In this adventure you play three different characters, each of them stuck in a different time period of the location. Objects can be swapped between them through thier time machines and some puzzles must be solved by changing the future or letting objects age through time.

I like to play point-and-click games at Adventure Game Studio.  The games usually are very good and they are made by whoever.  The games are quite addictive.  Last night I forwent my devotional time because I played one of these games until it was time for me to go to bed.  It was the first time in a while that I did that and I did miss it.There is a free game engine that the people at Adventure Game Studio wrote.  I think the only condition for using it is to post a link and description on the website.  You can make commercial games with it but I think that you should probably get a better game engine for that.  For a hobby, it kind of makes sense.

I had the software on my computer a while ago.  I never got anywhere though.  The storyline and logic puzzles are probably more central to the game than the programming part.  Therefore, it is a good idea to have a good idea first.  My first tries with making a game were met with failure because I didn’t have a storyline, wasn’t that dedicated to the project, and unfamiliarity with Flash when I was experimenting with Flash.

It seems like the good games take about three years.  That was how much time a previous game that I played took.  Even though I didn’t like it all that much (too mazey with several different rooms that looked nearly the same on each “level”), it was well done.  That is how much time the game that I played last night took.

That game was written by a 8-year-old!  He probably had help with the logic puzzles and most of the actual game.  However, he hand-drew all the scenes and all the animated sections.  For example a waterwheel spins with probably 3 or 4 different drawings.  Most full-length games, I have to consult (okay, rely on) a walkthrough about 1/2 of the way through the game.  This was no exception.  The puzzles make sense once I know how to do them.  (Sometimes I’m baffled after the walkthrough with solutions that do not make sense.)

He could have used some help with spelling.  Spelling was atrocious. In practically every dialog box from talking to another character, there are several spelling errors.  Probably I shouldn’t be too hard on him; he’s a 8-year-old after all.  If he was older and still writing like this, then that would be a problem.  I guess its kind of how I was raised: to automatically notice spelling errors.  I notice every misspelled and mis-capitalized error on the song lyrics at my church.

So this site is definitely worth checking in out.  Try the Ben Jordan: Paranormal Investigator series.  Also the game that I played last night was “Life of D. Duck II.”  Perhaps I should play number one now.

“Chapter 4: The Trial and Execution of Guybrush Threepwood brings the story back around and ties together the adventure with a mixture of both expected and unexpected plot twists. Having grown accustomed to a steady stream of humor and cleverness found in past episodes, the laugh-out-loud moments don’t seem to appear quite as frequently in this latest chapter, and it takes longer for the momentum to build. The good news is things eventually do pick up and the insanity that unfolds in the final moments of this stretch of the journey is worth muscling through to the end. You can expect the forthcoming last episode will be one worth waiting for.”

Check out the full review here at Cheat Code Central.

Link to review

Sam and Max return for another season of 5 new episodes of madness for you to solve!

Keeping in line with Season 1, the game follows the ‘don’t fix what aint broke’ concept of things and continues with the same puzzling point an click adventure game that made the first season a hit.

There’s 5 more episodes for you to get your troublesome crime fighting duo back into the swing off things filled with classic Sam and Max humour to keep the fans going or even those on the same level of humour entertained. Those used to the series can expect plenty of familiar faces and even those more familiar with Season one will recognise plenty of ‘friends’ to encounter.

Much like the first, puzzling game play will be broken up with an occasional mini game of sorts, including driving down the streets looking for the new ‘Torture Me Elmer’ to run over.

Unfortunately, the game is more of the same. Which in some ways is great. Others not.

For some the game play will become rather monotonous fast and will shortly become bored with having to talk to all the characters and click around on all the objects in places for clues. I found playing I with a friend a lot more easier as I found them playing it got me more involved when it came to just helping out, and as I wasn’t the key player, I could zone in and zone out when needed. However, this isn’t really how the games intended to be played.
Reduced: 90% of original size [ 799 x 449 ] – Click to view full image

Majority of arcade games are used for killing time, or classics. Usually, played when bored, waiting or to allow a download to continue without you being bored out of your skull. Either way, there very jump in jump out orientated. Sam and Max is far from it, its big and definitely will keep you going, but to which extent is really up to the gamer and your tastes, at points, I’d happily just watch an episode or two rather than sit through 5 episodes of long, repetitive and tiresome gaming, still only one for the big fans of Sam and Max.

5

Link to review

“There’s nothing like waking up after being unceremoniously dumped into a heap of scrap only to find your head and limbs have gone missing amidst the filthy debris. Making a crummy situation worse, mechanical hooligans have strapped a large, makeshift bomb to the central tower in the looming industrial city you were just booted from, and your shiny lady friend is nowhere to be found. Being a little droid in a gritty robot world is tough business, but it’s worth pushing through the many seemingly insurmountable obstacles you’ll face in order to get to the heart of what makes Machinarium tick.”

Check out the full review here at GamesRadar.

Amanita Design’s latest is the adventure game Machinarium. Like their earlier games it is also a point-and-click adventure with a lot of puzzles thrown in. Unlike, say, Samorost 2, the action revolves more strongly around the game’s hero, the little robot Josef, who possesses many qualities useful in an action game protagonist: He has telescopic hands and a body that can be adjusted either higher or lower, a lot of storage space and most importantly has a mission.

Josef’s adventure begins at a waste deposit outside an aged robot town. As the game progresses you find out that the city is being terrorised by a group of evil robots, who refer to themselves as the Black Hat Society. They plan to blow up a tower in the city and have taken Josef’s girlfriend as a prisoner and are using her as a cook. The plot may sound like the archetypal videogame tale of princesses with men trying to save them, but there are many details that set Machinarium apart from any other video games you might have played.

First off the setting. All the game surroundings are handdrawn and look stunningly beautiful. Screenshots of the game, mind you, do not do the game justice: There are so many small details hidden within every area you stumble into. Instead of just static backgrounds there can be a small waterfall, or some funny character animations.

