What are Reddit's favorite Puzzle Game Apps?

Wait, Valve said that they would release the next video on Tuesday, http://www.thinkwithportals.com/blog.php?id=5163&p=1(At the end). But it's only Monday.

Gentleman, Valve Time is now faster than real time.

This is not a new concept, SimTower long ago is the originator of the idea. Here's a flash game of it: http://armorgames.com/play/7348/corporation-inc

I don't think porting the idea to a casual game/phone is really worthy of being that unique, although I'm sure Zynga is doing it because of the other one's success, I have less sympathy for them considering they took the idea from someone else too.

WAIT. Please edit your post. You only have to play the games. Not get potatoes.

http://www.thinkwithportals.com/blog.php?id=5307&p=1

Potatoes get you a reward:

>There's also still time to collect all 36 potatoes. Anyone accomplishing this feat by the time Portal 2 launches will receive a very special, non-hat-based reward.

They made a sample page for the turret's instruction manual on their blog.

http://www.thinkwithportals.com/blog/posts/001/turretguidesamplepage.png

These people aren't "the 2048 guys". And I don't mean in the sense that the others are saying, that 2048 "copied" Threes. Ketchapp literally just took the open source game created by Gabriele Cirulli and released it on iOS before he made an official version.

Also, from the "Lab Rat" comic:

> If any Aperture Science employee would like to opt out of this new voluntary testing program, please remember: science rhymes with compliance.

> Do you know what doesn't rhyme with compliance?

> Neurotoxin.

I personally think Crush the Castle is better than Angry Birds for physics games. It came out well before Angry Birds too, which essentially is identical to Crush the Castles except they replaced royal figures with pigs.

http://asherv.com/threes/threemails/

> But why is Threes better? It’s better for us, for our goals. 2048 is a broken game. Something we noticed about this kind of system early on (that you'll see hidden in the emails below). We wanted players to be able to play Threes over many months, if not years. We both beat 2048 on our first tries. We’d wager most people that have been able to score a 768 or even a 384 in Threes would be able to do the same using the fabled “corner strategy”. You probably could too! Just try tapping “up” then “right” in alternating order until you can’t move. Then press left. You may not get to a 2048, but you might just see your highest score ever.

> When an automated script that alternates pressing up and right and left every hundreth time can beat the game, then well, that's broken. Is Threes a better game? We think so. To this day, only about 6 people in the world have ever seen a 6144 and nobody in the world has yet to “beat” Threes. But that’s what’s better to us as game designers. We worked really hard to create a simple game system with interesting complexity that you can play forever. You know, “simple to learn, impossible to master”. That old chess-nut…

tl:dr, the clones of Threes are broken.

One of the best tower defense games I've ever played is called Kingdom Rush. It is free on armor games, one of their most popular games ever I believe, and it is $1 on iOS.

Anyone else amazed that Mari0 hasn't been DMCA'd, yet? I get that it adds a lot of functionality thus making it way more "transformative" than a straight port, but you can also ignore the portal mechanics and play through the original Super Mario Bros in a near 1:1 port on modern PC's for free.

Do you need to get the potatoes, or just play the game?

Looking at the page seems to imply the latter to me...

EDIT: Looks like this has been answered

Here it is, if anyone's interested. It explains quite a bit of some easter eggs there is on both games and how the second game started, considering the end of the first.

I know you are making a joke, but that is exactly what the author should do next. Not only is it the original, Three's creators actually focused on making the game hard to beat with an algorithm:

> But why is Threes better? It’s better for us, for our goals. 2048 is a broken game. Something we noticed about this kind of system early on (that you'll see hidden in the emails below). We wanted players to be able to play Threes over many months, if not years. We both beat 2048 on our first tries. We’d wager most people that have been able to score a 768 or even a 384 in Threes would be able to do the same using the fabled “corner strategy”. You probably could too! Just try tapping “up” then “right” in alternating order until you can’t move. Then press left. You may not get to a 2048, but you might just see your highest score ever. > > When an automated script that alternates pressing up and right and left every hundreth time can beat the game, then well, that's broken. Is Threes a better game? We think so. To this day, only about 6 people in the world have ever seen a 6144 and nobody in the world has yet to “beat” Threes. But that’s what’s better to us as game designers. We worked really hard to create a simple game system with interesting complexity that you can play forever. You know, “simple to learn, impossible to master”. That old chess-nut…

Well worth it at both prices IMO. The TD market is over-saturated on PC, but this is part of the small minority which stand out above the pack. There's a free flash version here if you want to try it out, but the full version has vastly improved visuals and all the premium content of the flash version included.

For the lazy:

1) http://armorgames.com/play/2619/the-game

2) http://armorgames.com/play/5115/replaying-the-game

I like those better all the advanced game play in this 3rd one doesn't suite me.

