I bought this as a treat to myself for decently handling what has been an extremely difficult teaching year so far. I needed a pick-me-up. I played for an hour today, trying out the first six...
I bought this as a treat to myself for decently handling what has been an extremely difficult teaching year so far. I needed a pick-me-up.
I played for an hour today, trying out the first six games in the pack (ordered “chronologically” — each game has a fake release date).
Barbuta is a rough start, honestly. It’s a 2D open-world platformer (probably metroidvania?), but it has really stiff controls. I will end up coming back to it, but as a first taste it didn’t have the “modern meets retro” feel that I wanted. It just felt retro.
Bug Hunter, on the other hand, is exactly what I was looking for. It’s a simple, elegant grid-based puzzle deckbuilder game. You have a set of cards with movements and attacks on them, and you have to move about a grid eliminating bugs and collecting energy pellets. Energy will let you swap out your cards with more powerful ones, which you’ll need as the field gets more crowded with bugs. I really liked this one and will definitely play it more. It’s got some genuine depth.
Ninpek is a score attack runner where you kill enemies and collect their drops for points, all while dodging their projectiles. Sessions for this one are very short — early on I was dying in a matter of seconds before I got used to the movement and enemy patterns. This one was okay, but I probably won’t spend a lot of time on it.
Paint Chase is a top-down grid-based driving game. You have to drive over squares to paint them your color all while enemy vehicles are painting them the opposite. You can run over opposing cars to destroy them, but new ones spawn regularly. Each level has different layouts and power-ups. It plays like a Pac-Man version of Splatoon. I really liked this one and will play it more.
Magic Garden is a snake-like game. There are certain squares that spawn on the floor that have stars on them. You wander around and collect a chain of cute things that follow behind you. When they are over star squares, you can press a button to “save” them, getting more points the longer the chain you have. While doing this, there are also enemies that get in the way (though you can get a power-up that lets you go after them Pac-Man-style). I think this one is neat but I probably won’t play it more.
Mortol is a 2D platformer in which you have a set number of lives to get through a level. The twist is that you will need to utilize previous lives to get to the end. You can launch a character like a dart at a wall that the next character can then use like a platform. You can turn a character to stone. You can blow up a character to clear obstacles. As you progress through the level, you can find collectibles that will give you additional lives. This is a neat idea, and I will play this one more.
Overall, I’ve been impressed with the quality of the games. Even the ones that I haven’t liked aren’t really bad — they’re just not my cup of tea. It’s clear a lot of thought and effort went into making the collection. None of the games I’ve played have felt like throwaways. All of them nail the retro feel, while a few have nods to modern ideas that are incorporated into a retro framework really well.
As a package deal, UFO 50 reminds me of two different things.
The first is the game Arcade Paradise. In that game, you manage an arcade and can play the different cabinets you buy. It was a neat concept, but the quality of the actual minigames included with the cabinets varied wildly, with many being clunky or un-fun. UFO 50 has a similar feel of “play all these retro facsimilies” but it drops the management aspect and, in my opinion, has games a cut above those in Arcade Paradise.
The second is the Playdate. When you buy that console, you also get a “season” of games. Due to the limitations of the device, many of these are simpler, more elegant, smaller-in-scope games with retro feel: less plot and more score attack. That’s not to say there aren’t some that feel modern and interesting, but that no matter what you’re playing, you’re looking at it through a lens of fairly strict restrictions on design that often end up being boons for creativity. UFO 50 has a similar feel — it feels like you’re buying a retro-inspired handheld that comes with its own “season” of games that manage to still be creative and interesting despite their deliberate design limitations.
It’s definitely not for everybody. If you don’t have a love for retro games, you can probably safely sit this one out. That said, I have only tried 6/50 games, and even then I was only dipping my toe in the waters of those 6. So take this as a very preliminary opinion rather than a last word.
If you do enjoy retro games and score attack-style play, then I can give a preliminarily solid recommendation. It’s great so far, and if the pattern of quality holds for the remaining 44 games, then UFO 50 will end up being something genuinely special.
I think it's mostly because the "meta narrative" in a sense is that the first game is probably not gonna be their best, in the terms of this fictional studio at least. It's definitely a bold...
I think it's mostly because the "meta narrative" in a sense is that the first game is probably not gonna be their best, in the terms of this fictional studio at least. It's definitely a bold choice for sure but it makes sense in the context of the game as a whole.
