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Recommendation: “Portal”

A typical level in Portal

The PC game “Portal”, developed by Valve software in 2007, is in my humble opinion one of the most ingenious game ever created. The concept is simple, but a bit hard to wrap your head around. You have device that can shoot (over distance) a portal entrance and a portal exit, but only on certain surfaces, be it walls, roof or floors. Once both portals have been placed you can walk through the portals either way, and physics count (e.g. “speedy thing goes in, speedy thing goes out”). You can only create two portal openings, and as you progress in the levels you need to figure out exactly how, where and when to place the portals in order to cross chasms, up or over obstacles, around automated turrets that fires at you, transport energy balls into their receivers and open doors by using certain cubes you can pick up in the game. It’s a game that requires thinking, and often challenges you to think completely outside the box.

Scribblings from previous test subjects: The cake is a lie

The gameplay itself makes a great game, even though the game is a bit short. But there’s more. Throughout the game you are accompanied by a computerized voice which speak to you (and watch you) as a “Aperture Science” test subject in “The Enrichment Center”. The voice comes with witty comments and statements which really gives the game personality.

Weighted Companion Cube

Throughout the levels you also encounter the “Weighted Companion Cube”, a cube with a heart, another bonus which adds to the game’s genius. You carry and use the cube while the computerized voice reminds you that it will never threaten to stab you, it cannot speak and in the event that it does speak, disregard its advice. In the end you are told that your beloved cube cannot accompany you through the rest of the tests and if it could speak it would tell you to go on without it because it would rather die in a fire than become a burden to you.

You are constantly being promised cake when you have completed all of the 19 levels. But once you reach there you are, apparently as every other test subjects, being terminated by transporting you into a pit of flames. But the game doesn’t end there. As you cleverly escape using portals, you navigate through the building to find the source: the computer that have been talking all along. While you find your way towards the computer voice, it inquires you to give up, come back for your cake, jokingly excuses for trying to kill you or lie to you and threatens to start cutting and eating the cake without you.

The computer (voice) behind it all

When you have reached the computer brain behind it all, you are engaged in an end boss fight while the voice constantly tries to discourage you with hilarious statements. Among others how unlikeable you are and that nobody would come to your party, or imitate how stupid you sound. I won’t reveal how the game ends, but after it’s finished you are played the infamous and witty song “I’m Alive”. You are also given the option of replaying some of the levels in advanced mode.

I recommend getting the game, it is included in Valve’s Orange box or can be bought singly through Steam. But if you are convinced it’s not worth buying, (you are totally missing out, fool!) there is a free online Flash-version of Portal. It contains no less than 40 challenging which features almost every feature the real game does. Personally I prefer the real thing. “Portal” and its “Weighted Companion Cube” will always have a special space in my heart.

September 2nd, 2009 in Gaming | tags: game, online, Portal |  Print This Post | No Comments

Free, online browser-games that deserve credit

First, I got to admit that I have never been a fan of online, in-browser flash games. Even though I have spent many breaks between classes at high school playing around on the Norwegian site 123spill.no. It’s probably because I have pretty high standards to games, especially to its graphics and “cleverness”. I like puzzle games which don’t have a timer, and provides intricate levels where you really have to think to solve it.

Still, through the years I’ve come across a few free online games I really think deserves credit. Some of the games contain great (though simple) graphics which is crucial for me to even enjoy looking at something more than five seconds. Other games are more clever and good at keeping the challenges.. well.. challenging and fun.

“Oil Panic” – move and react fast!

A typical level of Oil Panic

It’s rare that I enjoy an arcade game, where time matters. “Oil Panic” is one. It’s a very old game and I’m suprised that it’s still active. It’s in Norwegian, but you don’t need to know more than using the arrowkeys to move left, right and down and Space bar to retreat the oil drill. The goal is to gather all blue drops (presumably oil drops) in the level. The challenge lies in the enemies (in form of flames, red stars or other things) that suddenly appears at the border’s edge and move horizontally. The only way to kill them is by hitting them with the drill head – if they hit your extended pipe you die. That means that even though the drill head is picking up drops way at the bottom, if an enemy appears in the upper rows, you need to climb all the way back up before it hits your pipe and then climb back down again. Special walls and items appear in the later levels, as well as faster enemies and shorter time to react.