Yes, because basically they made 2048, realized it was too easy, and tweaked it to perfection. Also the art direction and sound production are unbelievable. Very sad 2048 is trumping it in popularity, though not entirely surprising because people like cheap, easy instant satisfaction

More info

Also, from the music page, if you click the hole burned by the turret's laser it takes you to Turret Lullaby: A Portal 2 Comic.

That's a great puzzle mind-fuck game ! I love it !! Reminds me of Antichamber. Also has shades of Narbacular Drop before it became Portal.

The levels needs some lighting work since the floors and walls tend to blend into one another but I could totally see this turning into a "proper" game! Looking forward to see what you do with this!

To the uninformed, both versions of Kingdom Rush are playable on PC. You can find the first one here and the second one here. I linked directly to the games.

On an on-topic note, there are much worse things than werewolves.

The article unfortunately focuses mostly on the visual design and doesn't touch much on the game design, partly because that's most of what the email thread the developers shared focuses on. That said, there's a big design difference between Threes and 2048. The main difference is a very finely tuned difficulty.

2048 is easier, so it has broader appeal starting out. Threes has a higher skill requirement, so it's a bit easier to get frustrated, but it is also easy to see your skill increasing because the games don't last super long.

Anecdotally it seems like 2048 is possibly more generous in spawning high value tiles, which lowers the difficulty. Also the joining of 1+1 instead of 1+2 has a very significant impact on the gameplay. Threes is more likely to suffocate you with low value tiles because they are harder to mix than in 2048.

Since Threes only moves the tiles one square at a time it takes three swipes to mix tiles on opposite sides of the board instead of one in 2048, meaning that there's no penalty to poor planning resulting in tiles on opposite sides of the board.

I don't know to what degree this counts as game design, but 2048 pops up a timed notification whining when you don't play it for a few days, which was my incentive to immediately delete it.

Ringtone: 8-bit Sherlock theme

Notification: Portal 2 "Button Positive" sound here, under Volume 2

This came out before the game and will (hopefully) explain everything for you.

It's also a great read.

I love valve's comics. They always have a combination of interesting art and story, I mean, they even made a story for dota 2 which wasn't already established lore.

>It was kind of a perfect storm of taking a game that everyone that has access to the internet has seen before, adding some mass-appeal characters and releasing it on an accessible platform.

The cause of it all was Apple's mobile phone and tablet platforms skyrocketing in popularity before the rest of the market. Normally, this wouldn't be an issue, but the iPhone has been notorious for the lack of a very key element for web browsing.

Flash.

The lack of Flash on the iPhone meant that many web based games were pretty much unplayable, which enterprising people picked up on and ported popular free web game ideas into app form. Angry Birds? Crush The Castle.

Angry Birds just happened to be the right idea pitched at the right time.

1) Portal 2 is in the same place, but just presumably a couple thousand years in the future (I don't know this for sure though), and it does explore more of the place.

2) There's no way to change anything in the final cutscene.

3) He has his own comic, called "Lab Rat". You can read it here: http://www.thinkwithportals.com/comic/#1

EDIT: Removed part of my answer from 2 due to spoiler reasons.

Looking at the source for Mari0 might help. The developer provides the source as a .love file, which is just a zip file with a changed extension. So just change the extension from .love to .zip and extract it.

Also, reading up on prototypal inheritance would be helpful if you're only vaguely familiar with it. It's the style of OO that Lua (and Javascript) uses.

Adding to this, the Gemcraft series is also a great tower defense game based on Flash. Here is the original, but the other entries in the series (Chapter Zero, Labyrinth) are actually even better.

Learn to Fly is, I think, a better implementation of the concept. There's more control, more strategy and more things to do than just body slams. Burrito Bison does have better design, though.

Wow, brilliant game! I love games like this that can create this tone. Really captures a mood and gets you immersed. Great artwork and fun, somewhat challenging gameplay. Reminded me a lot of this beautiful game - The Company of Myself

Jahooma's LogicBox is a pretty fun way to gauge (and hopefully improve) your ability to think algorithmically. It doesn't teach you how to code, per se, but turning the concepts into syntax is easy enough.

Yeah, I never realized Monument Valley is an actual place. Now I wonder why the ustwo game is named that, since the game doesn't look anything like a Nevada mesa desert.

Spoilers below, but if you care, you should have played it by now...

She was adopted by Cave and his assistant, Caroline. GLaDOS and Caroline are basically one in-the same, as the technology meant to save Cave's personality wasn't ready in time and instead used on her.

Ratman is not her father, but a sympathetic and troubled researcher. He has his own comic, which is definitely worth reading if you want to see a little more backstory.

