Sling Ming

[h1]Sling Ming[/h1] The earth rumbles with constant anger, and a revered Princess of some prosperous civilization has had her fill of the terror it causes her people. This princess, Ming, with the help of her trusty and long-serving assistant of many generations take up responsibility in place of their missing King and brave the toxic depths beneath their homeland to find the source. With the use of a trusty old oxygen suit used in olden days of her world to brave the polluted outside lands, Ming sets out on a tethered adventure of particular navigational spelunking. [i]Sling Ming[/i] is a beautiful and artistic world of cosmic regions and deathly omens of pollution, with an inventive and very unique mechanic of node-altering, on-rails adventuring and puzzle solving in the most unpredictable of locations. [h1]Gameplay[/h1] A very simple and seemingly casual mechanic, Ming takes to the cavernous tunnels beneath the earth on her trusty sling which acts as a conveyor with a grapple. A long stretch of wire continues along each level, and with a simple click of each consecutive node ahead on the wire Ming takes off to the next point. Clicking to each point with either your mouse or gamepad and watching the physics carry our adorable protagonist, spinning and twirling along with gravity, feels really good and is incredibly easy. Things soon get complicated though, and all forms of enemies, obstacles, and hazards block the defaulted route of Ming's sling line. You really have to consider the angle with which you lower yourself into the cave, and later on even the timing. Simply pathing your sling rope out of the way of hazards like toxic waste or lava isn't enough, as Ming is the real hitbox here not the node you control and she dangles pretty low beneath the actual grapple point. The erratic ragdoll physics on Ming's body as she bumps and tussles around on the sling is also used to full effect here, with many corners and ledges needing to be swung around with full momentum of her body in order to avoid hazards like radioactive pools of waste. Planning your route and taking into consideration where Ming will be positioned and where her bouncy little body will fling itself from the movement of your sling is all part of the challenge and the fun here. Coins also sit dangerously near hazards and edges of the stage beckoning real daredevils to try their luck and skim close as possible to obstacles, gaining that sweet bit of treasure as a reward. Later on different node types are introduced such as speedier zip-lines that propel you through impossible openings with a double-tap, and make the whole coin obtaining and goal completing routine much more interesting and creative. These become important later when individual stages you tackle will all have a plethora of challenges and side-objectives to complete in addition to reaching each end goal. [h1]Visuals/Sound[/h1] Sling Ming features some very high-quality art for a sidescrolling game of such a casual nature, with an almost hand-painted and personal touch to it. The environments have a wonderful range of interplanetary aesthetics, from the dark toxic caverns you start in to the gorgeously detailed lush and vibrantly green planet you take off to afterwards. Ming herself is of course super adorable, and all of the strange little alien critters you encounter and have to dodge are so imaginative in a cosmically extraterrestrial way, even in their personality and movement patterns. This has some of the most professional looking artwork I've seen in recent 2D games, and its something that needs to be seen in all of its smooth and charming animated glory to truly appreciate. The music of your adventure is suitably ominous during the deep and dark spelunking into unknown caves and toxic underworlds, while appropriately whimsical on the climbs into the more vibrant and lush outside worlds. Its an impressive and memorable soundtrack with a wide range of instruments, including some pleasing Chinese fiddles and other cultural instrumentation thrown into the mix for that "Planetary" feel. Little bits of the dialogue come with short bits of voiced phrases, usually different humorous expressions from Ming and definitely serve to draw you into the story of global peril at the hands of pollution. [h1]Final Thought[/h1] Sling Ming has a brilliantly simple but very open-ended gameplay mechanic with a wealth of interesting possibilities for puzzles and physics challenges. Figuring out a proper path for you nodes is ultimately very satisfying, and watching Ming swing, bump, and bounce her way around the twisting mazes and obstacles is just plain fun. With the variation of different nodes and the types of movement they provide or alter, puzzles in the game are incredibly inventive and accessible, never tedious or overstaying their welcome. If you're looking for some unique and addictive indie action with a decent amount of fun-over-challenge kind of puzzles then absolutely give this a try. It's also absolutely freaking gorgeous. [i]This review made possible through the consideration and contribution of [url=http://store.steampowered.com/curator/11739878-ReviewExperts/]Review Experts(REXnetwork)[/url] and the developer.[/i]