I wasn't alive in the 80's or anything so I'm not sure if it's accurate to the time period but I imagine the games back then were kinda super similar to that vibe anyways.
I've seen a lot of this "well it's because of the meta narrative" thing, and i'm not sure that makes a ton of sense? To be clear, i expect Barbuta to be one of the games I enjoy the most. Games...
I've seen a lot of this "well it's because of the meta narrative" thing, and i'm not sure that makes a ton of sense?
To be clear, i expect Barbuta to be one of the games I enjoy the most. Games like this are VERY interesting and I highly doubt they just made it bad for story. It's just that these games are viewed, by many, as bad because they're very punishing puzzle games that reward knowledge gained, not actual execution.
Just pointing this out because i've seen a couple of people worried about this, but so far not a single game i've played in the collect actually feels like some crappy "oh god this is awful to play" 80's thing.
I'd say my only complaints are that some games take too long (busido ball is great but i really wish it wasn't first to 8. Similarly the UFO racer thing feels like it's a LOT of laps) and obviously some games are going to be of a genre you don't enjoy.
I haven't purchased UFO 50 yet, but I'm looking forward to doing so and playing it this weekend. Looking up Barbuta gameplay on Youtube, I was most reminded of Pharoah's Tomb on DOS, published by...
I haven't purchased UFO 50 yet, but I'm looking forward to doing so and playing it this weekend.
Looking up Barbuta gameplay on Youtube, I was most reminded of Pharoah's Tomb on DOS, published by Apogee. That's from 1990 instead of the 80's, but tech-wise it would definitely fit in as an early 80's game (i.e., with CGA graphics).
I played six more! Velgress is a vertical platformer. There are different platforms, mostly clouds, that disappear a short time after you stand on them. You have to jump up the level and, as you...
I played six more!
Velgress is a vertical platformer. There are different platforms, mostly clouds, that disappear a short time after you stand on them. You have to jump up the level and, as you do, a bar of spikes rolls up beneath you, making falling a constant hazard. You also have a gun you can use to shoot platforms, barricades, and enemies. When you make it to the end of a level you can spend your coin on power-ups for the following one. This one was alright. I'll play it a bit more.
Planet Zoldath is a procedurally generated top-down exploration/combat game. It kind of feels like if Metroid were the original Legend of Zelda game. You wander around the open world divided into single screens and find items and dodge/kill enemies. Each time you die, a new level is generated. I only tried a few rounds of this and didn't get very far into it, but it's promising.
Attactics is a turn-based auto-battler. Your castle is on the left side of the screen, and the enemy's is on the right. Each turn, units spawn and advance/attack. The turns are also timed, so they automatically happen every few seconds. The playfield is broken into several different lanes, and, in those seconds before the turn ends, you can move individual units up, down, or back, but not forward (they will do that automatically on the turn end, if they can). Your goal is to defend your castle against the enemy's advances while breaking through their defenses to get to their castle. This had a Plants vs. Zombies feel to me, but with much more time pressure. You do not get long to think or plan each round. I think this will be really cool for some people. It's not my personal favorite.
Deviltion is a grid-based cascading explosion puzzle game. There are enemies and friendlies placed on a board. You then place pieces that will, if triggered, explode in certain patterns. Your goal is to set up your pieces to make a chain of explosions to take out all the enemies (and spare the friendlies). You can only detonate one square at the end of a round, so your setup has to Rube Goldberg itself to take care of the rest. I really like the concept of this one, but it's missing a pretty essential QoL feature for me: highlighting explosion patterns once placed. If I played the game enough I'd learn all the pieces by sight and be better able to "read" the board, but, as is, I had to put in a bit more effort than I'd like in that regard (note: I'm also completely mentally exhausted from this week, so take that into account).
Kick Club is a soccer platformer combat game. You are on a single screen with enemies, and you can kick a soccer ball to kill them. You cannot attack other than that, so you have to dodge the enemies and retrieve the ball after kicks in order to clear the screen. It reminds me of Super Crate Box or the POW minigame in the original Super Mario Bros, but a little more strategic since you have to put a bit of thought into your kicks. I like this one.
Avianos is a grid-based turn-based strategy game. Each round you can choose a god to pray to. That determines your actions for that turn, which vary from gathering resources, setting up structures, recruiting soldiers, and moving on the map. Praying also increases your affinity with that god, which will yield blessings (better actions) over time. Your goal is to eradicate the enemy from the map, which they are also trying to do to you. This felt like a single-player board game. It's not my favorite genre, but I also think people who like this style of game would really like this. It seems very well designed and thought out.
