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[Gregory]

Exploit

Information is freedom.  As a hotshot computer security cracker, you will solve over 50 puzzles and fight against totalitarianism, abuses of power, and terrorism.  Story Mode offers a twist-filled story of international intrigue, and Challenge Mode offers 19 more puzzles to engage the mind.  When it's all done, use the built-in puzzle editor to make and share your own creations!

So I just released my latest game!  It's a puzzley plot-heavy game with cool music by a guy named Evan Merz.  Check it out and let me know what you think!  I think it'd be especially awesome to trade some level codes in this thread from the built-in editor.

Play it here: http://www.kongregate.com/games/GregoryWeir/exploit

[Lynx]

Nice work!

I got up to Lchan-BB and then went 'gah...'  Knocked off there for now, I may go back and give it another crack.  (sic)

From what I've seen so far, the gameplay is solid but the graphics might need a little tweaking.  The pyramid for the processor core might be better as a more elaborate sprite that you see top down, and the splitters are too close to the blockers in general shape and color.

[increpare]

i got past the first area anyway.

i will play more tomorrow.

interesting, and good

(this would make good money a an iphone app, you know...it would eat into your schedule to make one though, I guess)

[Gregory]

(this would make good money a an iphone app, you know...it would eat into your schedule to make one though, I guess)

Hmm.  Fascinating idea, although I can't currently afford an iPhone to do development/testing on.  I'll make a note to look into the process, though.

[Lynx]

There's an iPhone SDK that costs $99, evidently, which includes a simulator for your iPhone code.

[Grif]

Good game, but honestly I would prefer pure puzzling to reflex based clicking and memorization.

My best specific example is the LChan-BB level; I can clearly see how the puzzle is SUPPOSED to be solved, but the exact pattern of clicking is frustrating to accomplish.

[William Broom]

I beat it...!
Usually I expect to get bogged down in puzzle games like this and stop playing after a few levels, but this one was really engaging - partly because it was relatively easy and partly because of the story.

I love the story! It was kind of cheesy but very well-told. It felt like some sort of 80s action movie about hacker kids who save the world president Ameribank building.

One problem I had was the way so much of the story was told to you by sk3tch. It made me think he was going to turn out to be lying in the end. Maybe you could remedy this by changing some of his messages. For example rather than saying 'thanks for hacking into X, here is what I found there' he could be responding to one of your messages ('thanks for those files you sent me, I think you're right about X'). You could also maybe include more of the actual files the player pulls up from his hacking, like maybe text dumps from Lchan-BB.

But apart from that, good game!

[increpare]

Hey dude; I went searching for this game, and I realised that I totally missed the thread you posted on feedback aaaaages ago.

Anyway, just finished the game.  It took some effort to come to terms with the faster-paced levels; I found myself having to use two service attacks, but, you know, I still managed to finish it, so.

Yeah, it was good.  I liked the level design (especially the 'reveal connections' blue key thing; the sense of revelation you get upon hitting those, or the white keys; I imagine the resulting modularisation of stages made things much easier to handle from a design-perspective as well).  I didn't pay too much attention to the story as I was going along, but it seemed quite solid.

Anyway, yes: I enjoyed it quite a lot.

As a matter of interest, do you have any feelings about it yourself?  Have many people made use of the level editor?

[Gregory]

Yeah, it was good.  I liked the level design (especially the 'reveal connections' blue key thing; the sense of revelation you get upon hitting those, or the white keys; I imagine the resulting modularisation of stages made things much easier to handle from a design-perspective as well).

Yeah, the white keys and blue directory nodes turned out to be an important part of the design.  Every other component in the game is time-limited, so players have to be quick.  Those two serve as a sort of checkpoint; once you get one, you can relax and recover before figuring out the next part of the stage.  I think that's what you meant by modularization.

As a matter of interest, do you have any feelings about it yourself?  Have many people made use of the level editor?

I'm really pleased at how it turned out.  One thing that was awesome was the music; I had the game basically finished when the composer approached me, and he did an amazing job capturing just how I wanted the game to sound.  He's working with me on another title, where he's done the same sort of magic.

The game's gotten over 75,000 plays in two days, which is awesome.  And yeah, there's been a lot of folks posting levels in the comments.  Some of the levels are very good, some are uninspired, and some are dumb.  One thing people really like to do is fill a level with the purple divider blocks and just let the packets multiply.  Luckily, I anticipated that and put a cap on the number of packets that could exist at once, but it can still slow the framerate down when there are 100 shots on screen.

[Corpus]

Oh, I didn't realise you were on TIGSource! I just finished the story mode today, and I really enjoyed it.

I thought that the difficulty curve was a little uneven at times (for example, you might go from one puzzle requiring fairly accurate timing to another which can be solved more conventionally and more at your leisure) but, other than that, it was a very well-executed idea.