I was like, why does this style seem familiar? And then I understood that at least the director was among the developers of Sinjid: Shadow of the Warrior.

A Portal gun mod like this actually exists for the original Super Mario Bros, and you can download it for free.

Trailer

Download

No, the browser game is free. The Ipad version, which is basically the same with some improvements is 0,89 cents, and this version, which was completely remade in a new engine and greenlit on steam (which means people clearly wanted this) is 10 bucks. I don't think 10 is too much for a good tower defense game imho (if the technical issues are fixed of course)

Edit: you know what, I just thought to myself "I'd probably bye it if it were cheaper" so I guess you have a point. It's a tough sell for this price. I still don't think it's too much to ask for.

Part 1 of this series and part 2 of this series isn't bad either. It tries to be more then it is, but what it is isn't bad.

The Art Department. An online art school with a pretty killer instructor list of industry professionals.

Valve concept artist Andrea Wicklund was one of the visiting artists during TAD's three week workshop in Kansas City (She drew this comic!) and she gave the assignment. A team of people with Valve also visited online at an earlier date and gave a different assignment.

I feel worse for the creator of the flash games Angry Birds are based on; to think someone took the exact same idea and put it on smartphones was the only thing required for it to be successful.

Edit: If anyone was curious, there's crush the castle and I also believe one that's even earlier than that but I don't remember the name unfortunately http://armorgames.com/play/3614/crush-the-castle

that is Mari0 of which is still available today.. http://stabyourself.net/mari0/

the way i have seen nintendo act is they are fine with any fan made project, no matter its capacity.

however, if you put in a 'donate' button, then you end up like full screen mario, and if you put a 'buy now' button.. expect a call from their lawyers.

Laccnow

Lac c now

Lack Vitamin C Now

What does lack of vitamin C cause? Scurvy.

Where is scurvy mentioned most? Pirate movies.

Pirates use ships.

What's on those ships? Portholes.

Portholes.

Portals. Portal.

There were four Pirates of the Caribbean movies.

The last one wasn't as good. 4 - 1 = 3.

You think this means Portal 3 confirmed? Think again.

There's only two portals in single player and four in co-op.

They come in the colors blue, orange, red, and yellow.

Red + yellow = orange, and blue + yellow = green.

But there is no green portal.

Also blue + red = purple. There is no purple portal either.

Because purple isn't actually a color.

This means there's only importance in the lack of a green portal.

Where is something green that acts like a portal?

Mario's pipes.

But there is a game that combines Mario and Portal. Mari0.

M a r i 0

Marry 0

Marry no one.

THE FACT I AM NOT MARRIED TO ANYONE CONFIRMED.

For me personally, it's my second time. Ridiculous Fishing and then later Threes. In both cases the games were cloned after release. Threes was ripped off quickly because it is a small game with simple rules that can be churned out pretty quickly. That's why we posted The Threemails to show how it took us over a year to figure out those simple rules.

So to answer your question, I wouldn't worry about people stealing your ideas when you talk about them. The cloners are looking at the bottom line only, and stealing ideas that are in development are far too great a risk for them. Not to mention they have no idea how to take a game idea and make it a functioning system that's fun and engaging. That's why they clone. So don't sweat showing off your ideas and your game in broad daylight, the cloners will only come when they smell money in the water.

Well, except the interlude comic between Portal 1 & 2 kinda goes against that, in that it explains why Chell was picked in Portal 1, and how she ended up where she begins in Portal 2.

To reiterate Tagart451, I don't want to shame you or anything, just spread awareness of the problem.
Threes - Rip Offs and The Making of an Original Game

It's sad seeing games that are cloned over a weekend get so much attention when real developers might end up spending over a year creating a game, only to be overshadowed by knock-offs a few weeks later. Maybe give Threes a try. I think it's supposed to be more of a challenge, and support the actual creators/developers.

Most of this information comes from sources outside of the games themselves - game commentary, <em>Lab Rat</em>, the ending credits, and other official stuff released by Valve.

That said, GLaDOS's name is in Her Chamber in Portal 1.

I've waited so long for this! I'm thinking some good samples from Zelda, Metroid, and perhaps Portal would fit well. Is it sad that this is my killer feature?

Edit: found awesome Portal tones. Button Positive is perfect.

Well its already solved but i have another honarable mention for a great flash game i stumbled upon years back. Much less depressing.

Karoshi Suicide Salaryman

Probably "Achievement Unlocked." It's enjoyable, and does a great job of making fun of how many useless achievements show up in games to fill up the empty space in weaker games.

link

Definitely! I've been using LOVE for a good 5 years now and I've never had any problems with speed, aside from some very shader-intensive games.

Just to list a two large games that use the engine - Mari0 and Move or Die.