Хорошая, довольно сложная, но чертовски увлекательная игра. Подробнее в видеообзоре: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bj2brjcqqqU

[b][i]Review copy provided by developer via Curator Connect[/i][/b] There's a peculiar subset of puzzlers and platformers that task you with moving a person or object from one place to another without actually controlling them directly. It's a well that developers seem to come back to every now and then without realizing that to some folks, that well is poisoned. Lack of direct control can be an intensely frustrating experience if the intermediary systems aren't responsive or the challenge isn't balanced for it. I can't think of many games that do it well besides Kirby's Canvas Curse, and while I'll admit Sling Ming makes a good showing it still rolls off into the deep end of the challenge pool. If not for the gorgeous graphics and creative mechanics I'd say give this one a pass, but for once the experience might just be worth the hassle. The planet Topius is wracked by constant earthquakes, and Princess Ming has had enough. When a fissure opens up in her palace she defiantly leaps in to investigate, and finds a contraption that hooks her up to a tube network called the Oxylane. Ages ago the air on Topius was too toxic to breathe, so everyone hazmat-suited up and plugged themselves in to this people-moving machine. Ming discovers she can use it to explore, and in doing so finds a sealed door deep underground that's locked by the three crown jewels, scattered on different planets. With the earthquakes growing worse, Ming embarks on a planet-hopping quest to retrieve the gems and get to the bottom of this well-shaken mess. Despite some snappy writing for Ming and her associates, it's the Oxylane that steals the show here. It's a terribly unique idea for a puzzle system, as the only way to move Ming is to click on nodes to move her tether along the track. You can click a node when the tether's stopped to make Ming choke up on her rope, and as the game progresses you get new mechanics to play with like speed sections and picking up objects that give you more momentum. What looked to me like a simple, one-trick system proved to be more detailed and involved than I ever expected. And in truth, that's kinda the problem. Your first few levels will have you snapping nodes together to bridge gaps, swinging Ming out around outcroppings to proceed, and tilting furiously at coins just out of reach. But right from the first planet you'll start running into challenges where you have to time swings past spikes or dodge pacing instant-death enemies. Mastering the touchy physics of the Oxylane is not optional here, as you'll start learning key swing techniques right from the start of the second planet. It's fine while the challenge stays reasonable but that quickly ceases to be the case, forcing you to hover carefully between lava geysers and time out swings over rows of deadly monsters. Even on the newly-added Normal difficulty, the techniques needed to get Ming where she's going will require boatloads of effort. And I still think it's worth it, because Ming's worlds are vibrant and beautiful, and the challenges tax your brain in the best ways. It's just that you're going to hit roadblocks and you're going to hit them hard, and your patience with the lack of direct control is going to determine just how okay you are with that. There are dozens of levels and plenty of challenges for each to test your puzzling skills for at least two to three hours, so if slinging Ming around sounds like a good time, you might want to give this one a gander. Did you enjoy this review? I certainly hope so, and I certainly hope you'll check out more of them at https://goldplatedgames.com/ or on my [url=http://store.steampowered.com/curator/11322459/]curation page[/url]!

Great game in several aspects! Original and very interesting mechanics. Good level design too. My main criticism is a very common occurrence with puzzle games; it borrows elements from action games where repetition works better. Once you figured out how to traverse a section of a level, where to put the nodes, the swing time etc, it feels nice but doing it again becomes a chore. It's not like dying in super mario where there was nothing to figure out, you just need enough reflexes to avoid the goomba. Repetition in an action game is a signal that you didn't master what needs to be mastered yet, but when you bring puzzle elements to it, the repetition will force you through already solved puzzles as well. It's a difficult mix to get right. So the game is cool but could be more fun with either 1) less hazards and repetition during puzzles, or 2) less puzzles and more action with faster and more dynamic gameplay; stuff like health meter, attack options, faster movement and simpler control schemes. Obviously I would prefer alternative 1 since it's much closer to the original intention of the game. But I do love some original mechanics. And despite the criticisms above I think this is a pretty good game. The visuals are super nice, the music is great, it's a well polished game in all.

Another great suprise! Very challenging. Momentum plays a big part; even on the early levels. Of course there are some days when I don't have the patience to play something like this but it definitely on my favorites list!