Gonna add my thoughts every once in a while to this thread too! I'm currently playing through Night Manor, a point and click adventure game which is genuinely really creepy, it's really impressive...
Gonna add my thoughts every once in a while to this thread too!
I'm currently playing through Night Manor, a point and click adventure game which is genuinely really creepy, it's really impressive on how they could make it so scary actually. I was never a huge adventure game kinda guy, especially because "video game logic" tm, but this one was really fun.
I think it might be worth making a separate UFO 50 discussion topic! Seems like there are enough of us here playing it right now that we’d get some good mileage out of it, and it’d give posts a...
I think it might be worth making a separate UFO 50 discussion topic! Seems like there are enough of us here playing it right now that we’d get some good mileage out of it, and it’d give posts a bit more breathing room.
Ive been periodically gaming but i havent had too much time between that and dating and other obligations, do you mind making the topic? Ill contribute when I have the time.
Ive been periodically gaming but i havent had too much time between that and dating and other obligations, do you mind making the topic? Ill contribute when I have the time.
I’m honestly surprised at how good these games are for how simple they tend to be. It turns out that a weird control scheme and a running chicken drumstick is all it takes to make boring 8-bit...
I’m honestly surprised at how good these games are for how simple they tend to be. It turns out that a weird control scheme and a running chicken drumstick is all it takes to make boring 8-bit platformers interesting again (mooncat). And while House Party is basically just RNG: The Game, it’s somehow managed to become the most played game in the collection. There are more games that I haven’t played than that I have because they are so addicting.
Magic Garden and Mortol were two of my favorites when I played it on the first day actually! Magic Garden in particular is surprisingly satisfying for my brain.
Magic Garden and Mortol were two of my favorites when I played it on the first day actually! Magic Garden in particular is surprisingly satisfying for my brain.
Sorry for the marketing title, but I just learned about UFO 50 recently, apparently it's a game by the creators of Spelunky, Downwell, and others as 50 actual good full length games as a homage to...
Sorry for the marketing title, but I just learned about UFO 50 recently, apparently it's a game by the creators of Spelunky, Downwell, and others as 50 actual good full length games as a homage to retro gaming.
Wondering if anyone has heard of it/is hyped for it! It's coming out tomorrow and I'm kinda into the idea plus I've been reading that they're mostly full length games in there too. The value prop for $25 might be insane if that's the case.
That's an incredible concept. Unfortunately I don't know how much I'd actually enjoy playing it though; I've tried a few older games recently that I hadn't played before and just felt no desire to...
That's an incredible concept.
Unfortunately I don't know how much I'd actually enjoy playing it though; I've tried a few older games recently that I hadn't played before and just felt no desire to stick with them. Seems nostalgia might be the main factor for me than actually enjoying the design and aesthetics of older games.
Seems that way to me too. Games look shallow and unappealing for anyone who didn't grow up with the 80s-90s era of gaming. It's a tough sell for me to put down something like Ori and the Will of...
Seems that way to me too. Games look shallow and unappealing for anyone who didn't grow up with the 80s-90s era of gaming. It's a tough sell for me to put down something like Ori and the Will of the Wisps to bang my head against the wall with a 2D side scroller with 2 button inputs and crunchy graphics/music.
I've been playing the horror point-and-click game in the pack and it's much better than actual games of this type from the 80s. Really cute game design while still operating within the confines of...
I've been playing the horror point-and-click game in the pack and it's much better than actual games of this type from the 80s. Really cute game design while still operating within the confines of the retro graphics. For example, when your character gets scared the cursor shakes around and you have to fight it to click on things. And when you get a flashlight you can only see a portion of the screen through dithered blackness.
Sure, but that's a comparison most people won't be able to make. You have experience playing those games and its a fun thing to go back and compare to. Most younger people won't have that same...
Sure, but that's a comparison most people won't be able to make. You have experience playing those games and its a fun thing to go back and compare to. Most younger people won't have that same connection and feel the same sense of excitement from something like this.
I want to emphasize that I don't have any problems with nostalgia, but I think its important for anyone to realize that their opinions on something may be affected by it, and others don't share that experience with them.
Yeah. I was raised with NES games even though that’s a bit before my time (we played that during the N64 and GameCube generations). My parents thought we’d spend less time playing video games if...