To answer your questions as well:

1) GTA2 can be comfortably made in LOVE if you're a bit clever with the pseudo-3D.

2) How open-world are we talking about? There have been LoZ1 type open-world games made in LOVE before and I have made a Terraria clone a while back with infinite worlds and chunk saving and such, so it is entirely possible.

Just remember that LOVE does not handle anything except for the very basics for you - some tips for open-world games include only drawing things that are visible on the screen and using ECS. LOVE requires you to have a pretty good knowledge of how things are meant to work, not only from a gameplay perspective, but also from a technical perspective. If you're okay with that, then you're looking at an incredibly flexible and fast framework!

There's always the classic Team Fortress 2, which is free on steam.

Also I like to play Dota 2 and Heroes of Newerth on occasion.

Mari0, a spin on mario and portal, is also really fun to play. requires love 0.8 to play, so you can just do

sudo apt-get install love

If you're using ubuntu.

Rattmann, not sure if you played Portal but he's supposed to be an aperture employee who survived something I can't say because of spoilers and in the first Portal he's following the protagonist to help her leave the facility.

For anyone wondering I did not spoil anything as you will never see Rattmann in game but I know that he's chasing the player because of a free comic released by Valve http://www.thinkwithportals.com/comic/

As you can hear from that video he became crazy. Creepy stuff and you hear that message while playing going into a hidden room, I went there the first time I played Portal 2 (bought it during steam sale) and I didn't even know about Rattmann (when I noticed there was a voice I wanted to uninstall), I always considered Portal as a game with a funny storyline but after learning about Rattmann I started to see it just like I see Half Life, they are in the same universe as Black Mesa is mentioned a few times by Cave Johnson.

Valve's got some great ones from Portal 2, already pre-made for you!

http://www.thinkwithportals.com/music.php

I'm currently using Persona 4's "quest start" jingle, and have been for a while. My ears are tuned to it such that I don't really want to change it at all this point. :) Before that I highly enjoyed Geometry Wars sound effects, but that's not musical at all.

> Yeah seriously though, your whole theory sorta falls apart on the basis that people fear the unknown.

I wouldn't say his theory falls apart. Part of what makes a good horror game is trying to uncover the mystery. You need gameplay for it to be more than just an experience. And random events you have little control over are not gameplay.

A really interesting example of a non-horror game I'm going to bring up is Antichamber. It's a puzzle game in a world full of rules. It's just those rules do not match the rules of our world. The game revolves around first realizing the that world does indeed have rules, and then learning them and using them to your advantage.

That's how a good horror game works. You find an unknown threat, and you have to discover how to not die to it. You need to learn the rules that govern it. Sometimes events can happen which change what you thought the rules were, and that's where the mystery comes into play.

Another random example from Veritasium. Watch these people try to learn the rule. Look how their brain works. You may even work the same way. That's the type of thing good horror games play off. They just add the threat of death to heighten the fear. You must figure out the rules to survive and that is what creates tension.

In his top post he was referring to imagining the game as a monster to avoid creating bullshit sequences which the player has no control over.

Never thought I'd link to Antichamber and Veritasium talking about horror games... but turns out I think they apply nicely.

I think the point was that if you do a mindless alternating pattern without paying attention to what's actually on-screen, you'll often get your highest score. They feel that having to pay attention to the actual game is less broken than the alternative.

Here is the section of their post where they encounter that situation in their game: http://asherv.com/threes/threemails/#adamtext

Came here to post a smarmy comment about Crush the Castle, beaten to it.

Seriously though, Angry Birds is CtC with cutesy graphics. If you have the urge to download this with all the app store bullshit, try this link instead.

I don't think there's any need to worry, cos the proper hammer editor for portal 2 has been out since May, so I guess this is just an extra to make designing levels easy and accessible to everyone.

If you read the Portal 2 comic, Mr. Bald Scientist says that this is their "generation's moon shot" unto which Ratman says "I'd rather have gone to the moon."

If you you've read up on people decoding that radio noise into an image, the Ratman's final transmission (achievement) turns into this picture, which is [a picture of the moon with a companion cube](/spoiler)

Edit: added the forgotten links....

Here's the demo for it from Amanita's website (also the makers of Machinarium). And here's the full first one, which is a free browser game at Amanita's website too.

Charming zen-like simple point&click games. I love them but they're not for everyone... give them a try though, it's free.

