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On Trial: Minotaur China Shop

Mike — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 19:50:35 +0000

Minotaur China Shop is an absolute scream. As the name implies, you play as a Minotaur that owns a China Shop in ancient times – you’re big, move awkwardly and become enraged if you break too much stuff. The game takes the popular Time-Management genre and infuses it with some much needed physics and violence. As the owner of a China Shop, you must fetch the correct item for each customer. The quicker you deliver the item, the more cash you make. Of course knocking over and breaking china costs you money and angers you. Break too much and your get enraged. Lucky for you, the Minotaur’s shop has Rage Insurance so everything that you break during this period earns you positive cash. What makes Minotaur China Shop great, is that it’s like 2 games in 1. There is a legitimate time-management game here; there just also happens to be an equally fun violent destruction game as well. Personally, my strategy in the game is to play 1-2 rounds of time-management to build up my cash so that I can maximize my inventory, moves, and insurance for some great destructive payouts. The Minotaur’s angry noises are pretty funny and build to the real payoff of this game which is the enraged bashing, stomping, and charging of the Minotaur. The game is quick, simple and easy fun and while the Minotaur moves a little clunky – it serves the game well by creating accidents. For me, Minotaur China Shop shines as Blurst’s best title. Score: 9.5/10 – Rank: 1st

On Trial: Paper Moon

Mike — Wed, 28 Jul 2010 19:46:32 +0000

Paper Moon is beyond a Blurst project and was done in collaboration with Adam Atomic and Infinite Ammo (Alec Holowka). As a result, the game feels a lot more innovative and ‘indie’ than any of Flashbang’s other projects. The game is a platformer but with a twist; the graphics are an extremely unique blend of black and white noir with a flat paper aesthetic which creates a charming pop-up book world. The pop-up world mechanic is the main twist and innovation in this platformer. Tapping the spacebar will instantly transform and move pieces of the environment in Paper Moon’s world. Popping an object into an enemy (or yourself) will kill it and the mechanic along with the visuals make Paper Moon an extremely memorable game. In fact, my only complaint about Paper Moon is that the game ends to quickly. Luckily, there are some branching level paths that allow you to explore different levels on repeat plays. The time limit is also challenging and motivates you to keep replaying levels to get faster and farther in the whimsical story and land of Paper Moon. Score: 9/10 – Rank: 2nd

On Trial: Time Donkey

Mike — Tue, 27 Jul 2010 19:42:43 +0000

Time Donkey is another one of Flashbang’s humorous concepts. The game is a 3D platformer where you play a Donkey with a Flava-Flav Clock around its neck that allows it to time travel and create recorded copies of itself. The goal of the Time Donkey is to

On Trial: Off-Road Velociraptor Safari

Mike — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 19:32:09 +0000

Off-Road Velociraptor Safari is by far Blurst’s most popular title. It was so popular that the team at Flashbang was working on a full HD version of the game that would have included enhanced graphics, more features, more levels, level objectives and much more. After playing Raptor Safari,

On Trial: Crane Wars

Mike — Sat, 24 Jul 2010 19:21:26 +0000

In Crane Wars, you work for the loyal, but expensive Construction Union and compete with the good-for-nothing scabs that are building adjacent to you. The goal of the game is to stack building blocks on top of one another to build skyscrapers while chucking excess debris and cars into the scabs buildings to damage them. You’re money is constantly depleting and when you hit $0, the game is over. The simple arcade setup works well for this Blurst title and the banter between the two factions is a definite standout. While I like the overall concept, I found the controls to be a little difficult and frustrating. Unfortunately, Crane Wars’ controls and gameplay don’tquite reach the same high quality as the writing, graphics, presentation and concept. Score: 7/10 – Rank 6th

On Trial: Splume

Mike — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 19:19:02 +0000

Splume is a physics-based match-3 game. If you’ve played Bust-a-Move or Snood, you’ll quickly pick up the game. There’s a bunch of colored balls hanging from the top of (or side of) the screen and you shoot other balls at them in order to get 3 of the same color together. When there’s a bunch of like colored spheres together, they explode. Splume adds in some physics to the mix, so things break and react a little differently and more interestingly. The game has different levels that really start to show off the physics and how it evolves the match 3 gameplay. It’s nice to have some level progression in a Blurst title. The art style of Splume is a little too simplistic for my liking. A Splume sphere is just a paintball with an eyeball and the backgrounds are flat vector drawings. I like where Blurst was going with the paint effects, but when you’re looking at their whole portfolio, Splume’s visuals are definitely sub par. The game’s core concept is simple and very familiar which makes the game easy to pickup and play, but also makes Splume a little forgettable. Score: 6/10 – Rank: 7th

On Trial: Blush

Mike — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 15:03:43 +0000

Blush suffers from two things: simplicity and exploitation. In Blush, you control an underwater squid entirely with your mouse. The goal of the game is to attack enemies with your tentacles, collect their eggs (they stick to your tentacles) and return the eggs to glowing spheres to upgrade your squid and extend your tentacles. Basically, it’s all about the tentacles. The game simplicity is exacerbated by the fact that you can camp by a collection sphere and just whip around your tentacles to kill enemies and rack up points. The visuals in Blush are really cool. The neon colors and glowing underwater critters all meld together with great sound and music to create a great atmosphere. As great as Blush’s presentation is, the gameplay was just too rudimentary to last beyond the few minutes that you’re given in Blush. Bottom line was that when my time was up, I didn’t really care to play Blush again when there were other Blurst titles that left me wanting more. Score: 5/10 – Rank: 9th

On Trial: I Hate Clowns

Mike — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 14:59:23 +0000

I Hate Clowns is one of the most simplistic games on Blurst. It was made in only 2 weeks (as opposed to most of the others which were given 8 weeks of attention) and it shows. The goal of the game is to score points by

On Trial: Jetpack Brontosaurus

Mike — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 14:55:08 +0000

Jetpack Brontosaurus can best be described as Dinosaur PilotWings. As the name implies, you play a brontosaurus with a jet pack and you navigate and fly around a world completing objectives such as flying through stone rings. I really like the visuals in JB, but the clunky

IGF on Trial: Continuity

Ashley King — Thu, 27 May 2010 15:15:45 +0000

Stew: 7 I hate tile puzzles. I have never been very good at them and as a result as the game grew more complicated, my fun level began to drop as my frustration rose. That said, Continuity is still a clever combination of the puzzle and platforming genres and works very well. Levels are divided into different sliding tiles that you have to mix and match to find the exit and its corresponding key. You slide matching pathways into each other, exploring each environment until you can find the proper way through. Really, I have no problems with Continuity. It’s appeal may be limited depending on your tastes but it has some neat ideas and pulls them off well. Ashley: 9 Continuity is