Slant community chat on DiscoursePro Artistic puzzle
Limbo has very unique environment with highly creative puzzles that offer a great experience with monochrome, b/w and other dim colors.
Pro Unique black and white aesthetic
Limbo uses (what was once) a very unique monochromatic color scheme to give an atmospheric feel.
Con Keyboard controls not that good
Movement is locked to the arrow keys instead of wasd.
Pro Forgivingly tight controls
The addition of a "run" button adds a lot of depth to levels, keeping the run-jump-repeat loop more interesting. The characters have acceleration as well, which demands finesse.
Pro Play through iteration is fast
When you die, you spawn quickly to try again. Many games draw out the death, and have to reload. Super Meat Boy immediately re-spawns you so you waste no time.
Pro Unique visual style
As is typical of Ed McMillen's games, it looks like nothing else out there. The art style is 2D based but heavily unique with a vector graphics cartoony look.
Super Meat Boy is an indie platforming game that focuses on difficulty. The gameplay consists of controlling a 2D meat blob and platforming ones way to their mate.. As the levels progress so does the difficulty. Often the player is going to die over and over again to finally be able to complete a level.
Pro Great storyline
Cave Story offers a pretty deep storyline, more than one would think by just taking a quick glance at the game. There is a reason this game is still so popular after being around for so many years and it's story is it.
Pro Incredibly challenging, with hard mode for veterans
Cave Story is hard and the hard mode even harder, which makes this game great for players looking for a new challenge.
Pro Multiple versions available
After the initial release in 2004, the game has been ported to other platforms and updated along the way by various fans and indie devs.
Pro Roguelike origins allow for quick sessions
Being that Spelunky is at its heart a roguelike the gameplay sessions can tend to be quick as the player will die quite often. This makes for something that can be played in quick bursts throughout the day. the convenient saving also lends to this as a game that is still ongoing can be quickly sav...
Pro Expanded gameplay through mods
Ranging from Mega Man to Metroid, there are a tone of great mods for Spelunky all of which make for a new experience in the game which vastly expands the replayability.
Spelunky is an open-source procedurally generated 2D roguelike platformer that costs $14.99. Co-op: 2-4 local co-op, shared screen. The gameplay consists of randomly generated worlds where the player is tasked with exploring without dying, of which will happen quite often due to the roguelike mechanics of the game.
Pro Wonderfully challenging
On the outset Braid looks like any other platformer but once any time is spent with the game users soon find that the puzzles are deviously difficult forcing users to think outside of the box and even time itself.
Con Story is depressing
There is a definite sense of melancholy while playing this game which can make for a depressing experience while playing the game, which may reduce the amount of time played.
Pro Clever game mechanics
Braid utilizes a rewind mechanic where in the player can rewind the action in the game at any time. This is coupled with puzzle layouts to each lever where the player has to use the rewind mechanics to reach certain spots in a level.
Braid is a cross platform puzzle platformer that uses time manipulation as a core game mechanic that costs $9.99. The gameplay consists of basic platforming but with a twist of time control, where the player can reverse time in order to redo a mistake as well as use it to solve puzzles. It is through this time mechanic that the majority of obstacles will be overcome.
Pro Combination of the best gameplay elements of retro pixel games of the NES era
Combining elements from Mega Man, Mario 3, Duck Tales, Zelda II and Castelvania Shovel Knight excels over the rest of the games trying to cash in on the 2D pixel art revival of recent years.
Con Enemy design is not always great
Some of the more recurring enemies often have just a pallet swap in order to differentiate them, which comes off as a bit lazy and uninspired.
Pro Risk reward system
Players can risk destroying checkpoints for loot, which means if one does die after destroying their checkpoints they will have to start from the beginning of the stage. Basically this is a gambling system that can pay off or cause a crushing blow.
Con Frequent crashes on PC
PC version of the game has stability issues. Luckily, FEZ autosaves often so no much progress is lost when the game crashes.
Pro Brilliant puzzles
Fez has some deviously hard puzzles and mysteries that will require gathering clues from around the world to solve them.
Pro Mysterious world with lots of depth
FEZ goes beyond just being a great puzzle platformer. It also has a very clever storyline and game world with a mysterious bygone civilization that fits perfectly with the mysterious puzzles of the game.
Con Short
The gameplay only lasts about 3 or 4 hours.
Pro Great story
For what is a pretty simplistic looking game, Thomas Was Alone offers a truly great story that actually gets the player to care about what are basically squares and rectangles.
Pro Enjoyable professional narration
What really drives the well crafted story home is the wonderful narration done by British filmmaker, comedian, writer, actor, and presenter of radio and television, Danny Wallace. Not many indie small budget games receive the polish this game has in their voice acting, which really adds to the exp...
