MIDI Week Singles: "Parasitic" - Twin Robots: Deluxe Edition (NS)

"Parasitic" from Twin Robots: Ultimate Edition on the Nintendo Switch, PS4, Xbox One, & Steam (2018)
Composer: Levi Bond
Album: Twin Robots: Ultimate Edition Soundtrack
Label: Self Released / Bandcamp
Publisher: Ratalaika Games
Developer: Thinice Games

While most of the music in Twin Robots: Ultimate Edition is suiting for the game in that it comes across as background music, "Parasitic" was the track that stuck out to me as being particularly catchy.  The first two thirds of the song are fairly similar in tone to the previous two songs on the soundtrack, but once the piano kicks in at 1:29, that is when my ears perk up and I start really paying attention to the rest of the song, which makes the first two thirds of the song more important than they were before.

Or, at least that is the way that I feel about it, which is why I wanted to share it with you all today as the first MIDI Week Single of the year.  And after playing a number of games as part of #IndieXmas2018 that Levi Bond composed music for, I can pretty much guarantee you that we will be featuring more of his music on this feature throughout the rest of the year.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Instrumental

Game EXP: "Twin Robots: Ultimate Edition" (NS)

Disclaimer: I received a copy of Twin Robots: Ultimate Edition on the Nintendo Switch free of charge from Thinice Games through IndieGamerChick's #IndieXmas2018.  The game was given without expectation or promise of a good review, only that the game be played as soon as possible and to post about it on social media and talk about the game in general.

Twin Robots: Ultimate Edition is a puzzle platformer where you control two robots, but not at the same time, and help them escape to an exit.  Essentially that is it.  However, that escape comes two fold.  The first part of the escape is to free your twin who is trapped in a single room chamber with a lowering ceiling threatening to crush them.  It is up to the one robot that starts outside of the room to quickly (and safely) run, jump, and climb throughout the stage looking for a large red button that will stop the ceiling from its fall and open the door.  There is also the added complexity that each robot has a life/energy meter that is slowly used up with each action.  Any time the robot runs, jumps, hangs, and in some cases comes into contact with certain obstacles, their life/battery power is drained, forcing the player to pay attention to their life, the falling ceiling above their twin, and where they are going.  Then at the end of the stage, you still need 100 units of power required to open the exit.

The first thing that stuck out to me about TR:UE is how good the game looks.  Considering that this is an indie game that retails for $7.99 on Nintendo's eShop.  Then I felt a bit guilty for thinking that just because the game is independently developed and published that it cannot look good, but coming off of games like Jack N' Jill DX and Devious Dungeon, which do have good looking yet simplified 2D graphics, seeing TR:UE with its Unity rendered 3D characters and environment in a 2D space looked really nice.

I am presently about halfway through the 40 levels in the game, with each level being only slightly more complicated than the one previous, or simply adding in a new mechanic to be used in later levels.  Thinice has done a really good job in the pacing department, not introducing a new type of trap or element that is out of place or unsolvable after an attempt or two at the level.  From about Level 12 and on though, the difficulty has increased quite a bit more than previous levels, but has never seemed unfair.  As the levels progress, they have become longer in length, often times having the large red exit button at a distance that can be reached by one of two routes, with one being significantly shorter than the other, but ever so slightly hidden away.  And speaking of hidden away, in each level there is a battery, which I am pretty sure gives you a boost to your current power levels, but it is also something to collect that has a finite amount in each stage and since there is a counter, I have a need to find it and collect them.  the same with the blue energy pads that only turn on once you set your partner free.

Running towards what I hope is going to be the red safety b

Now, TR:UE can be a co-op game with one player controlling the white robot and one the black robot.  Each stage starts off with a different robot in the chamber with the falling ceiling so if you are playing co-op, you will not run the risk of the same person being in the solitary chamber each and every game.  That being said, I have not played co-op, but instead have controlled both robots myself, albeit at separate times, although I presume that in co-op, both robots can be controlled simultaneously.  Maybe I'm missing out?