Gorgeous! Really nice looking game and good bouncy feeling in the bungee cord which makes the game really enjoyable. Lots of different sorts of puzzles and variation in gameplay. I really enjoy the combination of figuring out how to solve a challenge together with the action part of the game. Be aware that the game is much more challenging than what the cute graphics might make you believe, but it does also offer hints where new skills are needed. This will probably be even nicer with touch devices, since trackpad did not feel like the best match. I will use a mouse when playing from now on. All in all a very enjoyable game. Highly recommended!

Sling Ming is a mobile app that's been dumped on Steam as if it was a real PC game (it's not)... it's a cash grab from greedy mobile devs. This mobile app is a basic swinging object/pathing/reflexes type mobile game with limited to no interest for PC gamers. In fact, as we'll get into later, despite having trading cards, the game is so crap it didn't even attract trading card idlers... that's how worthless this turned out to be for PC gamers. In this mobile app, you'll tap away eagerly on your iPhone screen as a girl swings along the various actuation points of a static rail, avoiding programmed roaming bots and wishing you could have a gaming PC so that you could pay cash money for free mobile apps. Do you like paying money for free things? This could very well be the game for you! There's an overwhelming amount of mediocre Visual Novel/E-book style cutscenes in this mobile app. So you'll spend a huge amount of time not playing the game, but clicking through endless lines of poorly written VN text cutscenes because the developers couldn't work out how to relate their narrative through the game mechanics, and decided instead it would be better to compete with reading a book for your time. We're here to play games, not watch hours of garbage intersituals. From a technical perspective, as a mobile app, this doesn't meet basic minimum requirements that most PC gamers expect as standard. While there are options to change the resolution for the mobile app, all this does is scale up the simplistic 2D art assets used to make the mobile app, which makes little or no difference to the graphics quality. Without any other substantial graphics tweaks, it's not possible for gamers to improve the lacklustre 2D visuals. The controls can't be customised, which will be an annoyance for many, but it can also render the mobile app unplayable for differently-abled gamers, left handed gamers or gamers using AZERTY or other international keyboard layouts. Because this is a mobile app, it carries a number of deliberate design deficiencies. Compromises were made to cater to the iPhones that the mobile app was designed for. These are unfortunate handicaps and limitations that PC gamers shouldn't be forced to accept, but it's evident that PC was an afterthought for the iPhone developers who are to blame for this. The mobile app is deficient as a result of these choices, and would have been so much better without the handicaps that designing games for mobile phones forces upon a game. Once more, mobile devs have made gaming worse for everyone. I didn't spend thousands on building a gaming rig just so I could pretend it's an iPhone. These technical defects push this mobile app below acceptable standards for any modern PC game. Sling Ming didn't appeal much to the people who own a copy of the mobile app, either. It has achievements, and they show us a very clear picture that the mobile app didn't really capture any interest from gamers. The most commonly and easily attained achievement is for getting through the mobile app tutorial, trivial to get, but less than 31 percent of players bothered to get that far before uninstalling the mobile app. Hardly a success story, gamers just weren't all that interested in the mobile app. The poor quality of this mobile app is also reflected by how many people spent time with it. At the time of this review, SteamDB shows the all-time peak player number was only 7 players. This is a remarkably low number, and now, the only player activity occurs once or twice a month, presumably someone loading it up to see what it is then quickly uninstalling it. Considering there's over 120 million gamers on Steam and well over 100,000 games for gamers to choose from, the overwhelming lack of interest in this low quality mobile app is to be expected. So, should you buy this free mobile app? Once more we see greedy mobile devs trying to scam PC gamers. On Steam, this is $5 USD, on app stores, it's free. Mobile devs must learn PC gamers are not here to be gouged, and can't be expected to pay a premium for a free mobile app just because it's been lazily dumped on Steam. This is unacceptable disrespect for PC gamers. Because this can be played free elsewhere, and because of the other defects, it's impossible to recommend. Just who do they think we are?