Yeah. I was raised with NES games even though that’s a bit before my time (we played that during the N64 and GameCube generations). My parents thought we’d spend less time playing video games if we only had older ones available.
I'd give it a little more credit than that. Spelunky is a 2d game made in the style of older stuff, and easily one of the best games i've ever played, with an absurd amount of content. The...
I'd give it a little more credit than that.
Spelunky is a 2d game made in the style of older stuff, and easily one of the best games i've ever played, with an absurd amount of content. The spelunky dev is just one of the dev's involved in this.
I suspect there will be some duds by your standards, but at the same time I wouldn't completely write it off on appearance alone, as "looks retro, is actually amazing genre has been around for awhile now. Hell the best metroidvania i've played is Environmental Station Alpha.
Haha maybe, I'll probably give it a shot eventually; even if its just for the local multiplayer games. But I don't think I've ever had a good experience with the many "50~ games in one!" packs...
Haha maybe, I'll probably give it a shot eventually; even if its just for the local multiplayer games. But I don't think I've ever had a good experience with the many "50~ games in one!" packs I've played over the years. Even if this is one of the best ones ever, its not a very high bar.
The thing is, each of these 50 games was designed specifically to be a good standalone game. The entire point of the exercise was to take the concept of a "50 games in one!" package and ask, "What...
The thing is, each of these 50 games was designed specifically to be a good standalone game. The entire point of the exercise was to take the concept of a "50 games in one!" package and ask, "What if these were actually good?"
"Good" is pretty subjective though. It's not like they're packaging 50 hollow knights, stardew valleys, and metroids all in one game, its all little experiences that are meant to last for a couple...
"Good" is pretty subjective though. It's not like they're packaging 50 hollow knights, stardew valleys, and metroids all in one game, its all little experiences that are meant to last for a couple hours as most. Not sure what the draw is for me when you could experience the same thing consistently with other popular indie games
Small, more compact experiences have a joy of their own, though. For example, a game with a long playtime may have more drawn out parts, or gameplay elements that start off interesting or engaging...
Small, more compact experiences have a joy of their own, though. For example, a game with a long playtime may have more drawn out parts, or gameplay elements that start off interesting or engaging but eventually wear out their welcome. Games designed to be shorter can distill their gameplay down to the most fun, exciting parts, and end before anything gets old.
“Good” is certainly subjective; my point is just that these aren’t designed like Action 52 games (I.e. shovelware), but are made with the intent to be fun, quality experiences. So the usual preconception of “XX-in-one” collections as being of lower quality is not applicable here.
Ehhh. I have an Analogue Pocket and I've had the chance to throw some piles of older games on, which this game is trying to emulate. Sure, a lot of games you throw on, find some novelty, and move...
Ehhh. I have an Analogue Pocket and I've had the chance to throw some piles of older games on, which this game is trying to emulate. Sure, a lot of games you throw on, find some novelty, and move on. But I threw on Super Metroid after bouncing off it multiple times in the past, and it finally clicked about why everyone who played it is so obsessed with map layouts and backtracking. It's laid out entirely open, without a specific marker, but I found myself exploring naturally, almost always finding something along the way, and naturally figuring out how to get in places via the environment and my skills without having explicit markers. (ie the ship, which I used a mix of bomb jumps and speed boosts + shinespark.)
I played Metroid Prime, Metroid Dread, and Hollow Knight around the same time; none of them touched on how natural it felt. Metroid Prime made things interesting along the way with scans and environmental storytelling, but slogged at backtracking. Dread was a streamlined parkour experience with little of the natural exploration. Hollow Knight almost gets there, but it sprawls into levels too much past that feeling of a natural, singular environment that Super gets.
I've discovered the same general feeling from Batrider's sense of shooter spectacle, Chrono Trigger's pacing, Rondo of Blood's extremely rewarding timing and commitment to execution, DnD: Shadow over Mystara's tricks of committing you to an adventure via an arcade game... The point isn't gameplay time, (though I can play Pokémon Puzzle League for hours,) it's that some of these games still have something in the sauce, and people haven't quite figured out how to fit it into a new context. Some of that comes across from simplicity, not in spite of it.
While you are most likely correct, I think if you don't have nostalgia or at least a positive interest in these sort of games, it just wasn't made for you. I grew up with Atari and the NES, so I'm...
