yeah, this point occurred to me too. It's not so bad as a computer artist because r, g, b is kind of ingrained in my brain (even then I had to pause sometimes) but for a casual punter the order means nothin,, apart from it's the name of the game

On the other hand people who're only game player, not maker, all said they hated this style

fuck em

hehe, I agree with the sentiment.. don't try and please everyone at once. Stick to a strong style that works well (like you have) and you'll attract your own fans. If you listen to everyone you'll just end up with a grey mishmash

yep, nice stuff MadWatch!

its nicely presented, but kinda boring right now. there's no choices to make or risks to take.. you either get in the right lane as the right colour or you don't

hmm, I found it pretty difficult to control

imo, the best ragdoll control I played is in ragdoll masters: http://www.ragdollsoft.com/ragdollmasters/

imo, something like that but with cranked up gravity, (and maybe some mouse aim on the gun arm) would be pretty cool.

(ps, too much blur! save it for occasional slow-mo bits and turn right down for normal fighting)

loved it i have to say the 'pixel hunting' gag did wear a bit thin.. ok I get it! stop making me click drawer handle pixels!

maybe you could change the cursor and widen the hotspots after a few pixel hunt clicks? he could find a new cursor in one of the drawers or something, i dunno

ending was pretty funny :D didn't see that coming!

hmm! text:

I may have encountered a bug, because I got down the first part by hanging on the edge, and when the black one got to the edge it floated to my foot and slowly brought me down, while I was still in the hanging position. I couldn't get it to happen for the second drop though, I guess I must have been standing on it as it fell. I can't quite accept in my head it's ok if you fall with it to land on it, but if it's on the ground and you land on it you die (i tried for quite a while to land on one (or several) as they grouped below

I think for this section I'd really like to see the blobs combine again and cushion your landing, because I loved that part in the ascent

completely stuck on the 3 ghettoblasters and the 3 coloured blobs :/
edit: ah, I did it (I'd still like to hear the solution though.. don't quite understand how or what I did)

like the ending

that's fixed it . ok, i'll play more of the game a bit later. first few levels are fun! nice mechanic!

i like the idea of placing the orb somewhere safe and jumping into danger, to teleport out

not really enjoying the whole install thing.. now I gotta uninstall the old one to install the new one..

giving it a go tho

riiight right. when you design a game it should be *just right* for yourself. if other people can't play it it's simply their fault for not being more like you, the ignorant dolts.

damn those hacks at Valve for paying attention to how people play their games and altering them based on the reactions. it's almost as if they care about the player having a good time! *spits*


(ahem. none of that's aimed at you pigpen )

downloading.. just to add to the graphics comment, also varying the scale of the background and foreground bricks would help a ton to pop out the game area.

back soon

edit: hi, the bouncing of the orb is waaay off on my computer. Are you compensating for the cpu speed when doing this? basically when it goes to bounce the ball whizzes extremely fast between two surfaces. the initial throw is ok, but after that it goes crazy

hmm, I'm afraid all that's happened is you've moved the bit to get stuck on later in the game

could I suggest raising the initial platform again, but including a little more of a hint on the sign? like:  \/, tap /\

i think if you want to rely on the mechanic, it's best to make sure the player gets it somehow before using it in the game.

actually, the way I would handle it is if the player is stood on a box when it bounces, you get launched higher by default so you never have to tap jump

aha- I understand..
here's some more text to prevent spoilers for others:
since I've been holding and releasing jump all through the game, I didn't have the idea to tap jump. I just noticed there's a box at the beginning to teach me this, except I didn't learn it because you can jump straight off the top of the box and reach the ledge

I think it should just go for the closest bread, or ignore the first entirely. I assumed the high ledge that forces me to drop the first bread was so that it was out of the picture so to speak and 'used up'. I'm not sure why you need 2 breads though, when you could just reuse the first

RE killing yourself, maybe some spikes would be a more obvious way to off yourself? or a drop you can voluntarily fall down. it's not a deal breaker, but it does feel more like a mistake than a feature

(not meaning to come across negative about the game btw, loving it so far)

ps- hmm, im stuck on the box climbing bit. how many do I need to get to the top? I can only figure out how to get one up there, but trying to jump up using just one kills you