There is a surprising amount of depth to Machinarium’s robotic characters as you find out throughout the story. Instead of dialogue or text, all communication between Josef and the other robots is relayed with a bubble that plays a simple animation, which can tell the player what is needed to solve a puzzle or appease a certain character and sometimes simply tells us more of them. The animations detailing Josef’s relations to the evil robots especially come to mind.

Another thing I was taken aback by in the game was how emotional and engaging the story was. There is something very cute and moving about Machinarium’s robots. It is the heartrending imagery of the Black Hat Society committing increasingly evil deeds and also the animation and subtle sound effects that help in this. Also every new area, especially towards the end, began to create a feeling of awe.

And awe is the word best describing Machinarium.  Everyone who has played a point-and-click adventure at some time or who likes puzzles will love this game. People not fitting the earlier description should try the demo out, but keep in mind that the three first levels don’t give a good picture of the sweetness toward the mid and end-parts of the game. An instant classic. Go play it already.

First published October 25th here at Ace Gamez – Point and click adventures have enjoyed a massive resurgence recently with iPhone iterations of Beneath a Steel Sky and Monkey Island currently selling like hotcakes on iTunes, as well as a string of superb newcomers such as Zombie Cow’s hilarious indie project Ben There, Dan That! True to the staples of the genre, any good point and click developer worth its salt will deliver a game world rich in history, interesting characters, smatterings of humour and a novel’s worth of narrative. But what happens when you take away the latter and present the same experience without anyone uttering a single word? Machinarium may deliver a  point and click title every bit as slick and enjoyable as its peers, but it breaks one of the key conventions of the genre by being entirely mute, save for the atmospheric soundtrack and odd sound effect. The result is every bit as emotive and haunting as any text or dialogue-heavy game available today.

Created over three years by independent studio Amanita Design, the painstaking hand-drawn visuals have a distinct Tim Burton quality, also appearing similar to David Hellman’s stunning artwork for 2008 cult hit Braid. The brief intro sequence depicts an eerily silent and barren land, save for the looming robot metropolis on the horizon, rusted and crumbling beyond whatever prime it once had. It’s a bleak image, made all the more unsettling due to the minimal soundtrack, begging you to question what happened to all the humans who perhaps once lived here. Suddenly, there is a break in the stillness as a garbage ship flies across the sky to a nearby dump, tipping out a heap of scrap metal including the body parts of Machinarium’s nameless robot hero. While the little chap never utters a word, he’s instantly likeable with two eyes that sort of look in different directions, a habit of being incredibly clumsy and a penchant for eating inventory items.

The story that follows is incredibly heartfelt, as the courageous robot overcomes hurdle after hurdle to reach the heart of the city, foil a robo-terrorist bomb plot and get the girl. Your first task is to help the disassembled robot get back to one piece, by bartering with a metallic insect to get his leg back and constructing a magnet grappling hook to fish his detached arm out of a pond. While these initial tasks are relatively simple, many of the puzzles in Machinarium do fall into the common trap of having ludicrous solutions, hindered further by hiding invaluable objects out of plain sight. It is often much easier to walk around each screen, clicking every inch of the environment to uncover useable items or points of interest, rather than toil over pre-planning each solution in the first instance. In many cases, common logic simply doesn’t apply, unfortunately diluting the sense of strategy and problem solving.

Where similar titles let you click on every potentially usable item on screen at any one time, here you must get the robot in range before points of interest become selectable. It makes sense that, physically, grabbing an item from the opposite side of an area would be impossible, but it does make the game a lot harder at some points. Also frustrating is the inclusion of items that must be clicked several times before it reveals its true purpose, meaning you can potentially hammer your mouse over an object a few times then give up, assume the item is worthless and, by doing so, miss a valuable piece of the puzzle. However, these are relatively minor niggles when stacked up against the many areas where the game excels.

While you will come across a slew of usable items along the way, inventory clutter is thankfully kept to a minimum even when puzzles branch out across several screens. This allows the game to zing along at a pleasing pace, moving away from laborious, multi-faceted puzzles found in some genre counterparts. Moving away from a reliance on inventory items, height is an interesting concept thrown into the mix to keep puzzles taxing. You can stretch the robot’s body to make him short or tall, letting him scuttle under small spaces or grab out of reach items. One notable screen sees the robot squeezing out of a dank prison cell and escaping through a sewage pipe, only to resurface underneath a table next to a gun-toting robot that will shoot you on sight. Knowing when to poke your head out of the manhole to grab useful items and when to duck down is the key to success here, adding a sense of urgency and tension to a puzzle that could have happily remained slow and laboured.

Of course, the addition of height-based puzzles requires you to think even further outside of the box, but again falls into a trial and error process of clicking on every possible point of interest at every possible height. It’s a shame that some essential items are poorly sign-posted in this manner, such as painfully small switches that can be hidden in plain sight for ages until you happen to hover your pointer over it by sheer luck, but again these brick wall moments are few and far between. The addition of puzzles that don’t require items to solve is a neat concept, such as re-wiring circuit boards and working out the correct position of switches, adding another layer of thought to the process.

Juggling so many puzzling elements at once is not a radical departure for the genre, but it can test your patience and thought process to the utter limit in some instances. So if you really do get stuck, a helpful hint button in the top right of the screen can be used once per screen to give you a brief visual clue to help you on your way. Rather than serve as a cop-out, this single clue only usually points you in the right direction instead of solving the puzzle for you. If you are absolutely, hopelessly stuck, the entire walkthrough guide can also be accessed from the menu, but at a price. To unlock the guide book you must complete an infuriatingly difficult mini-game in the style of arcade classic Scramble, where you must guide a floating key through a cavern riddled with jumping spiders. The game is nigh-on impossible in an attempt to dissuade you from using the guide at all and, to be fair if you are willing to toil over this mini-game for ages then you might as well just get on with the puzzle instead.