Dear Naossoan:

I can honestly say that I believe myself to be an above average--perhaps even outstanding--candidate for a copy of Defense Grid. I quite enjoy defense games, and can remember staying up until 4:00 in the morning on multiple occasions playing those lovely flash-based online ones (this, for instance). Alas, they only have a limited amount of content, and eventually I outplayed their enjoyment. I also like Starcraft II and can remember staying up until 4:00am playing the beta as well. Unfortunately, my beta key inevitably expired many moons ago, and I couldn't bring myself to put my limited resources towards purchasing the full game. With Defense Grid, a game that seems to combine Starcraft-II-esque graphics with the gameplay of the online defense games, I can easily see myself staying up until 4+4= 8:00am! That's a new personal record! And best of all, this game has no expiration date and boasts an incredible amount of content. I could potentially spend every single day for the rest of my life playing it into the wee hours of the morning! (Though in all honesty, I won't.)

Also, I spent my entire dinner today thinking about what I was going to write for this. Even if what I came up with wasn't all that impressive, at least the amount of time I spent shows dedication. I eagerly await your response, and wish you the best of luck in evaluating the many applications you are sure to receive.

Sincerely, Eric (That's my real name! I told you my real name!)

Paul—may I call you Paul? Paul, listen, I'm asking a serious question here (I won't even use the word "troll"):

What do you get out of this? You comment in threads you have to know—even before clicking the links—you'll vehemently disagree with, post nothing but childish name-calling and hollow, snide remarks, then moan when you get downvoted.

It's got to be incredibly time-consuming to do this, and I can't believe that anyone would spend that much time doing something that doesn't benefit them in some way (money, pleasure, etc). So, honestly: what benefit are you getting? Even if you actually believe the stuff you're saying, do you think you're somehow going to sway anyone's opinion? Do you just have a really boring job in an office that blocks sites like Armor Games and Newgrounds?

I'm genuinely curious to know what motivates you, because I can't imagine spending so much of my time doing something I either hate so much (i.e., reading so-called "leftist hivemind" comment threads) or am so very, very bad at (i.e., converting people to my own political philosophy via debate).

Chell was not the only survivor as we learn in both portal 2 and the comics.

Doug Rattman was the one responsible for moving Chell to the top of the testing list. Which is why she was the first to get tested. Its not totally clear why. In the comics her file talks about her being "abnormally stubborn. Never gives up" and she was not even intended to be tested.

Its confirmed that Chell has a Father who worked at Aperture Science, as shown in the Portal 2 room with the "Bring your Daughter to work day" Potatoes. One of them has the name Chell written next to it and some text about a "secret incredient" from dads work.

Overall most Test Subjects are held in either Rooms, which are probably filled with special gas to keep the subject alive. Or in the sleeping pods ( which are probably filled with the same gas )

In the beginning of Portal 2, Wheatley talks about you being the only survivor. During the destruction of GLaD0S in Portal 1 the power went out. Rattman, who was shot by a turret in the foot, knew that the backup power soon will run out and therefore he rewired to power to only go to chells room. He probably died after that, but it is never actually confirmed.

Because of that all other subjects soon died and after an unknown amount of time, chell wakes up and Portal 2 begins.

How rattman survived is unknown. But if you want to check out the comics go for it: http://www.thinkwithportals.com/comic/?l=en Its not long.

Fun fact, the ending actually changed when portal 2 was released. The original ending had you black out after making it outside. Since valve wanted to have the same protagonist for portal 2, they changed the ending so you get dragged back inside by the party escort robot.

Also, the party escort associate is mentioned when you first escape the fire. Glados says to "assume the party escort position or you will miss the party". This position is laying down, and the party is a joke about a party with cake. In the current ending, the party escort bot thanks you for assuming the party escort position. Of course, I can't say much more without spoiling Portal 2, so you will have to play that to find out what happens next.

I would recommend reading this free comic that was released as a teaser prior to Portal 2.

The Second One was probably one of the best games of this kind I've encountered. I wish I would find more games like this. Possibly more indepth ones.

So very true. I have no idea! Maybe we had low(er) standards as kids? I haven't actually spent a lot of time asking youngsters if modern educational games look decent to them, I always just look at them and know it wouldn't interest me.

The only "educational" game that I've seen in the last decade and found to be fun is Light Bot. (found on reddit)

There are two movies, possibly. One is the events of Portal inter cut with the events of the Lab Rat comic. Then a second film with it going back and forth between the events of Portal 2 and the Rise and Fall of Cave Johnson.

I may or may not have tried at outlining how it would work, would love to actually delve into it and write parts of it....

> For Portal I am not sure, maybe a prequel focusing on how facility got overrun by robots.

This was already explained in the comic and the original portal lore (before a lot of it was retconned by portal 2). More or less GLaDOS was turned on and killed everyone the neurotoxin could reach, those that survived became test subjects. She used the time in between to make robots and other things.