While you are most likely correct, I think if you don't have nostalgia or at least a positive interest in these sort of games, it just wasn't made for you. I grew up with Atari and the NES, so I'm likely going to pick it up even if I would generally get more enjoyment out of a modern game.
They've been quite tightlipped, outside of individual dev streams over the years. Now that it's here it will be very hard to sort out what I learned before now except to say that this is one of...
They've been quite tightlipped, outside of individual dev streams over the years. Now that it's here it will be very hard to sort out what I learned before now except to say that this is one of the most ambitious and thoroughly approached projects I have ever heard of. I assumed for a long time that this would be vaporware and never release!
This looks great, thanks for posting it! One of my favorites are modern takes on the old formulas. I do have a lot of nastalgia for the older gamss but I really don't miss the jank at all. I'm...
This looks great, thanks for posting it! One of my favorites are modern takes on the old formulas. I do have a lot of nastalgia for the older gamss but I really don't miss the jank at all. I'm going to keep this one I the pocket for when I'm feeling like spending a few hours in the past.
Have to say I think it's an AMAZING game. A lot of these games look simple but have a shocking amount of depth. It's got a wonderful version of windjammers, snake, a couple of great tactics/puzzle...
Have to say I think it's an AMAZING game. A lot of these games look simple but have a shocking amount of depth. It's got a wonderful version of windjammers, snake, a couple of great tactics/puzzle games, a few metroidvania's on various spectrum's and a whole bunch of other stuff to screw around with. Hell they've even got an idler game.
It's also got some good potential couch co-op/vs although I haven't tested that. I can see the price being high for someone who's wary but if it goes on sale at all i'd say it's almost certainly worth it.
I just bought this game because of all the hype I'm hearing here. It'll be the first brand-new game I've purchased in probably a decade. I'll play this when I get home today but if it's bad I'm...
I just bought this game because of all the hype I'm hearing here. It'll be the first brand-new game I've purchased in probably a decade.
I'll play this when I get home today but if it's bad I'm blaming each and every one of you!
This looks fun; it reminds me a bit of Last Call BBS from Zachtronics in that both are collections of fictional retro games, although that one is obviously going to have the Zachtronics...
This looks fun; it reminds me a bit of Last Call BBS from Zachtronics in that both are collections of fictional retro games, although that one is obviously going to have the Zachtronics programming/engineering angle.
I have not yet but I'm sure there's something online at this point right? I haven't even gotten through like 20 minutes of every game yet, so I'm just waiting to see people figure it out first haha
I have not yet but I'm sure there's something online at this point right? I haven't even gotten through like 20 minutes of every game yet, so I'm just waiting to see people figure it out first haha
HELP is a command. You will need to find a four-character code somewhere else in the terminal to complete it. You can also use the terminal in the main menu.
HELP is a command. You will need to find a four-character code somewhere else in the terminal to complete it.
I bought this as a treat to myself for decently handling what has been an extremely difficult teaching year so far. I needed a pick-me-up.
I played for an hour today, trying out the first six games in the pack (ordered “chronologically” — each game has a fake release date).
Barbuta is a rough start, honestly. It’s a 2D open-world platformer (probably metroidvania?), but it has really stiff controls. I will end up coming back to it, but as a first taste it didn’t have the “modern meets retro” feel that I wanted. It just felt retro.
Bug Hunter, on the other hand, is exactly what I was looking for. It’s a simple, elegant grid-based puzzle deckbuilder game. You have a set of cards with movements and attacks on them, and you have to move about a grid eliminating bugs and collecting energy pellets. Energy will let you swap out your cards with more powerful ones, which you’ll need as the field gets more crowded with bugs. I really liked this one and will definitely play it more. It’s got some genuine depth.
Ninpek is a score attack runner where you kill enemies and collect their drops for points, all while dodging their projectiles. Sessions for this one are very short — early on I was dying in a matter of seconds before I got used to the movement and enemy patterns. This one was okay, but I probably won’t spend a lot of time on it.
Paint Chase is a top-down grid-based driving game. You have to drive over squares to paint them your color all while enemy vehicles are painting them the opposite. You can run over opposing cars to destroy them, but new ones spawn regularly. Each level has different layouts and power-ups. It plays like a Pac-Man version of Splatoon. I really liked this one and will play it more.
Magic Garden is a snake-like game. There are certain squares that spawn on the floor that have stars on them. You wander around and collect a chain of cute things that follow behind you. When they are over star squares, you can press a button to “save” them, getting more points the longer the chain you have. While doing this, there are also enemies that get in the way (though you can get a power-up that lets you go after them Pac-Man-style). I think this one is neat but I probably won’t play it more.
