RPS Feature Beautiful, ingenious and a little bit filthy
Headlander [official site], Double-Fine and Adult Swim’s skull-swapping Metroidvania affair is nothing like as funny as it probably thinks it is, but fortunately it’s a quiet delight in so many other ways. It’s also filthy.
Headlander [official site] made me think of Wall-E, except there’s only one human left in the robot-run offworld colony. Technically, the bots are humans of a sort, the entire race having transferred their consciousness from its fleshy confines into new robotic bodies. Those robots are under the authority of a wicked computer and it’s up to the last meat-person (YOU) to save the day. Problem is, you’re outnumbered. Oh, and you don’t have a body. Cue body-switching, ability-gathering, side-scrolling action.
Wasted [official site] is “a roguelike post-apocalyptic pub crawler”, which instantly places it high on the list of things I’d like to play. And play it I did, right before heading out to E3 last week. I haven’t spent enough time to deliver a full judgement but it’s a game worth placing a spotlight on, with some smart progression mechanics and a Fallout meets Adult Swim sense of humour. It was indeed published by Adult Swim’s gaming arm and has been receiving regular rounds of boozy updates since release.
Duck Game [Steam page] made me swear at an empty room this morning. Not because one of the other ducks trapped me in a bubble and threw me off the edge of a level (although that did happen), not because a shotgun blasted me backwards through a door in a flurry of feathers (that also happened) and not because I popped on some plate mail only to run into a duck with a magnet, which he used to rip the sword out of my clutches and then clamped the magnet to my armour before lobbing me into a pit (also a thing that happened).
Duck Game made me swear because I couldn’t fucking believe I haven’t been playing it every day since it released. It’s brilliant.
I haven’t written anything about Kentucky Route Zero yet, but Floor 3: Bears is my gaming moment of the year. I bloody love bears, me. I’ve got three t-shirts with bears on them, my desktop wallpaper is a bear, and I have bought my baby daughter two outfits which make her appear to be some extremely cute human/bear hybrid with poor motor skills. So you’re goddamned right that I clicked on the link for Adult Swim broswer game ‘Holy Crap, Bears!!‘ the second I saw it. I regret nothing.
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Craig wrote about Westerado back in January, but I like to think we live in a time where there is no past or future, only an eternal present. Also I first heard about it at the weekend and it’s swell.
Westerado is a western-set RPG in which your brother and mother are killed and you want to find who did it and avenge their deaths. Only, it’s an open world game, you don’t know where that person is, and they look different every time you start the game.
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RPS Feature Lose Yourself To Dance
Soundodger was absolutely excellent back when I played its original free release earlier this year, but has it somehow become horrible in its frenzied dance lust for more? That unlikely question was brought to you by a need to artificially build contrived tension, and its answer is a resolute, incontrovertible “NOPE.” Soundodger+ brings new songs and the ability to make levels out of your own music, but also a price tag. Make no mistake, however: it’s worth the money. Here’s wot I think in the form of both wordshapes and THE MOST MEANINGFUL VIDEO I HAVE EVER MADE.