Lastly I want to briefly talk about the music, composed by Levi Bond.  While there is not a wide variety of music in TR:UE, what is there perfectly suits the game, the play style, the not quite frantic search for the red button tunes that is needed for this type of game.  To me, it is almost as if Thomas Was Alone and Portal had a little soundtrack baby and this is what come out.  And now that I think about it, I do kind of get Portal 2 co-op vibes from TR:UE, possibly because it is/can be a co-op game where two robots are tested to escape a chamber using their jumping skills, pushing/pulling boxes, and pushing buttons to open doors.

Smushed!

My one and (currently) only issue with the game is when your character gets smashed/ crushed/ impaled/ drained of power.  When you die, the game holds for a second or two before it brings up a Continue?/Quit? screen.  As in, there is plenty of time to hit pause bringing up its own Continue/Options/Quit screen, which is often times faster than waiting for the game to do it for you.  It games like TR:UE, BIT.TRIP.RUNNER, and Jack N' Jill DX where you have infinite lives, having to wait as little as possible between dying and restarting the stage is significantly important in order for the player to maintain momentum and drive to complete the stage after being killed.

So, even though I have yet to finish Twin Robots: Ultimate Edition, I have definitely been enjoying it as a single player experience.  The levels (that I have played) have been thoughtfully constructed and laid out usually lasting between 1 minute and 4 minutes to complete, the music is perfectly suited to the stages, and the difficultly seems to be on point without being too easy or agonizingly hard.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
I Am No Longer A Human

Game EXP: TETRA's Escape (NS)

Disclaimer: I received a copy of TETRA's Escape from developer ABX Games Studio via IndieGameChick's Twitter account as part of IndieXmas2018.  The game was received with no promise or expectation of a positive review, only to talk about the game and share my experience via social media channels, including Twitter.

The easiest way to describe TETRA's Escape is that it is a single screen puzzle platformer where you use a set number of walking blocks called Tetras who can turn themselves into shapes familiar to fans of the Tetris series in order to get at least one Tetra to the exit.  Game screens typically look like the screenshot right over there.  Here, you had two blocks that could transform themselves into specific "tetronimos" with each Tetra only able to transform into one shape that is able to be rotated into place, allowing the single grey Tetra to the exit.  All Tetras are able to jump one square up and over, although they are unable to jump gaps, instead falling back to the ground (displacing a Tetra over one square if they land on another one).  Here, let me show you an example of one of the early stages, although, I guess I should say that there are spoilers.

You get the idea.  Obviously as the game progresses, the puzzles become increasingly difficult, especially if you are one who wants (NEEDS!!) to get all three of the stars and the trophy.  The Tetras are able to morph into different Tetrominos (with some two kinds and one other can be any of the traditional Tetris block shapes), then you are able to not only rotate the pieces, but flip them to use the mirror image of them.

Often times, the puzzles may not be too difficult to solve as in finding your way to the exit, but then finding out where the trophy appears after the third star is collected will frequently require a second or third playthrough, on top of the numerous attempts to use the pieces strategically to even get to the exit.  Puzzle 3-4 is unique (at least as far as I have gotten to, being 4-4), in that it only uses the L block, but it uses a lot of them.  I have managed to get two stars, but then found out that even crossing in front of the exit means that you are signaling that you are done with the level.  This is where the frustration in TETRA's Escape comes from.  Knowing that the answer to the puzzle is right in front of you, but being able to wrap your brain around the solution.

My other frustration with the game, which is no fault of the developers, is selecting the Tetra you want later in the level after you have moved around a bit seems almost random and can become annoying when you are trying to select one particular Tetra amongst a screen full of them.  But in the end, you just end up pressing either the L or R shoulder buttons a few more times to select the Tetra you are aiming for, if only to remember which Tetra can turn into which block and to scout out what looks good before you make the transformation permanent (which you are unable to undo without restarting the stage).

So, TETRA's Escape, in the end is a fun, low key puzzle game that doesn't require and quick movements or dexterous fingers, just a mind capable of solving puzzles in a 2D space (although TETRA's Escape 3D, played on a board more than one square deep would be a fun and added complexity that I probably wouldn't be able to finish).  So, as mentioned above, I am presently stuck on world 4-4 with no option but to keep at it or hope that someone accidentally posts the solution either on Twitter or I see one somewhere out there as the game gains in popularity.