Mortol is a 2D platformer in which you have a set number of lives to get through a level. The twist is that you will need to utilize previous lives to get to the end. You can launch a character like a dart at a wall that the next character can then use like a platform. You can turn a character to stone. You can blow up a character to clear obstacles. As you progress through the level, you can find collectibles that will give you additional lives. This is a neat idea, and I will play this one more.
Overall, I’ve been impressed with the quality of the games. Even the ones that I haven’t liked aren’t really bad — they’re just not my cup of tea. It’s clear a lot of thought and effort went into making the collection. None of the games I’ve played have felt like throwaways. All of them nail the retro feel, while a few have nods to modern ideas that are incorporated into a retro framework really well.
As a package deal, UFO 50 reminds me of two different things.
The first is the game Arcade Paradise. In that game, you manage an arcade and can play the different cabinets you buy. It was a neat concept, but the quality of the actual minigames included with the cabinets varied wildly, with many being clunky or un-fun. UFO 50 has a similar feel of “play all these retro facsimilies” but it drops the management aspect and, in my opinion, has games a cut above those in Arcade Paradise.
The second is the Playdate. When you buy that console, you also get a “season” of games. Due to the limitations of the device, many of these are simpler, more elegant, smaller-in-scope games with retro feel: less plot and more score attack. That’s not to say there aren’t some that feel modern and interesting, but that no matter what you’re playing, you’re looking at it through a lens of fairly strict restrictions on design that often end up being boons for creativity. UFO 50 has a similar feel — it feels like you’re buying a retro-inspired handheld that comes with its own “season” of games that manage to still be creative and interesting despite their deliberate design limitations.
It’s definitely not for everybody. If you don’t have a love for retro games, you can probably safely sit this one out. That said, I have only tried 6/50 games, and even then I was only dipping my toe in the waters of those 6. So take this as a very preliminary opinion rather than a last word.
If you do enjoy retro games and score attack-style play, then I can give a preliminarily solid recommendation. It’s great so far, and if the pattern of quality holds for the remaining 44 games, then UFO 50 will end up being something genuinely special.
Having played it now, Barbuta is very clearly La Mulana inspired and that’s…a choice for the first game people are likely to play.
I think it's mostly because the "meta narrative" in a sense is that the first game is probably not gonna be their best, in the terms of this fictional studio at least. It's definitely a bold choice for sure but it makes sense in the context of the game as a whole.
I wasn't alive in the 80's or anything so I'm not sure if it's accurate to the time period but I imagine the games back then were kinda super similar to that vibe anyways.
I've seen a lot of this "well it's because of the meta narrative" thing, and i'm not sure that makes a ton of sense?
To be clear, i expect Barbuta to be one of the games I enjoy the most. Games like this are VERY interesting and I highly doubt they just made it bad for story. It's just that these games are viewed, by many, as bad because they're very punishing puzzle games that reward knowledge gained, not actual execution.
Just pointing this out because i've seen a couple of people worried about this, but so far not a single game i've played in the collect actually feels like some crappy "oh god this is awful to play" 80's thing.
I'd say my only complaints are that some games take too long (busido ball is great but i really wish it wasn't first to 8. Similarly the UFO racer thing feels like it's a LOT of laps) and obviously some games are going to be of a genre you don't enjoy.
I haven't purchased UFO 50 yet, but I'm looking forward to doing so and playing it this weekend.
Looking up Barbuta gameplay on Youtube, I was most reminded of Pharoah's Tomb on DOS, published by Apogee. That's from 1990 instead of the 80's, but tech-wise it would definitely fit in as an early 80's game (i.e., with CGA graphics).
You’re absolutely right. Can’t believe I didn’t pick up on that! Thanks for the insight.
I played six more!
Velgress is a vertical platformer. There are different platforms, mostly clouds, that disappear a short time after you stand on them. You have to jump up the level and, as you do, a bar of spikes rolls up beneath you, making falling a constant hazard. You also have a gun you can use to shoot platforms, barricades, and enemies. When you make it to the end of a level you can spend your coin on power-ups for the following one. This one was alright. I'll play it a bit more.
Planet Zoldath is a procedurally generated top-down exploration/combat game. It kind of feels like if Metroid were the original Legend of Zelda game. You wander around the open world divided into single screens and find items and dodge/kill enemies. Each time you die, a new level is generated. I only tried a few rounds of this and didn't get very far into it, but it's promising.