“Shift” – think in black and white

A Shift 1 level with a reference to Portal

There are now four “Shift”(s?), but i prefer the first two, “Shift 1” and “Shift 2“. These games don’t consist of many levels, but have a clever gimmick. The game is in black and white for a reason, because pressing Shift inverts the board. Otherwise it appears as a platform-game where you move and jump your way to the exit door. Reaching keys, switches and avoiding spikes have never been as challenging as in “Shift”. The games got humor too, including several obvious references to the great game Portal. I haven’t played “Shift 3” or “Shift 4” as much mostly because the last game runs on a timer.

“Fragger” – ninjahunting with grenades!

A typical Fragger level

I recently discovered “Fragger“, which is basically the traditional Tank Wars dressed up as throwing grenades killing ninjas in a more “urban” setting. You can set your angle and velocity using your mouse, and click to throw a grenade. You only have a limited amount of grenades, but unlimited retries at all levels. “Fragger” consist of 30 creative and challenging levels, where not only adjusting the angle and velocity is crucial for completion. When you have completed all 30 levels, you can play them again using a harder difficulty level.

“Orisinal” games – just cute

A selection of Orisinal games

Games created at “Orisinal” is not really games per se. They are more pleasurable for the eye than actually providing you challenges. The site provides no less than 60 individual games, all in the same style. Each game consists of really just one simple challenge, e.g. stack pigs in order to reach floating muffins high up in the air, or control a squirrel hunting for apples. What really attracts me is their beautiful appearance. My favourite games are the jumping rabbit in “Winterbells” and stacking pigs in “These Little Pigs“.

August 4th, 2009 in Gaming | tags: game, lol, online |  Print This Post | 2 Comments

Game nostalgia: Strategy games

During the last few weeks I’ve digged around in my hard drives and resurfaced the old strategy games I used to spend so much time playing when I was younger. Strategy games and in some cases adventure games were the only games I was allowed to play by my parents at home, even on my own computer. So, of course, after having spent hours after hours playing certain games during my early teens, I still get a tingle of a smile and nostalgia looking at screenshots from the games I loved then. They had such a special charm.

I’m talking about computer games from 1998, 1999 and 2000, so they don’t have all that super-duper-fantastic 3D graphics in a super-omfg-high resolution. Instead they feature fixed isometric perspective. But it was, and still is, amazing how they managed to cramp up such details on such a small surface – on maps, buildings, and people – so that everyone could easily figure out what it is and appreciate the details.

I have yet not experienced such appreciation of details and addiction of a cleverly designed game since that time. They don’t make games like this anymore.

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March 31st, 2009 in Gaming | tags: game, strategy |  Print This Post | 3 Comments

Unofficial sequel to Broken Sword II

Screenshot from
Broken Sword 2.5

When Broken Sword II: The Smoking Mirror (PC) was published in 1997, some german fans of the Broken Sword game series got the idea of making an unofficial sequel. They named themselves mindFactory and it took them no less than 8 years to develop and finish the game. Their unofficial sequel was released for free on September 28th and is called Broken Sword 2.5 (downloadable at their site). The game is a classic 2D point-and-click adventure game, following the steps of the first two Broken Sword games. The game has german voices, but luckily comes with english subtitles. The story takes place between The Smoking mirror and before the next official game, Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon, which was released in 2003.

Being interested in game development and game design I found it interesting to see what some “just some fans” could come up with. They have developed a complete game with great graphics (similar to the earliest Broken Sword games) and a great functional story. Definitely worth a try if you enjoy traditional point-and-click adventure games and don’t mind listening to german voices.

