Payload

Really Good puzzle game that actually is kind of hard.

Enjoyable, difficult, and scratches that "I want a timekiller but not just an [i]empty[/i] timekiller, yknow?" itch

6/10 A puzzle where you move on the cube's surface, with a dystopian story connecting the levels. Good: - the core concept of the puzzle is good. Each side of the cube is tiled 2x2, some tiles are impassable, you need to move through all the black tiles switching them to while, and you can jump over 1 tile to the other side - music is very pleasant, though there are too few tracks and it does get repetitive after a while So-so: - the minimalistic design is a mixed bag. E.g. the 3D "Matrix" view, the "glitch" effects, and the post-victory animation are stylish but the 2D "Map" view looks too primitive - white text on black bg is a bit straining for the eyes. They should used shades of gray at least - the story starts strong and will resonate with adults who have worked for corporations. However, it keeps mulling over the same topics over and over and starts getting boring by level 8-9. It's just the main character ("Operator") and its AI program talking. The protagonist is constantly in bad mood. It doesn't even feel realistic. By mid-game you don't really like the protagonist and don't care about him. I mean, they wanted to keep it all in-character and did an above average job. But it runs out of steam quickly and simply lacks material, energy and variety. The description says there is a big twist coming in the end - maybe I'll get to that (I got till lvl 13) Bad: - the view of the field is unfriendly. Namely, you can't rotate the 3D "Matrix" view and it ends up useless in most cases because the side to which you'd want to jump is in the back, invisible. And the 2D "map" view doesn't show connections between the sides which are visually detached yet still share an edge in 3D. The 2D map should show semi-transparent copies of sides next to other sides, so that you could plan for 2-3 jumps. It's very difficult to do these mental conversion and rotations. So I actually ended up solving almost all of the puzzles by more or less random moves. It doesn't feel rewarding - the idea to add red enemies that block your moves and move in pre-defined paths doesn't add much to the game, just increases the number of backtracking steps you have to make - mouse isn't supported in the puzzle at all. Instead, left-mouse drag should rotate the 3D view, and clicks on the tiles (either in map view or in the 3D view) should move the player's icosahedron there. Also, all tiles where you can move at any given moment in time should be highlighted. This would make the game much friendlier and playable with one hand, with just the mouse. Currently you have to keep both hands on the keyboard, one on WASD, the other on the arrow keys. I frequently pressed a key on the wrong side (e.g. W instead left arrow). Mouse control would be far more intuitive and simple - no key or button to reset the puzzle, you have to backtrack step by step - no visual clue if the puzzle has already started or you still have to press Space to go through the dialog (btw need just a "Next" button to advance the dialog) For a free student project, it's actually quite good. It's worth at least checking out and even completing (maybe in 2-3 sittings). However, the game is rough around the edges and would benefit from obvious improvements (e.g. full mouse control) that aren't difficult to add. I don't know if the devs can or want to work on this further though. As is, it's already a playable game. Btw I found the store listing funny. There are complimentary adjectives almost for each substantive in the text ("striking graphics", "gripping narrative"). I guess this was written by marketing students. The mistake they've made is that one must know the audience he is selling to. Praising the product with these emotional but essentially meaningless adjectives only works on low-IQ audiences (e.g. small kids, or players of casual mobile games). But a puzzle game, especially if it's in this hardcore setting and has a story about some IT guy's job at a sci-fi corporation, targets maybe an audience with IQ120+ (much like that of the students who made the game). People with higher IQ have critical thinking and get instantly distrustful when they hear meaningless, manipulative adjectives. So, when you advertise to such a person, you need to keep your text factual and low-emotion. It's the same when you sell to rich people or investors: typically those guys are smarter or more experienced than you, so being modest and to-the-point in your statements is what builds trust best. Anyways, it's a game with potential, just needs improvements. [table][tr][th][i]I'm a Steam curator, you can [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/43946907-Friendly-Nerd/]follow me[/url][/i][/th][/tr][/table]

前面的2×2×2只是热身，3×3×3游戏才真正开始 [spoiler] （4×4×4出来的时候给孩子吓傻了） [/spoiler] [spoiler] （我承认我玩不下去只能暴力穷举了（迫真图论游戏）） [/spoiler]

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