps then.
10/09/2012 at 11:08 RobF says:
Given the audio is hinged around AY emulation and is very much tied at the hip to your actions, nopers.
Hence, they’re not tunes! I’m not being sarcy although it might have come across that way. It’s an integral part of the game and how it feels.
10/09/2012 at 11:34 Muzman says:
No, fair play. I’m just kind of over chip-audio type noises is all. It looks good. The particular sound set is a bit of a hurdle. I can endure though. (aside: I do think games using embedded ‘music’ like that should dabble with interchangeable sound sets from time to time. Not a simple thing necessarily, but could be interesting.)
10/09/2012 at 11:52 RobF says:
Definitely, I’d love to see that done.
10/09/2012 at 11:01 GeeKay says:
Where’s the sale about Bob?
10/09/2012 at 11:04 GeeKay says:
Forget that, found the homepage :)
10/09/2012 at 11:08 GeeKay says:
To think I spent hours playing this…..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pJEjZHfas70
10/09/2012 at 18:54 someindiegames says:
another recommendation, this is lovely – as is Leave Home, so go get that bundle! what’s up with indie games at the moment? so much lovely stuff coming out these days, it’s hard to keep up.
11/09/2012 at 01:24 Daniel Klein says:
This is really good. Played 3-4 sequences, will definitely play more. Very absorbing and can’t wait to see what it will mutate into.