Perhaps the biggest draw of Machinarium is its astounding aesthetic quality, recognised recently at the 12^th annual Independent Games Festival where it scooped the Excellence in Visual Art award. The broken and decaying robot city is a wonderful backdrop for the robot’s quest, complimented by Thomas Dvorak’s unsettling and beautiful soundtrack that together make for an engaging experience. While the lack of dialogue is incredibly powerful, plot devices are delivered through a series of animated thought bubbles that are just as touching and emotive as the core story. An incredibly powerful moment sees the robot thrown into a dank jail cell surrounded by darkness. The poorly-lit cramped room is the only thing visible on screen, really hitting home the sense of isolation and hopelessness of the robot’s predicament. It’s a touching moment helped along by the minimal bass soundtrack, breaking every so often with chilling, indecipherable robotic chatter.

Machinarium is a solid and thoroughly enjoyable point and click adventure and while it’s not without fault, these are passing annoyances rather than sticking points that will sour the experience. This is quite clearly a labour of love for the seven-strong Czech studio, made evident throughout every painstakingly intricate screen and touching flashback from the plucky and instantly loveable lead. There is a real sense of achievement here each time you crack a puzzle, comparable to figuring out a solution in Braid or Portal, making the slog more than worth it. The only real issue is the poor signposting which might result in some players gazing blankly at the screen, concocting ludicrous solutions when really the answer was simple and staring them in the face the whole time, or hidden under another item. But to overlook the game based on such trivial setbacks is to miss out on one of the most breathtaking point and click games available today.

84%

Depuis quelques années, l’industrie du jeu vidéo se lance dans une course effrénée au chiffre d’affaires. Les budgets explosent (près de 100 millions de dollars pour GTA IV) et les licences deviennent de plus en plus rentables grâce à une pléthore de suites. Les jeux s’ouvrent au grand public pour engranger d’autant plus d’argent dans les caisses. Paradoxalement, de petits studios indépendants sont de plus en plus nombreux à se lancer dans l’aventure. Du développement à l’édition, ils démontrent qu’il est encore possible de réaliser un jeu de qualité à moindres coûts. Les récents succès de World of Goo ou de Braid en témoignent. Dernier en date, Machinarium, un jeu d’aventure tout droit sorti de l’antre d’Amanita Design. Et déjà encensé par la presse comme un véritable bijou vidéo-ludique.

Bonjour, voici... heu... un petit être robotique désireux de retrouve son chez-lui.

L’histoire commence avec un robot, éjecté de sa ville et séparé de sa promise. Ce petit autochtone automate va devoir se frayer un chemin à travers un monde entièrement mécanique. Dans ce ʺpoint and clickʺ, pas l’ombre d’un dialogue. Tout n’est que rouages, antennes, boutons et tuyaux. Et notre protagoniste de tôle – bien plus sobre que Bender et bien moins téméraire que R2-D2, mais tout aussi attachant – évolue d’une scène à l’autre en résolvant des énigmes. Rien d’original : des objets à ramasser, à combiner, et à utiliser à l’endroit et au moment opportun. Certains casse-têtes sont poussifs, mais tous restent d’une logique absolue : on est bien loin des puzzles loufoques de Runaway. Ce petit droïde communique donc avec les autres robots au moyen de bulles de bandes-dessinées. Elles donnent des indications primordiales à la progression : elles désignent un objet à trouver ou une action à réaliser. Mais parfois, ces bulles se remplissent de flash-back. Une manière d’en apprendre un peu plus sur la vie du personnage et de s’immiscer dans un univers beaucoup plus humain qu’il n’y paraît.

Les décors se scindent souvent en vignettes. Un style poétique et très emprunté de la BD.

Plus que de faire cogiter le joueur, le propre de Machinarium est de l’enchanter. C’est une véritable incitation au voyage. Chaque décor du jeu émerveille : les dessins fourmillent de détails, et l’arrière-plan souvent griffonné ne fait que rajouter davantage de poésie à l’ambiance déjà envoûtante. Cerise sur le gâteau, le jeu mérite d’être parcouru rien que pour la bande originale. Des sonorités souvent indéfinissables, mais toujours oniriques. Douces ou saturées, elles rythment le parcours de notre petit robot. Un parcours semé d’embuches, mais qu’il est toujours possible de dénouer grâce à un double système d’aide. Première étape, une bulle qui donne idée du déroulement de la situation. Si vraiment le joueur bloque toujours, il est possible d’avoir la solution complète de la scène – après avoir passé un mini-jeu d’arcade relativement fastidieux. Mais rien que la planche d’esquisse décrivant la marche à suivre pour résoudre l’énigme en vaut la chandelle.

Un exemple des "dialogues" du personnage. Simpliste, mais redoutablement efficace.

On pourrait reprocher au jeu sa faible durée de vie. L’aventure – bien qu’intense – peut durer moins de cinq heures pour un joueur aguerri. D’autant plus que le jeu, réalisé intégralement en Flash, ne permet pas de déplacements rapides. Mais les quelques défauts de Machinarium sont vite gommés par son ambiance insaisissable et sa réalisation irréprochable, surtout au vu des moyens dont bénéficient les petits gars d’Amanita Design. Pour obtenir ce chef-d’œuvre, il vous faudra vous délester d’une quinzaine d’euros. Le jeu, disponible sur le site des développeurs, est d’ailleurs téléchargeable avec l’intégralité des musiques. Au final, Machinarium reflète la créativité de ses développeurs : c’est un jeu bourré de talent et d’instants émouvants pour une expérience magique.

Akyryn

Kojarzycie taką firmę jak Coktel Vision?

Ja na pierwszy rzut ucha też nie, ale okazuje się, że spod łapsk Francuzów wyszły takie perełki jak m.in.  Inca, Gobliiins, Lost in Time czy Urban Runner oraz gra będąca bohaterem mojej dzisiejszej recenzji czyli Woodruff and the Schnibble of Azimuth (tu i ówdzie tytułowana jako The Bizarre Adventures of Woodruff and the Schnibble).