Thomas Was Alone is a minimalist indie puzzle platformer that costs $9.99. The mechanics of the game are quite simple where the player takes control of different sized squares/rectangles characters in a 2D environment. Each character is able to jump a certain height, which limits where they are able to traverse. by combining the characters abilities though swapping out control of each character the player is able to advance through the level.
Pro 4 Player simultaneous, combined local and online
There are 4 slots per game, and each slot can be filled with a local player, a bot, a friend over the internet, or a random internet stranger.
Pro Fun and intense races
SpeedRunners is an intense race around a 2d course. The camera follows the player in the lead, so if you get too far behind you will go off the screen and instantly die. To stay in the lead you will need to dodge obstacles, use a grappling hook to move faster and intelligently use power-ups.
Pro Interesting movement mechanics
The game has a freeing walljump mechanic as well as a grappling hook that can be used to swing across obstacles, pull towards ledges, etc. This makes for movements that are intuitive and fun as well as well controlled.
Pro Time trials
There are time trial bonus levels that are free of platforming sections and combat, just pure timed running missions.
Pro Innovative, parkour-inspired, first-person platforming with excellent sense of motion
The game's core mechanic is about traversing levels using wall-jumps, rolls and slides without losing momentum. It does a great job of creating a fluid sense of motion that you have complete control over.
Con Poor combat sytem
The combat system often feels out of place and definitely interferes with the flow of the gameplay.
Pro Throwback to Atari/C64 games while playing like a modern game
VVVVVV is very reminiscent of a game one would find for the Atari or Commodore 64 in that the graphics are simple, but the gameplay is anything but as it plays like nothing one would have found back then. It is fast paced and very precise, also extremely tough.
Con Not much of a story
The basic plot is that you are trying to save your crew members, but really it is just a loose story to tie the levels together as there is really not much there to discover.
Pro Use gravity to solve puzzles
The main mechanic in the game is that the player can switch the gravity in any level allowing the character to flip from the bottom of the screen to the top. This is used in an ingenious way in order to solve puzzles and avoid hazards throughout each level.
VVVVVV is an indie puzzle platformer that costs $4.99. The gameplay consists of 2D platforming but with a twist where there is no jump button, instead the player is tasked with changing the gravity in the level in order to have the character fall in the opposite direction to the other side of the stage. It is through this gravity mechanic that the player can traverse each level trying to reach the end.
Pro Looks amazing
The graphics are 3d rendered with vibrant colors and a pleasing cartoon like graphics that give a real sense of the fantasy world they are meant to illustrate.
Pro It's challenging and fun
Each playable character has their own abilities and features that you must use in order to solve puzzles, platform, and battle to beat each level.
Con Co-op not as good as single player
Though there is support for local co-op the game feels as though it works best as a single player title.
Pro Keeps player coming back for more
In order to perfect a level there needs to be a lot of abuse beforehand, a lot of deaths. But once it all falls into place there is no better feeling of mastering a level.
Con Only local multiplayer
Sadly the multiplayer aspect of Dustforce is local only. For PC gaming to exclude online multiplayer (when there are multiplayer modes) is an odd choice as the platform lends itself better to online play more so than sharing a single monitor.
Pro Concise tutorial
Dustforce has a very detailed tutorial that teaches the player all of the ins and outs of the gameplay.
Dustforce DX is a cross platform platformer where a janitor is tasked with cleaning up the city that costs $9.99. Dustforce is a 2D platforming game where fast response times are necessary with gameplay that consists the player choosing one of four characters on the Dustforce team, each with their own abilities and maneuvers. It is through using these characters in the right situations that the player will progress in the game.
Pro Humorous story
The story for Super Time Force Ultra consists of the main characters going back in time to alter events in history, the twist being that most of the reasons to do so are petty and selfish. This give the game a pretty light hearted tone that is laugh out loud funny at times.
Con Short
The game can be completed in only a couple of hours.
Pro Pixel artwork and sound design are well done
The pixel artwork done by Cappy as well as the chiptune sound design done by musician 6955 both complement each other quite well by both being reminiscent of 8 bit style games as well as more modern by taking advantage of newer technology that allows for more sounds at once as well as more detailed
Pro Stealth is not forced
Players can choose how they play as stealth is not a prerequisite, players can run and gun if they feel like or even go around setting traps.
Pro Movement is precise and empowering
Movement is very fluid in the game and works very well, which is needed for a platformer. It is fun jumping around and there are no consequences when falling too far, so it allows for plenty of experimenting on where one can travel in a level.
Con Extremely short
The man story can be beaten in under 3 hours, which makes for a pretty short game.
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