Stay mentally strong out there fellow Tetraphiles, and good luck in those later levels, and by later levels, I mean from 3-1 on.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
Future's Rising in Your Mind

Game EXP: Devious Dungeon (NS)

Disclaimer: I received a free copy of Devious Dungeon for the Nintendo Switch from developers Ravenous Games, Woblyware, and published by Ratalaika Games, distributed by IndieGamerChick via her Twitter account for the #IndieXmas2018, designed to get the word out on independent video games.  The game was given with no promise or expectation of a positive review, only that the game be talked about.

Devious Dungeon is a roguelite-ish side scrolling action platformer where you enter procedurally generated dungeons of increasing size culminating in a boss battle.  During the game you level up by gaining experience points by killing enemies (and sometimes collecting Tomes of Knowledge), and further equip your character by earning money killing enemies and completing semi-randomly generated quests (Kill 5 Orc Axe Throwers, Destroy 20 Statues, etc).  That is basically it, although there is a bit more, but those are the basics.

My first disappointment in the game came when I found out that you could not chose the gender of your character, which is a purely innocuous and cosmetic feature that I would think would not be difficult to implement in a game with this type of pixelated art style.  My reasoning behind this that coming off of Jack N' Jill DX which gives you the option to play as either Jack blob or Jill blob (whose only distinguishing feature is a bow on the top of her head) and I thought playing a fantasy action game with a Conan the Barbarian type character would be fun to play as a Red Sonja type character instead.  Instead, the game only gives you the option to play as the unnamed male character.

The second disappointment was that Devious Dungeon did not support video capture on the Switch.  Again, this is really a minor thing as it means that I am only able to share screenshots of the game, but like the cosmetics above, did not prevent me from playing the game or sharing frequent moments of the character killing any number of enemies.  The variety of enemies though is pretty diverse and unlike what you might expect from a smaller indie game, at least in the first half of the game that I have managed to crawl my way through, monster assets are not re-purposed and re-colored to make new monsters.  There have been a couple of instances where an existing monster is combined with another to create a new monster, such as when the Orc is riding a Wolf and essentially becomes a Warg Rider of sorts.  This I found to be very impressive as it meant that although I had faced both Orcs and Wovles before, going up against these Warg Riders (I've since forgotten what their official name is, sorry), the approach is a bit different.

That being said, the approach to fighting enemies is fairly simplistic.  You swing your weapon either hoping or knowing that you can kill them before they run into you (thereby damaging you), or you are able to jump over them or onto a nearby platform so that you can avoid their attack, then hop down and continue yours.  There is no ranged attack and you have no magic spells.  This is a melee combat only game.  So combat can get a little monotonous, but no more so than playing a melee character in Diablo III.  The Ancient Beholder here, was an oddly easy boss, even before I upgraded the armor in that I just stood there and took minor damage.  The earlier boss, the Orc Chieftain though did take two attempts as I failed to recognize the chieftain's tells on when best to attack it.

The only other criticism I have of Devious Dungeon is that the music, while often appropriate for the boss battles, the King's chamber (when continuing the game after booting the game back up), and when you run across Olaf's Emporium in the depths, the main dungeon theme is fairly mundane and more than anything offers ambient background noise that happens between the slashing, clanging, and smushing death sounds of dying monsters.  Maybe hearing it outside of the game might give it a bit more mental clout, but aside from a digital art representation of the soundtrack on the limited edition of the PS4 port of the game, I have not been able to find a way to just listen to the music (next to having the game open, which is not beyond 12 year old me).  Although maybe something like Jeff Ball's score to Tiny Barbarian DX: The Serpent Lord would be too much?