Portal 1 is around 3 hours long. Portal 2 is 8-10 hours. You should play through Portal 1 first as that sets everything up for Portal 2. Portal 1 is a bit repetitive but don't make the same mistake I did and give up on it halfway thinking you've got 100 of those same test chambers to complete, cause the ending is something special. Portal 2 is also way way more interesting environment and story wise.

Also, in between the two games, read this comic:

http://www.thinkwithportals.com/comic/

Oh and save Portal 2 co-op mode for after you've played through the single player campaign. That's really short but uses some environmental features that would be best kept as a surprise for the single player campaign.

Whevever you got your copy of the soundtrack butchered the metadata. It's supposed to look like (defun botsbuildbots () (botsbuildbots)). Screenshot.

You can get it from the official site free here.

Read this for the second point.

For the first point... the song is irrelevant. I mean after the first game she was inactive, she would have been unable to sing and in the second game she makes references to how Chell murdered her. Indicating she was dead after Portal, making the whole premise of the song incorrect.

> Because you're a gamer and you value game mechanics and how long the game is more than the overall design of the game, be it auditory or visual.

I agree with you overall, but this portion didn't sit right with me. Suggesting that gamers across the board care more about mechanics and length than design is silly. Games like Bioshock and Don't Starve would not enjoy the success they do if that were the case.

I certainly agree that not ever game needs to be challenging or long (and similarly not ever game has to be visually stunning), but it's not necessarily an either/or situation.

Finally on an only vaguely related note you should check out Small Worlds, it's a cool little browser game and probably the prettiest pixel game I've played.

You are right.

The developers with threes came up with the concept and designed the game mechanics.

They wrote a great article about creating the game and how they feel about all the clones that have popped up.

You're not the only one feeling that way.

Basically, the appeal is that the game is entirely randomly generated. You can play it a hundred times and always get a different dungeon layout, enemies, items, weapons, etc. Sometimes absurdly powerful, sometimes ridiculously bad ones, but always different. So it's partially the challenge of playing the game itself (which is hard enough to master) but also "unlocking" all of it. This could be the ultimate F2P microtransaction-fest but instead it's a rather fair and "complete" package, so I don't mind the model basically feeding off addiction.

My problem with the game (besides being a really basic Flash shooter) is that even if stuff is re-arranged every time, the pattern, the algorithm, is always the same. So you might see rooms rearranged every time, but they're ultimately the same. There's this lottery-esque chance of getting a really good item 1:100 times, but that never had much of an appeal to me since it's essentially just a very low number in some settings file. It's the Diablo school of gamedesign and I could never get into it.

The game's creator, Edmund McMillen, actually made some of my favorite indie games and proved for me that online Flash games don't have to suck. Check out Time Fcuk or Aether. Some of his recent success games, though, are strikingly minimalistic and uninspired in comparison. Some of his unique style shines through in Binding of Isaac's insane backstory (which is kinda awesome) but the game itself? Boring standard shooter.

http://armorgames.com/play/3614/crush-the-castle is one example. The only difference is a slight change in how the "weapon" is fired.

The point is, Angry Birds was not the original game, it is just one of the more popular ones.

In term of incremental, the gemcraft series allow you to grind to for an eternity, while allowing you to increase the difficulty along the way. Its not really made in the same spirit of what most would consider an incremental game, as it is primarily a tower defense, but its basically an rpg where you level up faster and faster

Although you do have to pay for the full versions of the later releases, gemcraft chasing shadows might fit your bill, http://armorgames.com/play/15760/gemcraft-chasing-shadows or you can find it on steam.

The idea of upgrading your graphics in a game has been done a few times but if done well they're pretty neat games. For inspiration I would check out Upgrade Complete and Evo-Land.

About the idea of unlocking mechanics as you progress: the main demographic for that idea would probably be people that play incremental games or 'clicker' games. I'd check out /r/incremental_games for inspiration on that.

Finally, if this idea is done right it can be fun but it would require a lot of balancing. The graphical upgrades/game mechanics would have to be unlocked at a rate quick enough to keep the players interest but not so quickly that the player runs out after playing for only a small amount of time.

Try the sequel. Instead of insta-capture the teacher's cone will progress from Green to Red depending on how long you're in it. You have about a half-second of "seen" time total as opposed to the instant-capture of the original. Also, the cone is actually representative of the Teacher's LOS.

Antichamber is genious, and I suggest everyone to try it. It doesn't have a lot of replay value, but the 1st time you'll play it, it will blow you away. Don't even watch the trailer, as that baisically spoils the 1st puzzle for you. (Well I don't know about all trailers, but when I first saw one, it was baisically just it.)

However I just went on their website http://www.antichamber-game.com and the video doesn't seem to spoil too much, althou I still recommend going in without knowing anything. It really is a one of a kind game.

People will link you to wikipedia, but I think it's better just to see it for yourself. Actually, even better: here's the Game of Life as a puzzle game.

