Posts tagged with “rhythm”

“Rayman Origins sometimes feels like playing a half-watercolor, half-oil painted version of LocoRoco” -Eric

There have been a lot of Lums at lunchtime here at Fire Hose becuase we’re playing Rayman Origins. It is a bright and colorful platformer that offers fun environmental puzzles and Super Mario Wii-esque four player gameplay (with slightly less griefing).

“It’s awesome!” wrote Jeff, Fire Hose programmer, “Collection performers are totally my thing, in 2D or 3D.  I loved the first Jak and Daxter, I loved Ratchet and Clank, and …Rayman is just really, really polished fun.”

“I agree with Jeff,” said Eric, another Fire Hose dude that was kind enough to bring the game in for everyone to play, “I’ve been playing Rayman Origins and loving the hell out of it.”

We have found that playing with four players can be a bit busy, with onlookers only being able to keep up with Globox, the largest and bluest character.

He kind of stands out.

Everyone else seems to blend into the scene, with cameo appearances made when they make sweeping jumps or fall behind enough to stick out from the crowd.  Not that that doesn’t add a certain level of fun, like Super Mario Wii each player can interact with the others, pushing, prodding, or helping. (Usually just pushing and prodding when we play.)

The game design itself is kind of awesome; there is a rhythm to the game that the player can discover by uncovering “Lums”, which are sleepy personifications of musical energy. A player can go through a level and free the pink and rather fab “Electoons”. You can get one Electoon for making it through he level, but uncovering more Lums and discovering the tempo of the level will earn you more.  Not only that, but as you traverse the stages you may run into a super spiffy King Lum whom will give you further hints which will allow you to uncover the inner rhythm of the level and allow you to save every Electoon. And you totally want to save every Electoon, just check out that pony-tail! Plus Each world contains a “tooth” level. In these levels you have to chase a living treasure chest through a dynamically changing, thematically interesting environment.  They are super challenging but the restart is quick and you frequently get that “just one more try” feeling.

Check out the game for yourself on the official website over here.

I like music games. Rock Band, Guitar Hero, the new DJ games, AudiOdyssey, if it is a music game I’m gonna play it. Auditorium is made by Cipher Prime and Will Stallwood, and is a fun new flash twist on a music game. Rather than being a traditional rhythm game in which you have to “play” (type) notes in order to hear a famous song, Auditorium is a fun puzzle game in which you have to push colored light into music boxes which then play a sort of repeating classical tune. It starts off fairly easy but gets pretty damn hard after a few levels, and most (if not all) of the levels are solvable in many, many ways.

Personally I think the game is great. The pseudo-classical music is nice, and the neon lights on black background aesthetic is quite compelling and enjoyable. I think that normally I would find such a complicated game frustrating but the music is so nice that I don’t mind spending huge amounts of time figuring out each puzzle. I also like how each music box plays a different instrument so you can hear each individually before combining them for the full song. My only gripe about the game is that once you do solve a level you don’t get to hear your composition for long, as the game almost immediately flows into the next stage. Having an option to keep listening for a while would be nice.

Normally we only feature games that are free in “What We’re Playing“, but Auditorium only has a free demo of a couple of levels (you have to pay for the full game). In this case we thought the game was good enough to mention it anyway.

I got a copy of Rhythm Heaven at GDC, and I got around to spending some time with it recently. It’s fun, and does a great job of teaching rhythm in an innovative and fun way. There are a bunch of minigames you have to play, all of which involve tapping and flicking along with a changing beat. The minigames themselves have a lot of style and little touches that make them enjoyable – rather than trying to get your guy to sing in a choir, you have to get him to shut up (making noise is the easy part). You get to head up a fan club full of monkeys clapping along to a famous singer. And… you get to play ping pong.

And that’s where I stopped playing. The game was always difficult, but when you get to the ping pong level the game just starts sucking. The two big problems as I see it is the lack of useful feedback on how well you’re doing and the (very Japanese) habit of kicking you when you’re down and telling you that you suck when you fail. The feedback problem is the worst though, as you never know how well you have to do to beat a level, and if you fail early on in you have to wait until the end of the level to find out. I once made it through ping pong and only missed 5 or 6 volleys, but even that was enough to lose! UNACCEPTABLE.

So, give Rhythm Heaven a shot if you want a fun new game and are a glutton for punishment.