For the record, the game isn't so extreme as to implement New York time with its own time server, so if you change your system clock you can fool it easily enough (it operates based on the system clock's reporting of UTC time)

aaah, I see. This is one jump further than my brain was able to make . I think it's because when I changed my clock, I saw no noticeable change in the game, so was unaware that the time change had in fact made a difference to the game's time- it just so happens the time I chose locally was still out of hours in the game.

it might be that some 'time of day brightness' effect would indeed make all the difference

PS, I'm enjoying the idea of the game (haven't made it in yet ) and the discussion. I'm not intending to make any kind of argument one way or the other for what the game should be, just present my reaction and I guess a 'what I would do'. But as you say, there is no right or wrong.

PPS- for me, Marcel Duchamp already answered the argument 'can games be art' :] if a urinal can be, surely a game can too.. But then what?

howdy! love it so far, but I'm stuck on the 2nd bird. I can't get it to follow me with the bread. it's just kind of sitting in the 'pond?' ignoring me..

is there a trick to it, or is it a bug?

ps, I die if I fall the height from my maximum jump? ie. jump up fully then die on landing?? seems kinda wrong to be able to jump a height that kills me

I see where you're coming from.. I'm just not sure the shop analogy holds up in the context of a computer game, where people come with a preconceived notion that you the game designer are setting a challenge for them to overcome, or at least something to interact with.

I can run the game at 9pm NY time, or 3am, and I just wouldn't have gone to the gallery (or the shops) in the first place at that time. It's expected that videogames happen in their own bubble of time (does the game grow dark at night? or is it always full sunshine?). Now, I think it's interesting to break preconceptions, i love the idea- I just feel that the user has to be aware you're doing it. it could be as simple as adding a NY-time watch to the hud. I don't think that adding context to understand the idea of the game is the same as an apology. I don't know one way or the other, but I imagine the original work had some kind of plaque or gallery pamphlet which talked about the meaning of the performance.

there's another thing which contributes to the preconceptions of the 'gaminess' of the piece- Sierra adventure games often had some area which was closed or off limits and you had to solve a puzzle to get in. To me, making this connection already sets up the idea there is a challenge or puzzle to solve, in the traditional game sense. And you could certainly argue that waiting till the right time is the puzzle, but the missing clue is what time it is. That's fine for a strip of people living on the east coast of America, but for a wider audience it's not so clear

could I suggest maybe putting a clock somewhere showing the time in New York?

also, maybe some short text explaining the idea behind the 'game'- many art galleries will have plaques next to modern art pieces explaining the idea and intent of the artist, giving a context without which the piece is often meaningless..

I kind of think something similar here might help, and help negate the 'gamery' reaction to being locked out much of the time. Unless you understand that the game literally is closed when the real gallery is closed (and what time it is in new york), the impulse is to keep playing even though in reality there's nothing to do- so you either assume the game is broken or there is something you're missing (like trying to change the system clock). Anyone who keeps on playing and eventually gives up is going to have a fairly negative overall feeling toward the game, so again I kind of think the mechanic behind it should be explained clearly somewhere.

ps, still confused why you allow people to wonder off into the endless void, when as far as I can see there is nothing out there.. It just encourages people to explore in the hope they find something, and inevitably get irritated and quit

I went left to the next screen, up, then right and get the message 'the museum of modern art is now closed, have a nice day' and I can't do anything else, it seems frozen.

that doesn't make sense to me since the first thing I tried to do was go in, and it said on the door it was closed. how is it 'now closed' when it was closed to begin with?

I thought you were being clever so I changed my system time.. hmm, nope..

so anyway.. is the answer 'no'?

edit: I read a few of your blog posts on it, and I can see it's taken a lot of work so apologies if the above seems harsh. I think maybe something should be done to put it in context.. or at least some clue as to the games purpose. I'm *guessing* that I can go in when the real MOMA is open? the first reaction as a game player when I see instantly the front doors are closed is 'hmm, I guess I have to sneak in' and so I try to go around the side, which results in a permanent 'closed' message. Actually the first thing I did was wander several screens off to the side to see if I would encounter the screenshot, which appears to be taking place in the void.

At the moment, I'm wondering really what the purpose of the void is.. is that some part of the artistic statement involved in the piece? or a bug? I feel when I'm asking this question it's bound to cloud the message of the game.