Od banału aż po głębokie horyzonty

Fabuła Woodruffa rozpoczyna się dość banalnie. Mateczka Ziemia staje w obliczu wielkiego niebezpieczeństwa: tym razem światu zagraża wojna nuklearna. Tyle, że pośród ludzi nie rodzi się bohater, który owej wojnie mógłby zapobiec, co w efekcie kończy się niemal całkowitym zniszczeniem trzeciej planety od słońca. Ruiny dopełnia fakt, że tereny, które cudem uniknęły skutków wojny, w wyniku silnego napromieniowania nie nadają się do jakiejkolwiek egzystencji.

Wobec tego obrazu nędzy i rozpaczy, grupka ludzi wpada na pomysł aby zejść do undergroundu, a konkretnie do jądra Ziemi, którego wytwarzana energia pozwoli przetrwać ludzkiej rasie z nadzieją, że “kiedyś” będzie lepiej…

Mijają wieki. Wreszcie ktoś z nowego pokolenia ludzi rzuca pomysł aby wydostać się na powierzchnię i zorientować się czy promieniowanie z przeszłości wciąż się utrzymuje. Ku zdziwieniu ludzkiej ekspedycji świat nie przypomina już spopielonych metropolii, a stał się czymś w rodzaju dżungli rodem z przygód Tarzana.

Co ciekawsze, wśród tej bujnej natury pojawiło się kilka nowych ras stworzeń, w tym dominująca w nowym świecie, pacyfistycznie uosobiona rasa Buzków (w krótkiej charakterystyce różniącej ich od ludzi można wymienić: ogony, królicze uszy i długie nosy).

Niespodziewanie jednak okazuje się, że ludzie przez długi okres czasu zdążyli chyba zdziczeć w podziemiach planety, bowiem w stosunku do Buzuków postanowili rozpętać wojnę i większość z nich wybić, tak jak myśliwi czynią na ogół z kaczkami.

Ludzkie człowieczeństwo, tak eksponowane choćby w czasach romantyzmu, nie przetrwało tej próby. Buzuckie niedobitki zostały wygnane do zamkniętego miasta o nazwie Vlurxtrznbnaxl i odtąd miały być zdane tylko na siebie, w większości przypadków żyjąc na skraju nędzy i ubóstwa. Co, gorsza wśród Buzuków wykształcił się też stan trzymający władzę i napiętnujący  resztę Buzuków, na czele z prezydentem miasta i jego prawą ręką, faktycznie sprawującym władzę BigWigiem.

Czyńmy dobro

Buzukowie jako rasa najpierw bezwzględnie pozbawiona swoich praw przez ludzi, a następnie kontrolowana przez grupę Buzuków trzymających władzę, jest dodatkowo piętnowana przez kryzysy ekonomiczne nawiedzające słabo położone Vlurxtrznbnaxl. To wszystko sprawia, że te sympatyczne stworki żyją teraz w skrajnie słabych warunkach, albo popadając w alkoholizm, albo zwyczajnie staczając się na dno.

Jeden z nielicznych Buzuków, któremu leżał na sercu los swojego narodu, niejaki profesor Azymut postanowił zaradzić tej sytuacji. W czasie swych badań nad czasem natknął się przypadkowo na legendę o Szniblu, legendarnym buzuckim bohaterze. Ponoć jego przybycie po latach ma wyrwać Buzuków spod jarzma niesprawiedliwości i zła. Azymut podekscytowany tym odkryciem postanowił podzielić się nim na radzie naukowej Buzuków, chcąc dać nadzieję swoim pobratymcom na “lepsze jutro”.

Okazało się to błędem bowiem w gestii prezydenta i BigWiga, dobro Buzuków było sprawą drugorzędną.

Tym samym BigWig zaplanował plan porwania profesora Azymuta, który z prawdziwą rozkoszą wprawił szybko w życie. Okazuje się jednak, że profesor przewidział ten ruch, w ostatniej chwili wykańczając swoje wielkie dzieło… Woodruffa.

Ów pół buzuk pół człowiek, genezą powstania nawiązujący do bohatera powieści Mary Shelley tylko dzięki Viblefrotzerowi uzyskał pełną dojrzałość (choć jego zachowanie wielokrotnie przypomina zachowanie dziecka), ale w wyniku przemian jakie w nim zaszły utracił pamięć. Jego ostatnim wspomnieniem jest widok wstrętnego pana strzelającego do jego pluszowego misia i tkwiące w podświadomości słowo Sznible…

Czy Woodruff będzie w stanie odzyskać świadomość, uratować profesora Azymuta i pomścić śmierć misia? Ha, w tym momencie pojawia się gracz i to on o tym wszystkim zadecyduje.

Główni aktorzy

Głównym bohaterem gry jest wspomniany Woodruff. Zachowując wszelkie proporcje pomiędzy Olimpem, a światem Buzuków pochodzenie Woodruffa można przyrównać do pochodzenia Heraklesa – jest to bowiem pół człowiek, pół Buzuk, efekt pracy laboratoryjnej swojego bohaterskiego ojca. Odważny młokos wielokrotnie nie stroni od przyjmowania pozy ciamajdy, ale w rzeczywistości to bystry, a w dodatku pełen humoru stwór.

Wspomniany profesor Azymut to nie tylko przybrany ojciec Woodruffa, ale i wielki uczony krainy Buzuków, który wstawił się w innowacyjnych badaniach nad czasem. To właśnie Azymut odkrył nadejście mitycznego Sznibla, buzuckiej alfy i omegi, czym zresztą srogo przepłacił stając się obiektem zemsty BigWiga.