October 23rd, 2008 in Gaming | tags: game |  Print This Post | 2 Comments

Pong (gamemaking at UiO)

Pong, gamemaking at the University of Oslo

This semester, to my joy, Ping (Program, Information- and Networks-technological Group), a student union at the faculty of Informatics at the University of Oslo decided they wanted to gather students to create computer games. Cleverly, they named this group Pong. (It’s clever because Ping Pong is recognized as the very first (successfull) computer game ever created).

Some of Pong’s members.
Can you find me?

We gather once in the week at Ping’s premises, are randomly split into groups and have three weeks to come up with a game concept and create a computer game out of it. After three weeks, we are randomly split into new groups for another game. The games are programmed using the library Allegro in the programming language C. Most of us are informatics students, with expertise in different areas; programming, artmaking and sound engineering. I signed up for artmaking.

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October 21st, 2008 in Gaming, Personal happenings | tags: game, pong, uio |  Print This Post | 2 Comments

Game nostalgia: Oxyd

When I was just a little child, (luckily) my family was eager in buying personal computers in its early years. Many saturdays mornings was spent sitting in front of the computer in the living room, still wearing pajamas and poking around in MS-DOS and later on Windows 3.1. Yes, I was a geek already at the age 6, and I loved exploring the seemingly unlimited possibilities with new technology. Because I have a stern and harsh (German) father who wouldn’t have his kids waste their time playing silly computer games, there were only a few games available (because he could never find them! ) Our old computer had Snake and Space Invaders, both in only 16 colors, playing on MS-DOS. So it was no surprise I was in awe when a friend of mine showed me Oxyd for the very first time. It was monochrome (black and white) but I was still amazed by the detailed graphics. My friend had the shareware-version of Oxyd on a floppy disc, and I remember I begged and begged and nagged to borrow it so I could install it on my family’s computer.

The original
monochrome Oxyd

The gameplay of Oxyd is simple. You control a marble with your mouse, and to solve a level you need to “open” boxes (touch them) and match all pairs of matching patterns. It’s like Memory. When you touch a specific type of box with your marble, the eventually previously opened box are closed if the pattern doesn’t match. If you successfully make a matching pair, they stay there until you have matched all pairs on the level. When you advance in level, there are different obstacles (some of them you can move around), larger landscapes, enemies, different kind of floors and puzzles you need to solve. Since the entire game is based on using only your mouse, you’ll need a steady hand and a good mouse!

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October 8th, 2008 in Gaming | tags: game, Oxyd |  Print This Post | 1 Comment

Cutest game ever!

Screenshot from Winterbells

Go play Winterbells online.

Control a (cute) bunny and get as high as you can by jumping upwards on falling winter bells! Great time killer while winter approaches.

October 5th, 2008 in Gaming, lol and/or aww | tags: cute, game, lol, online |  Print This Post | No Comments

Recommendation: “Lost Odyssey”

The Xbox360 game Lost Odyssey (released in February 2008) developed by Mistvalker and published by Microsoft Game Studios is a single-player role-playing game. It comes in 4 (yes, four) DVD’s. One of the developers, the legendary Hironobu Sakaguchi, who among others developed the Final Fantasy-series, provides an emotional story and turn-based battle game play in Lost Odyssey. To find out more about Lost Odyssey, you can read Gamer.no’s review (in norwegian!) and ITavisen’s review (also in norwegian).

The game tells the story about Kaim, an immortal who’d lived in a thousand years but yet has no memory of his past. During the game several characters (some also immortals) join him in his journey to reveal their memories and discover who they are. Their world is ruled by another immortal with evil intentions of taking over the world (of course). As our heroes are trying to take him down, the story behind our immortals is revealed.

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August 7th, 2008 in Gaming | tags: game, Lost Odyssey, xbox360 |  Print This Post | 1 Comment