And with all of the critiques I have of Devious Dungeon, I have found myself going back to it, sort of as a palette cleanser when more thought heavy games such as TETRA's Escape or The Adventures of Elena Temple are causing my puzzle solving brain to strain itself.  With Devious Dungeon being so light on story that I can kind of turn my brain off, is not at all a bad thing as sometimes I just need solid hack-and-slash game where the rules are not complicated that is fun to play and not too frustrating when you die.  And you will die, or at least I seem to frequently die after only a handful of dungeons.  And for now, Devious Dungeon fits that bill pretty well.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

Instrumental

Game EXP: Jack N' Jill DX (NS)

Disclaimer:  Jack N' Jill DX is game I received from developer Rohan Narang, Publisher Ratalaika Games, and Twitter person IndieGamerGirl as part of the #IndieXmas2018 event to help get the word out on indie games developed for various systems and platforms.  The stipulation upon receiving the game free of charge was to talk about the game, with no promise of further compensation for either a good or a bad review.  Simply talk about the game.  And that is what we are here to do.

The first thing that struck me about Jack N' Jill DX developed by Rohan Karang, was that the monochrome color palette closely resembles that of the original Game Boy, but the graphics and art design are clean and sharp.  So do not go thinking that the visual aesthetic also includes the chugginess of Super Mario Land or Castlevania: The Adventure.  The music is also similar in tone to Game Boy era music, but takes advantage of the ability to have more than a few fingers worth of tones.

The basic premise of the game is a fairly simple one.  You play a blob, either Jack or Jill (with Jill wearing a bow, but otherwise, both characters play the same as the other), and you press the A button to start running, and then press A again to jump over obstacles, collecting coins along the way until you reach your counterpart waiting at the end of the stage.  I feel like it is a decent mix of  the runner-on-rails model of BIT.TRIP.RUNNER with the platforming and goal of reaching your partner in Super Meat Boy.  The controls are not quite as tight and accurate as Super Meat Boy (or nowhere near as manic), but I do not think that JNJ:DX is trying to be another Super Meat Boy, but instead its own game that feels influenced than anything else.

Before I get to the music in the game, from composer Nicole Marie T, I want to talk about the one sound issue that almost sounds too much Game Boy era sound effects.  In the third world, ice blocks are introduced that break after you run/scurry across them.  As you go across them, they break apart with a rather loud banging noise that sounds probably very close to if you hit an ice block with a sledge hammer and processed that sound through the audio chip in a Game Boy. Let me give you an example below.

I think an equally effective tinkly-splish-shattering sound rather than this meaty bang would have been less harsh on the ear drums and the inner ear.

As for the music now, that is a completely different matter.  Nicole Marie T. has written some music that not only fits perfectly with the visual aesthetic, but it also fits in well with Game Boy music in general, but it not as harsh as a lot of Game Boy music was forced to be.  The title music is a perfect example of the catchiness as well as the tone for the rest of the game.

This opening track is perfectly suited to bring the player into the world of Jack N' Jill and the music for the individual worlds as well.  One possible criticism, although not necessarily on the part of Nicole Marie T., is that each world is made up of 20 levels.  The same song plays throughout the world and only changes when you make it to the next world.  Sometimes by the 10th level out of 20, you might start aching for a new song to play, especially if the levels are becoming more increasingly difficult (looking right at you World 5-1!).  However, just like BIT.TRIP.RUNNER, when your character dies and you are taken back to the beginning of the level, the music continues and does not stop.  Again, this continuation of the music, for me at least, keeps me in the game and coupled with the near instantaneous restarting of the level does not let the player dwell on the characters death while they wait another five seconds to try the level again.

Presently, I am on World 5-1 which is 57% of the way through the game and I can definitely see myself finishing the game, especially over while on the two hour flight down to SoCal this weekend.  There is a lot of content to this indie title including being able to buy (with in-game earned currency) different colors to play the game in as well as cosmetic items such as hats and hair for either Jack or Jill.  There are also challenges which are essentially Achievements (for the Switch version at least), but do not pop up in-game when you earn them.  There is also apparently a Mirror Mode which I presume is the entire game, but played in stages where the world is mirrored.  So maybe there are an additional 140 levels after the first 140 levels?  That could be interesting.