There was a similar game to this where you had to repair your hot air balloon before you got whacked. Anybody remember what it was?

*NM, I found it: Balloon in a Wasteland

I just finished playing this game; it is insanely beautiful. A really really lovely experience. iOS and Android for a few bucks, totally worth it imo. http://www.monumentvalleygame.com/

NB I don't know these guys or work for them, but if you appreciate this sub you'll love this game.

There's a Portal 2 prequel comic that covers this: Portal 2: Lab Rat

Edit: I mean I see your point, and you arent neccesarily wrong, but it also seems clear (to me) from the comic that the tutorial and beginning subject are both Chell in the same room during and after a long sleep. The different painting may be a choice by the designers to foreshadow the finale.

> Oh. That's cool. It's the same tones as mine, but I had a larger pack, including the sounds from the Portal Gun, a Turret saying 'excuse me', and the doors whooshing open and closed. Still not sharing my specific link though.

no problem, all the rest is found here: http://www.thinkwithportals.com/music.php

HOLY SHIT ZACK MORRISON YES. Hype. I can now satisfy my rage at how slowly Paranatural updates with slightly reduced rage at how I only get one measly page of PXS per weekday.

The small details in this comic are awesome; Sollux is wearing a shirt that appears to say "EAT SHIRT", Gamzee's wearing something or another that appears to be stitched in a manner not unlike that of a codpiece, Kanaya has a Candy Corn Vampire backpack, and Vriska's shirt has an elephant for reasons which are not entirely clear to me. My shoot-from-the-hip reaction is a reference to This Is The Only Level, but that seems like somewhat of a reach, and there must be a better explanation that is eluding me.

Also, there's no Aradia on this page that I can see, which I really hope does not imply that she's already dead.

also wow is it just me or is Karkat swole AF in that last panel

Or you could support the official release. Read up about how this game is a clone of a clone of an original idea that had been iterated for over a year before it came out to the experience it is today: http://asherv.com/threes/threemails/

Check out this link

http://asherv.com/threes/threemails/

It is very long, but it gives you insight into the incredible thought process that goes into producing a game, even as relatively simple as Threes!.

Oh man, I just saw these were the same guys who made Flow ?? I haven't played Journey, but maybe um... maybe this will make you feel better in the mean-time? [link]

Or the original Flow maybe: [link]

Nebris needs some kinda of sneakiness game like This except he is going for the dragon egg.

If Arkas gets a game it needs to be text based only :P I don't know what type though

Kurt could have a space game similar to This

Pause could have a basic arrow shooting game like the slingshot mini-game in Ocarina of Time.

Ooh Beef could have one like he is constantly falling and there are obstacles in his way and he has to avoid them, it's hard to explain, like Cube Runner on the Ipod Touch but falling vertically.

And I was also thinking a relay between all the redstoners on the server, like passing the olympic torch but with a redstone torch, so from Doc to Etho to Shree and so on.

Sorry if some of these are a bit off but I was just getting carried away with ideas :P

Very similar to One Button Bob (reddit link). Some of the stages are identical so it is a pretty clear inspiration for the game.

My best in terms of clicks was 94 taking 4:31:1. The trick for minimal clicks is some stages can be beaten with either 1 or 0 clicks by waiting for you to get through by luck. Eg the 4 laser one where you run to get through you hold down run, and die about 5 times before getting lucky and making it through. The boss takes zero clicks, but about 2 minutes waiting for him to not throw a low shot for long enough to kill him.

Hello! This game was made by Amanita Design Studios. It's great that it is getting exposure here on reddit.

However, Amanita is a small independent company and can actually be damaged by piracy. So if you want to play this game (especially in your own language) please go to http://machinarium.net/ and pay for a download. It is only $10 and it deserves every penny.

I don't represent Amanita Design in any respect, I'm just looking out for the little companies.

Cheers.

I take the chance whenever I get to talk about all of the work of Amanita Design. Their work, all of it, is completely beautiful and relaxing and none of it has a ridiculous price tag on it. I've played through everything they made with my ex and I don't regret a second I gave them. Check them out!

EDIT: But seriously, if you haven't paid just $10 after trying the free demo of Machinarium, what are you even doing with your life?

I recently downloaded the Portal 2 soundtrack and I really like using that music with the app. It's appropriately post-apocalyptic, and while perhaps a bit techno, it gives a great mood, and I'm definitely into the app for the storytelling kind of deal (I'm injured right now and honestly not mad that I can't run, I'm just mad that I can't continue in the app) so appropriate 'mood' is something I really like.