Owe imię budzące grozę już przy samej wymowie ^_^ należy do głównego czarnego charakteru w grze. Teoretycznie jest on tylko jednym z wielu doradców prezydenta miasta, ale w rzeczywistości sprawuje rządy z tylnego siedzenia. Wśród niecnych występków BigWiga wymienić można choćby porwanie profesora Azymuta jak i zmuszenie Ko-koty do uprawianie nierządu w jego łożu.

A Ko-kota to nikt inny tylko Anita Werner w świecie Buzuków. Prowadzi swój program telewizyjny do czasu kiedy porywa ją BigWig. Generalnie stanowi obiekt westchnień niejednego Buzuka (również i Woodruffa)… oczywiście nieodwzajemnionych westchnień.

Czary Mary, humor i niezapomniana przygoda

Woodruff to klasyczna gra przygodowa w najlepszym z możliwych trybów rozgrywki (czyt. point and click), ze wspaniałą i nieustannie rozwijającą się fabułą i cieszącą oko, ręcznie malowaną grafiką.

O ile udźwiękowienie Woodruffa (liczne odzywki napotkanych stworzeń czy “żywe” otoczenie) stoi na dobrym poziomie,  o tyle sama muzyczka pozostawia nieco do życzenia. Nie zarzucam jej braku innowacyjności czy negatywnego wpływu na klimat gry, ale w pewnym momencie może staje się nazbyt jednostajna?

W kwestii audio-wizualnej warto jeszcze wspomnieć o świetnej polonizacji Woodruffa z porządnie przygotowanym dubbingiem, w roli głównej z Włodzimierzem Pressem!

Woodruff and the Schnibble of Azimuth powiedzie nas przez świat pełen humoru i momentami naprawdę trudnych zagadek. Niemniej owa przygodówka namaszczona przez Sierrę stanowi również przykład gry przekazującej tzw. wyższe wartości, gdzie staniemy się naocznymi świadkami niesprawiedliwości, ucisku i tyranii oraz próby obalenia przytłaczającego systemu.

Ponad wszelką wątpliwość Woodruff stanowi “must have” dla wszystkich, którzy chcą nazywać się fanami gier przygodowych.

Musisz sięgnąć jeśli… pasjonują Cię klasyczne przygodówki.

Abrakadabra

Screeny importowane z bratniej Słowacji:

http://www.oldgames.sk

This was originally going to be a very different post. Riled by an increasing number of blogs, forums and professional articles claiming that games were being made ‘too fun’ or ‘dumbed down’, this was going to be a rant about how the minds of the sort of folk who routinely make those claims are clouded by nostalgia for a golden age that never was and that, whilst the degree to which games have been improved might be debatable, only the most heavy duty of light red oracular devices could lead one to thing they were getting worse.

Actually, though, I’ve changed my mind. I think what’s needed is for everyone, on both side of this debate[1], to pipe down and grow up. And I include myself in that.

The problem with these arguments, and the reason that they’re doomed to go round in circles for all time, is that they’re based on the idea that some types of game, or styles of gameplay, are inherently good, and others are inherently bad. They assume that an individuals subjective preference is somehow instead die-cast, objective Truth.

That’s hardly an uncommon attitude on the internet, but gamers seem to have a particular pre-disposition towards it. In part, I think it’s due to the fact that the industry is so heavily technology driven. For most pieces of technology, you can easily assess them against objective criteria. If you’re choosing a tv, or an anti-virus programme, or whatever, you check the available products against your particular criteria, see which best fulfils those criteria, and go with that. Different people with have different criteria, of course, but preference doesn’t really enter into it.

There was a time when games were like that as well, when the technology was making such massive leaps, not necessarily in graphics but in scope and interactivity, that technological superiority often did equal a better game. That’s not so much the case now: the returns on technological improvements are starting to level off. But it’s left us as gamers viewing games as things which are either good or bad, successful or unsuccessful. Instead, we ought to be looking at them in the same way we look at books and films. It’s commonly accepted that while some films are truly bad, others (indeed, the majority) will appeal to particular tastes, which doesn’t make them inherently ‘worse’ than those that appeal to different tastes.

Take point and click adventures. I hate point and click adventures[2]. Dragging my cursor across the screen desperately looking for the interactive bits is like some kind of gaming purgatory. The way you sweep up everything not nailed down because you know, you know, it’s going to be useful later, regardless of the fact that no sane person would ever have picked the damned junk up, kills my suspension of disbelief[3]. Round that off by asking me to bash said objects mindlessly against each other until I hit upon whatever random combination of items a stoned designer decided was the ’solution’ to the current puzzle, and I’m pretty much at the swearing and monitor smashing stage.

So I really don’t like point and click adventures. But those who do, those who hold them up as the very hight of gaming joy, aren’t wrong[4]. They’ve just got a different preference to me. We don’t have to flame war to the death over who’s right.

I guess what I’m really saying is just chill, y’all[5].

Over on Offworld, a great blog on videogames, there was a feature some time ago on Machinarium. I finished the game last week and have to say that it is definitely something different. Anyone who likes their adventure games should definitely try it out. Also in the post on Offworld there are links to most of the projects of Amanita Design, the Czech indie-studio behind Machinarium. The skecthes are also interesting. I will see if I get around to posting a review here of Machinarium, but while you wait for that go check the feature out. You can also try out the first couple of levels here.

Video Game Review
Windosill
Windows/Mac
2009
Developer: Vectorpark
Publisher: Vectorpark
Website: http://windosill.com/

If you were to play Vectorpark’s Windosill in full, you would have enough time to cook a frozen pizza if it was already half-cooked. Windosill feels more like a demo more than a full fledged game. It wouldn’t be so bad if the game brought something to the table. Unfortunately, it is forgettable and a mindless time waste while you wait for your pizza to cook.

Each of the ten levels of Windosill comprise of one screen with a bunch of objects. You basically have to manipulate the environment to produce a small cube that fits in a car so you can drive to the next level. To do this, you need to click on the various objects which react differently. The idea is that you need to click and move your mouse in the right order for everything to click properly. Generally, everything sort of makes sense in a Dr. Seuss sort of way as go from step A to step B. You can breeze through some levels when you realize what each object does and you can put together how the equation is supposed to work.