Sling Ming is a really novel momentum-based puzzle game. Your protagonist, Ming, gets around by way of a rail system called Oxylane. You can guide her to designated nodes on Oxylane by tapping them (control pad, mouse and touchscreen are all well-suited for the task). You’ll need to leverage physics and your travel speed to swing around walls while taking timing into consideration to ensure you wait until deadly goo pauses long enough for you to proceed. From the outset, you’re able to move some nodes around a bit and play around with patterns to maximize swings to reach coins or to get through a level as fast as possible. It’s this balance between careful timing and exaggerated swings that keeps the player challenged and engaged. The numerous optional challenges in levels mean that you can go at your own pace. Maybe getting all the coins appeals to you more than beating the speedrun timer. Perhaps you’re only concerned with making it to the end of the level because that’s enough of a challenge. The combination of adorable presentation and novel controls in a traditional puzzle platforming structure make Sling Ming feel like this year’s Snake Pass. Be sure to check it out if you’re into that! [quote]Courtesy of [url=http://store.steampowered.com/curator/32143389/]Notable Releases[/url] curator group [url=http://notablereleases.com/post/indie-weekly-2018w14/#sling-ming]Full Review[/url][/quote]

This game's puzzles are fantastic, but that's not the only good thing about it. The art, sound design, and music are all fantastic. The colors are bright, and the story is fun.

[b]7/10[/b] [h1]Unerwartet herausforderndes Konzept[/h1] [b]Disclaimer[/b] Auch Sling Ming ist vom neuen deutschen Jugendschutz betroffen, da es bisher nicht alterseingestuft ist. Seit dem 15. November 2024 verschwand es vorerst aus dem deutschen Steam-Shop. Deswegen hier nochmal schnell der Hinweis auf dieses doch ganz süße Spiel. Ich habe Sling Ming jedenfalls vor längerer Zeit schonmal angespielt und jetzt nochmal einen kompletten Playthrough obendrauf gelegt. Meine netto-Spielzeit liegt so bei siebeneinhalb bis acht Stunden, wobei ich so ein wenig auf Extras & Challenges geachtet, aber bei weitem nicht alle holen/erfüllen konnte. Denn, wie schon die Überschrift sagt, Sling Ming ist verdammt schwer und nicht zu unterschätzen! Hier ist nur die Aufmachung süß. [h1]Gameplay[/h1] In Sling Ming muss man die Hauptfigur, die kleine Prinzessin Ming, an einer Strippe durchs Level führen. Dabei spielt die Physik eine nicht unerhebliche Rolle, denn das Spiel kalkuliert natürlich die Trägheit mit ein, d.h. wenn man mit Geschwindigkeit an einem Zielpunkt ankommt, stoppt der einen zwar ab, aber es hat zur Folge, dass es Ming am Ende nach oben haut. Das hat den Vorteil, dass man so Extras (z.B. Münzen) erreicht und den Nachteil, dass man teilweise wie in Zeitlupe mit ansehen muss, wie man in eine Gefahr reinschlittert ^^ Zusätzlich hat das Band, an dem Ming befestigt ist, eine gewisse Elastizität, was beim Schwingen eine Bedeutung hat. Um dem Schicksal etwas positiv nachzuhelfen, kann (und muss) man die Knotenpunkte versetzen, um den Weg damit etwas verändern zu können. Man probiert also ein wenig herum, welcher Winkel einem letztendlich den nötigen Erfolg beschert. Das kann schonmal einige Versuche kosten. Und Timing ist ja auch noch vonnöten, wenn man im richtigen Moment den richtigen Schwung aufbauen muss, um die Gefahren zu umpendeln. Alles nicht so einfach. Die Levels enthalten zusätzlich noch Extraherausforderungen, z.B. dass man in einer bestimmten Zeit etwas schaffen muss. Hierdrin würde meine subjektive Kritik liegen, denn diese Herausforderungen haben mich mehr frustriert als motiviert. Selbst an das Sammeln aller Münzen und der sog. "Itoms" war irgendwann nicht mehr zu denken. Und nicht zuletzt gibt es sogar Bosskämpfe! Da muss man schon gut taktieren, um sich geschickt um die Gefahren herumnavigieren und gleichzeitig den Boss im richtigen Moment angreifen zu können. [h1]Präsentation & Technik[/h1] Sling Ming ist einfach voll süß! Die Grafik ist toll und die Protagonistin sehr niedlich. [h1]Fazit[/h1] Mir ging es mit Sling Ming so, dass es mich erstmal ausbremst hat und ich es liegenließ - eher aus dem Grund, weil die Extraherausforderungen wirklich schon sehr bald nicht mehr so einfach sind. Die Physikspielereien mit der Trägheit sind hier das Alleinstellungsmerkmal, aber auch mit Vorsicht zu genießen.