So far my favorite tracks for running are:

• Bombs for throwing at you
• Concentration enhancing menu initialiser
• Don't do it
• The part where he kills you
• The courtesy call
• An accent beyond
• Science is fun

There are a lot of other ones that are great mood enhancers for a 'scary story' too.

I think in the future I'm going to look at other soundtracks as well - particularly video game soundtracks.

you know all those rooms with weird drawings and posters and writing in them? Those were all made by the same guy. Doug Rattmann. This is a Valve comic following Doug's story. If you haven't finished Portal 1, finish the game before you read it, because there are spoilers! This came out before Portal 2, so don't worry about spoilers there.

Wherever you happen to work I urge you to discourage your higher ups from developing any kind of nuerotoxin or potential all-powerful AI, and warn them that ground up moon rocks are ~~poisonous~~ awesome.

And for the people reading this: <em>the first two volumes of the soundtrack are available for free.</em>

I currently listen to both Portal 2 and the Frozen Synapse soundtrack. I never listen to music with lyrics, and almost never to non-soundtrack music.

The 'Cat Jumped Over The Moon', top left; foreshadowing?

Wonder if GLaDOS/Rat Man considers Chell as the cat from the thought experiment*: she was trapped in a room with neurotoxin (eventually twice) and survived...or in the case of Portal 1: [the player probably] died a bunch of times but kept coming back, so Chell's both alive and dead, I suppose?

*. ~~14~~ 16 mins later: Just read the comic and Rat Man makes a more logical reference to her being Schrodinger's Cat here

It looks like all official retailers (Steam, Amazon, Gamestop) are offering $5 off with pre-orders. This makes the PC version $45 and the Console versions $55. Keep in mind that the PS3 version includes a copy of Portal 2 for Steam (once you link your PSN and Steam accounts).

Amazon is offering it with an additional $5 gift certificate, Steam with a free copy of Portal and a two-pack that comes out to $40/game (instead of $45) and GS is offering a custom yellow skin/paint-job for the two robot protagonists.

Those are the only preorder bonuses listed off the official site afaik. Since I already have a copy of Portal from the Orange box and it goes on sale rather often on Steam for <$10 ($7.50 According to price history, $15 for the Orange Box during the holiday sale), I'd much rather get the custom skin that I can't get anywhere else. Plus I can have a copy on launch day by just going down to the shop instead of waiting for shipping from Amazon (yes, not an issue with Steam but custom skin!).

edit: it looks like you're in the UK (you referred to the prices in £ earlier). The only official pre-order retailer is game.co.uk and it looks like all they're doing is offering the game for £30.

He made a couple more, both are Armorgames links to the games:

Cat in Japan is the newest one that I'm aware of.

Christmas Cat is a little older but tis the season!

The maker of the game has made a lot of other great games. He's currently working on a steam game based on "House of Wolves" another game he made last year. All of his games are up on Armor games if you want to check them out: http://armorgames.com/author/Louissi I'm pretty sure that supports him more than playing on a rehost page.

His blog is here, if you want to check it out, he's honestly one of my favorite game creators: http://louissi.com/blog/

Antichamber had the best count down timer I've seen.

The timer is in the load/save/map screen, which you need to go back to any time you get stuck (it has a lot of dead ends) and need to go back to a different part of the puzzle.

Starts ominously counting down from 90 minutes when you start the game, but the only thing that happens when it runs out is a message that says "play on your own time, not someone else's".

Just adds stress and suspense (especially since I was probably 1/4-1/3 of the way through when it ran out), doesn't serve any actual purpose.

If you enjoy this game, please check out Threes. 2048 is a poorly done version of Threes, with gameplay that is fundamentally broken. There's very little challenge or strategy. You only play until the board reaches a point where a bad draw can end you.

Threes is a much deeper and more challenging experience. Unfortunately, the lack of depth of 2048 is probably what propelled it to it's popularity, despite it being a lazy version of an already-dismissed design from the Threes team.

Interesting and perhaps relevant. Threes was the origin of all the 1024 and 2048 clones. The developers made a blog post about it, their thoughts on the clones, and what might be learned from the experience, along with some of their design work along the way.

http://asherv.com/threes/threemails/

> So the fact that there are algorithms that give you a moderate to high chance of success it is "poorly made"?

Actually, yes. The whole point of game design is to prevent easily discovered tactics that can 'break' a game. On my first play through 2048 I wasn't even paying attention and did decently well which is a sign that the game isn't balanced or tested.

While I don't really want to get into the whole clone thing, it's obvious there was a lot more though put into Threes as evidenced in the design discussion that were posted that took place over a span of months.

It's clear that the 2048 was made by somebody who enjoyed threes/1024 and had coding skill but didn't actually understand the intricacies of the original's design, or possibly game design in general. I would be surprised if the creator spent any time play testing the game with others the way Threes was.