One of the biggest flaws of the game is that you can get away with clicking on random things until you complete the level if you get stuck. Nothing is too complex that prevents you from doing this without eventually achieving success. It would have better if the puzzles were more complicated or if they threw in some dead-ends, it would have added to the challenge of the game. The game is not all that challenging so even if you have trouble seeing the objects on the screen, you’ll still be able to somehow finish the level.

The other major flaw of the game is that it is incredibly short. This cannot be stressed enough. Even though the cost of the game at the time of this review is $3, the game will probably only take the average player thirty minutes or less. Players more accustomed to point-and-click puzzle games will probably flip through this game way quicker. It gets to the point where even a low cost still doesn’t justify such a short game, especially when you can play half the game for free through the demo.

It would have been better if Windosill was longer. Much longer. I can’t recommend this game even at the low cost of $3 because it is way too short. The puzzles are interesting but the game is too easy and too short. It would have been better if the game is longer. If Vectorpark had made the game at least three times longer, it would have been an easy recommendation; even if they had bumped the price up to somewhere between $10-20. Hopefully, this game is the start of something special that the developers are going to unleash to the public in the future. As it stands now, Windosill feels like a technical demo rather than something that anyone should buy.

☆

by Janet Clarke

Welcome to the On FOCUS blog – where we will endeavor to encourage discussion around the challenges faced in determining how or if MEDITECH’s migration to the next HCIS impacts you.

My role in this dialog is to present the perspective of the analyst “in the trenches.” My most recent experience outside of the vendor world is as a Nurse Informaticist in a mid-sized community hospital utilizing MEDITECH MAGIC. I’ve supported NUR, OE and PCI as a primary analyst and other modules in a secondary role. I provided a lot of end-user instruction and also made presentations to hospital leadership. I was lead or co-lead in implementing the Iatric Systems Visual FlowSheet Suite of products and other projects at this facility as well.

I have had the opportunity to become acquainted with Client/Server (C/S) in the past year and, only very recently, MEDITECH 6.0. I can offer a very practical take on the 6.x discussion.

The daunting task of contemplating a MEDITECH platform upgrade to Advanced Clinicals (6.x) presents a particular challenge to current MAGIC users.

At first glance, the Advanced Clinicals platform has a graphic user interface that will look more familiar to C/S users than to MAGIC users. It is apparent that the 6.x platform uses more of the monitor real estate than MAGIC – this is important because this offers more opportunity to display patient data, a point that is not lost on the most novice MEDITECH MAGIC user who is most likely familiar with Windows applications. The 6.x font is easy to read, and the pale background provides good contrast that has a positive impact on readability. The cascading menu display is organized in such a way that it is easy to follow the path to the desired menus and routines, which contributes to end-user understanding.

So far … so good. My first impression is not a bad one – but I’ve got a lot more digging to do – and share – to assist you in assessing the impact that MEDITECH 6.x may have on your facility.

Στις 16 Οκτωβρίου το Machinarium – Gameover.gr

Το παιχνίδι που κατάφερε να κλέψει τα βλέμματα της indie κοινότητας στη φετινή έκθεση PAX ‘09, είναι δημιούργημα των ανθρώπων που είναι υπεύθυνοι για τα φανταστικά Samorost και Samorost 2. To Machinarium είναι ένα point-and-click Puzzle / Adventure δύο διαστάσεων, με τους παίκτες να χειρίζονται ένα μικρό ρομπότ, το οποίο έχει πέσει θύμα της Black Cap Brotherhood, μίας συμμορίας ρομπότ.[next]

The second chapter in the renewed Monkey Island game has been out for a couple of weeks now, but I’ve only just got around to playing and completing it, and I’m disappointed to report that things seem to be on a downward spiral. Maybe it was the thrill of playing a new MI game that blinded me to the deficiencies of the first chapter, but the puzzles in The Siege at Spinner Cay are far less challenging yet at the same time often obscure and illogical, which means the game is damaged at the most fundamental level. Some of the items you receive are completely irrelevant, and not even included as a joke, and the new locations are devoid of character or any of the Piratey goodness present throughout the other games (prior to MI4). The writing is even a little worse, with fewer genuinely funny lines and far too many in-jokes to make it appealing to newcomers to the series. Add to all this poor character models that are usually generic carbon copies of previously encountered models rather than the original, well designed, memorable characters that the MI series built its reputation on, and you’ve got a pretty bland, lifeless game world.

All of the problems with the control and inventory system are still present (see my review of the first chapter) and there’s even another maze-like forest to navigate, although this time it has a linear layout which is a (minor) bonus. For more gripes about the new episodic series, check out the Zero Punctuation review, and then keep watching it every Wednesday for the best reviews online of any kind. Anyway, the single redeeming factor of this series is that they’re releasing it episodically every few months, which in effect lessens the impact of a pretty poor game. If it was released in one go, or you waited until they were all out and tried to slog through them, you would quickly chew your own pointy-clicky fingers off in a nostalgic rage.

Serving up another fab slice of time-travelling mayhem

Platform: PC

Developer: Zombie Cow Studios

Buy: Zombie Cow Studios/Steam

It is widely appreciated amongst a certain breed of gamer that LucasArts (along with a couple of notable others such as Sierra) used to make some of the best games around: games filled with humour, irony, wit and most of all….love. These were true interactive fables, point-and-click artistic masterpieces of escapism and a joy to play through. Unfortunately after Big George went and ruined Star Wars  by making some prequels those natty folk at LucasArts figured they’d stop making decent games and mainly just flog the whimpering, half-dead husk of a horse that is the legacy of Skywalker and Son, churning out tie-in after flaccid tie-in, or half-arsed crapfests like Fracture. Thankfully the chaps at Zombie Cow  remember the golden age of the original Monkey Island games and Grim Fandango like it was yesterday, and hate money so much that they decided to give away their first foray into adventure games – the hilarious Ben There, Dan That! - absolutely free and live in squalor for artistic benefit. In fact if you haven’t already clicked on that link and remain unconvinced then stop reading right now, check out my review of BTDT here before you do anything else and just play through it. You don’t need to necessarily, it’s not integral to the experience of Time Gentlemen, Please!, but it’s a really good game so do it anyway.