So that is really it for Jack N' Jill DX, or at least all that I really want to say.  There is some more to the game but coming across it on your own is a lot more interesting than me telling you that in each world, a new skill or game mechanic is introduced, but done in such a way that the learning curve is not at all steep.  See how boring that was.  So go play the game for yourself if you like.

~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian

To Its Final Round

P.S.  You can check our Twitter feed where I talk a bit more off the cuff (maybe?) about Jack N' Jill DX as well as talk about other games that have been featured on IndieXmas2018.

Game EXP: Midnight: Deluxe (NS)

Disclaimer: I received Midnight: Deluxe free of charge from IndieGamerChick (who is not employed by either Petite Games or Ratalaika Games) with no expectation other than to play and talk about the game.  "Talk" was not a promise or expected promise of a good or positive review, only to talk about my personal experience playing the game.

Today we are having a special Game EXP article because of 2018 IndieXmas run by IndieGamerChick over at her site.  During IndieXmas2018, game codes are handed out (free of charge) to help spread word of mouth (good or bad) about indie games released on all systems far and wide, except maybe the Jaguar and N-Gage.  So, this Game EXP article is looking at Midnight: Deluxe on the Nintendo Switch, although it is also available on other systems, but I am going to exclusively talk about it on the Switch.

The first thing that struck me about M:D, was that the game was described as being a golf-type game where you slingshot your illuminated block (whose name is Midnight) through a puzzle-type screen towards the goal.  My first thought was, "Okay, so golf meets Angry Birds, I can do this."  Then it took me a couple of minutes to figure out the control scheme, even though the opening level has on screen text about how to fire/shoot.  Since I still had Angry Birds in mind, I thought that you had to pull back and fire to send Midnight flying.  A couple of minutes later, I realized that you do not pull back, but instead point in the direction you want to go.  After feeling frustrated at not being able to play what seemed like a rather simplistic game for a minute, I felt a bit like an idiot.

With the Switch version of the game, developers Petite Games added touch screen functionality, which I thought was a brilliant move that makes the Switch version feel all the more exclusive.  However, after the first level, I instinctively used the attached Joy-Cons and not the swiping motion on the touch screen.  There were times that I did try to use the touch screen controls, but with the frequency that I needed to restart a stage (upon deciding that I shot myself into a bad situation, or just generally tried to improve the number of shots I took each level), I did not see any other option but to hit the X button.

And I hit that X button a lot, especially in that first screen shot, which is from the 3rd level in the game.  And the biggest distracting thing about having to constantly hit the X button and restarting a stage, was that the music in the background would start a new song.  I do not know if this was meant as a deterrent from manually restarting, but even when Midnight died (overshooting off-screen in certain stages, falling/flying into buzz saws, landing on spiked fences, or being hit by serrated spinning sword blade-things) the music would change.  This problem for me, and even Conklederp commented on the abruptness of the change, was that there might have been upwards of 10 songs, which all sounded very calming and serene, but when stages last maybe 10 seconds when completed accurately, only hearing 1.5 seconds of a song before restarting to then hear a new song for 2.5 seconds got a little weary on my brain-ears.

In the end, I do not know how much time I spent playing (due to the Switch not presenting that until after a certain amount of days past), but by the end of Level 46 of 70 stages complete (having 51.47% of the game completed), I felt like I was reaching a Super Meat Boy level of difficulty that I do not know if I was ready for.  On most of the levels, I did replay them in order to get two stars or higher (fewer launches means more stars, you know, like golf), mainly because I felt like achieving only one star was only skirting by and only putting the bare minimum into the game.  And after 46 levels, I felt like I had genuinely played the game and that the remaining 19 levels would have felt like a slog.  Maybe there was more innovation after that 51st level, but it started to feel like all of the levels after 50 (the one I played) were there to pad out the game.  

I might come back at a later date and finish those remaining 24 levels, but for now, I have played  through 65.7% of the levels in Midnight: Deluxe earning 78.8% of the stars, which is not too bad after one night of game play.  And most importantly, it was a fun game.  Now Petite Games just needs to fix the issue with the music and I would have no major complaints.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
I Saw the Danger, Yet I Walked