Krusty was only doing the Simpsons to fund his real passion

Time Gentlemen, Please! is a direct sequel to BTDT, and just in case you didn’t play the first game (or did and then bumped your head, forgetting everything Bourne style) its events are briefly summed up within the first twenty seconds or so of the game. After romping through space and time it would seem that Ben and Dan (the heroic alter-egos of the game’s creators) have succeeded in wiping out all of humanity by way of a coathanger and a strange predilection for Tom Selleck . Needless to say, our heroes decided that they don’t really want the blood of all humanity on their pixellated mits and so they pledge to make one last time jump to prevent the invention of the coathanger and therefore undo all the mischief they made in the first game. Sound slightly nuts to you? Yep? Well it’s about to get even more bizarre. I don’t want to spoil too much for you but the gruesome twosome wind up bumping into a horde of Nazi dinosaurs, getting a bunch of prehistoric nerds laid and turning a dead transvestite mouse into a sex doll. Oh yeah….and Hitler.

Dan really didn't want to play happy slaps with the comatose dino

Being a sequel, much of the game boasts a striking similarity to its predecessor: it’s still a classic point-and-click affair, with the right mouse button cycling through the available commands, and the left button executing your puppet mastery over Ben and Dan. But there are some notable differences, although most of them are simply cases of polishing stuff from the BTDT. The first is the presentation, although the endearing cartoonish nature remains unchanged, TGP is a much tidier game. It’s shinier, the facial expressions are more frequent and more varied, and their are some nice flash effects thrown in there for good measure. The animations are smoother and the menus and inventory appear more streamlined. There’s music pretty much all the way through, ranging from background ditties you’d find in a hotel lounge to funky bass and flute riffs lifted almost perfectly from Mission: Impossible and The Man from UNCLE. There’s not quite so much item combining in this game, which is perhaps a bit of a shame, but this is combatted through some clever temporal engineering. Everything, it would seem, has had double the effort poured into it. The speech responses for item combinations are nearly all unique, and again you’ll find yourself trying to combine everything with everything else just to trigger the witty, potty-mouthed remonstrations of Ben and Dan. One example of this found me stood in front of a Sex-Education Stall in the game, manned by a clown of all things, clicking happily away for ten minutes and laughing so hard at all of the different pamphlet names that came up that I inhaled orange juice and then sneezed it out all over my monitor.

Ben had a good understanding of his own limitations

Time Gentlemen, Please! doesn’t do too much radically different in terms of gameplay than its predecessor, but it doesn’t need to. The new plot is longer and more thought out than before, twisting and turning with playful glee; the puzzles are more elaborate, and the learning curve to the this game is slightly steeper, but more rewarding. The humour is even more referential than before, although more subtly perhaps than previously: there are so many hidden quips and homages to other games and movies that spotting them almost becomes a game in itself. There are geeky in-jokes for fans who absorbed all of the first game and wanted more, the largest of which is Dan getting up to some adventuring himself. The jokes are a big part of the game and, as with BTDT, this is NOT  a game for kids: no game whose options menu comes with a ‘Racism’ slider is suitable for children, but that’s fine and the refreshingly adult humour is as funny as it is filthy. Dan and Ben seem to have traded slightly on the violence of the first game for a new subject that pretty much fills the air every time the duo open their mouths: sex. Or rather genitals. There are time rips ‘that look like a vagina’, numerous dildo references (anyone with a G1 Megatron should probably beware), and enough smutty language to make Casanova blush deep red and take a vow of chastity. There’s also what I like to call a Casino Royale leg-crossing, wincing moment, but I’ll leave you to find that for yourselves.

School discos hadn't changed much in minus 2 million years

There are a couple of things that might get in the way of the casual gamer who is uncertain in adventuring territory: the first is that it is a very text-heavy game. But you can adjust the speed and click your way through it at your own pace if you wish, and the jokes keep the tempo up. Furthermore, unlike BTDT this game isn’t freeware, but it costs less than a pint in a London pub and lasts a lot longer, and is well worth it. It won’t work on Macs, but then considering it’s a game and not a miraculous new navel-staring device, that’s absolutely fine. Time Gentlemen, Please! isn’t a game for everybody, but it doesn’t need to be and trades on a simple humour staple that I find hard to disagree with: dick and fart jokes are damn funny. Even when they’re intelligent. Especially when they’re intelligent. And when wrapped in an engine that’s bright and intuitive as this with a story so barmy and ridiculous that you can’t help but laugh and wonder if drugs were involved (goosestepping Nazi robot dinosaurs?!), it’s hard not to do one of to things: 1. Sneer in distate like a populist wanker, or 2. Embrace the colourful carnage. It’s as if Withnail and Marwood got genetically spliced with Guybrush Threepwood and all of the guys who worked on Superbad. Imagine the Brit wit of early Red Dwarf mixed with Kevin Smith’s Clerks and sprinkled with essence of Monty Python. You get the idea. If you don’t then download Ben There, Dan That! or the demo of TGP, but I seriously suggest investing in this game. British indie developers are rarer than an uncooked beefburger and the good ones are often lost in amongst the sea of crap and mediocrity that is the internet. Dan and Ben deserve a pint or two for their efforts, but seeing as stalking them across London might be a little bit weird, I’d just buy their frankly excellent game. It’s cheaper and more satisfying.

The Short Version: Ben and Dan return for some more epic 4-dimensional adventuring. Bigger, better and more badass than its predecessor, TGP ticks all of the right boxes. Rude, crude and lewd, it also happens to be very, very good. Forget last orders, this is happy hour.

Temperature: ATOMIC!!!!!!

Because nothing gets in the way of watching Magnum PI…apparently!

Play Game: Zombie Cow Studios

Developer: Zombie Cow Studios

Did you know that you can teleport through the digestive organs of a cow? Have you ever seen a dinosaur killed by a small model Death Star? Would you travel through space and time to fight zombies, murder a priest, thaw out a mechanic and chase after an ancient Chinese symbol just to watch Magnum PI in some peace?

The cow looks fairly calm considering it’s just passed two grown men out of it’s backside. 

Welcome to the wonderful world of Ben Ward and Dan Marshall who, in a fit of egotistical whimsy, have created an adventure game based around some endearingly rude and witty cartoon characterisations of…..erm…..themselves. I found this game after I typed ‘Monkey Island point and click’ into Google and with a name like Zombie Cow Studios, I found myself more and more intrigued. The first great thing about this game, and it is a great game, is that it’s FREE. A couple of hours of well thought-out, occasionally laugh-out-loud funny, point-and-click adventuring that a great many of you will go all misty eyed over…..all for FREE. In fact I’m just going to have to put it in again in capitals just to hammer the point home. FREE. So I paid my £0, and yes it’s in pounds because it’s a British game (hurrah!), and was promptly given control of Ben, who had a problem.

There’s a shiny thing on the floor there….WHY HAVEN’T YOU PICKED IT UP AND EXAMINED IT THOROUGHLY?!?! 

In true Monkey Island style, this game kicks off with the epilogue of a previous adventure, and it’s clear that the last chapter didn’t go so well because Dan seems to have snuffed it. He’s deader than a dodo with a six buckshot rounds through the head and an axe in between the shoulder blades. So your first task is to resurrect your cartoon compatriot by somehow propelling him across a giant gorge and into a shack filled with what one can only assume is Jeffrey Coombs and a vat of reanimation serum. Once Dan is back amongst the living, the boys decide that what’s really needed after their adventure is to chillax on the sofa and marathon a load of Magnum PI. There’s lots of humourous dialogue, a bunch of swear words and disaster: the TV’s fucked. In true adventuring style, the recon mission to create a new antenna sorts you out with the basics of point-and-click adventuring, and you find out that Dan isn’t just there for comic relief….he can turn light switches on too. The only trouble is that once you’ve created a new, somehow better, antenna, it attracts the attention of a pan-dimensional alien spaceship who seem hell bent on preventing you from watching television. So you have to guide the two couch monkeys back to their home and along the way you’ll murder, pillage, extort and thieve. But it’s all funny, so that’s ok.

We love you Tom Selleck 

Confused? Don’t be. Ben There, Dan That is essentially just a loving ode to one of the finest game series of all time. But these guys have their own voice. Packed with sarcastic wit, pithy one liners and some buddy dialogue that is perfectly observed, spending time in this world is a joy. And it has to be because this game’s humour is often darker than Hitler’s soul.  There’s quite a high body count in this game, and some of the deaths are inventive to say the least. I’d describe them, but I don’t want to spoil it for you.

Graphically the game is lovely. The backdrops are beautifully rendered, and the intrepid pair themselves are delightfully drawn. Their jagged, 2-d movements and their facial expression make everything they do seem very endearing indeed, even when they’re being rude. Which happens a lot. The puzzles are a classic affair too, and it’s clear that these guys have created a game from something that they love. As with all the best adventure games, it’s a case of picking up everything you can find and trying to combine the items you’ve hoarded into more useful components. Again, it’s the inventive nature in which some of these items are eventually used that creates even more humour. You might not think you have a use for those urinal cakes….but just wait and see.

One of the two beers on tap is made from piss…the other is English. 

So Ben There, Dan That is a good game. It’s filled with nostalgic quality and rude cheeky humour. It has enough staying power that you’ll want to finish it, and the puzzles yield such frankly enjoyable results that the game probably won’t frustrate too much, and there’s always a comic quip and a witty questioning of intelligence should attempts to progress go awry. If there is a gripe to be had it’s that the funky intro music belies an otherwise pretty much aurally bare game, but it’s not too much of a worry when the game looks and plays this well. It’s simply a grand slice of retro gaming.

The Short Version: A funny, pretty and terribly rude point and click adventure with endearing characters and some superb set pieces. And did I mention that it’s FREE!

Temperature:  HOT!

I found some vids that I captured of a few levels of U.F.O.’s in all of its circa 1997 glory.  Behold the beauty of 15fps limited animation!

If you interested in checking out more, I gathered some more footage HERE.

Sellist mängu nagu “Sam & Max Hit the Road” mäletate? Noh, igatahes oli selline vinge point-and-click mäng kunagi ammu. Ja Max on sealt eriti hullu attitudega jänes. Igatahes, üks inimene nüüd toda tegelast omale tahtis ja suurima rõõmuga ma selle talle ka tegin.
Nõel: 7round liner
Tint: K

Remember “Sam & Max Hit the Road”? Well, anyway, it was a cool point-and-click game once upon a time. And Max is a, I quote – “a short and aggressive hyperkinetic rabbity thing”. And now one person wanted this “rabbity thing” and I was more than happy to make it.
Needle: 7round liner
Ink: K

Διαθέσιμο το demo του Machinarium – Gameover.gr

Η Amanita Design -δημιουργός των Samorost 1 και 2- έκανε διαθέσιμο ένα demo του Machinarium, το οποίο έχει μέγεθος 35 MB και μπορείτε να το “κατεβάσετε” από εδώ. Τo Machinarium είναι ένα point-and-click puzzle/ adventure δύο διαστάσεων, όπου οι παίκτες χειρίζονται ένα μικρό ρομπότ, το οποίο έχει πέσει θύμα μιας συμμορίας ρομπότ.[next]