Attactics is a turn-based auto-battler. Your castle is on the left side of the screen, and the enemy's is on the right. Each turn, units spawn and advance/attack. The turns are also timed, so they automatically happen every few seconds. The playfield is broken into several different lanes, and, in those seconds before the turn ends, you can move individual units up, down, or back, but not forward (they will do that automatically on the turn end, if they can). Your goal is to defend your castle against the enemy's advances while breaking through their defenses to get to their castle. This had a Plants vs. Zombies feel to me, but with much more time pressure. You do not get long to think or plan each round. I think this will be really cool for some people. It's not my personal favorite.
Deviltion is a grid-based cascading explosion puzzle game. There are enemies and friendlies placed on a board. You then place pieces that will, if triggered, explode in certain patterns. Your goal is to set up your pieces to make a chain of explosions to take out all the enemies (and spare the friendlies). You can only detonate one square at the end of a round, so your setup has to Rube Goldberg itself to take care of the rest. I really like the concept of this one, but it's missing a pretty essential QoL feature for me: highlighting explosion patterns once placed. If I played the game enough I'd learn all the pieces by sight and be better able to "read" the board, but, as is, I had to put in a bit more effort than I'd like in that regard (note: I'm also completely mentally exhausted from this week, so take that into account).
Kick Club is a soccer platformer combat game. You are on a single screen with enemies, and you can kick a soccer ball to kill them. You cannot attack other than that, so you have to dodge the enemies and retrieve the ball after kicks in order to clear the screen. It reminds me of Super Crate Box or the POW minigame in the original Super Mario Bros, but a little more strategic since you have to put a bit of thought into your kicks. I like this one.
Avianos is a grid-based turn-based strategy game. Each round you can choose a god to pray to. That determines your actions for that turn, which vary from gathering resources, setting up structures, recruiting soldiers, and moving on the map. Praying also increases your affinity with that god, which will yield blessings (better actions) over time. Your goal is to eradicate the enemy from the map, which they are also trying to do to you. This felt like a single-player board game. It's not my favorite genre, but I also think people who like this style of game would really like this. It seems very well designed and thought out.
Gonna add my thoughts every once in a while to this thread too!
I'm currently playing through Night Manor, a point and click adventure game which is genuinely really creepy, it's really impressive on how they could make it so scary actually. I was never a huge adventure game kinda guy, especially because "video game logic" tm, but this one was really fun.
I think it might be worth making a separate UFO 50 discussion topic! Seems like there are enough of us here playing it right now that we’d get some good mileage out of it, and it’d give posts a bit more breathing room.
Ive been periodically gaming but i havent had too much time between that and dating and other obligations, do you mind making the topic? Ill contribute when I have the time.
I'm happy to! Good luck with everything that's on your plate.
I’m honestly surprised at how good these games are for how simple they tend to be. It turns out that a weird control scheme and a running chicken drumstick is all it takes to make boring 8-bit platformers interesting again (mooncat). And while House Party is basically just RNG: The Game, it’s somehow managed to become the most played game in the collection. There are more games that I haven’t played than that I have because they are so addicting.
Haha I saw your comment on buying it sporadically so the fact that you're enjoying it makes me sigh in relief!!
Magic Garden and Mortol were two of my favorites when I played it on the first day actually! Magic Garden in particular is surprisingly satisfying for my brain.
Sorry for the marketing title, but I just learned about UFO 50 recently, apparently it's a game by the creators of Spelunky, Downwell, and others as 50 actual good full length games as a homage to retro gaming.
Wondering if anyone has heard of it/is hyped for it! It's coming out tomorrow and I'm kinda into the idea plus I've been reading that they're mostly full length games in there too. The value prop for $25 might be insane if that's the case.
Opencritic is here:
https://opencritic.com/game/17307/ufo-50
That's an incredible concept.
Unfortunately I don't know how much I'd actually enjoy playing it though; I've tried a few older games recently that I hadn't played before and just felt no desire to stick with them. Seems nostalgia might be the main factor for me than actually enjoying the design and aesthetics of older games.
Seems that way to me too. Games look shallow and unappealing for anyone who didn't grow up with the 80s-90s era of gaming. It's a tough sell for me to put down something like Ori and the Will of the Wisps to bang my head against the wall with a 2D side scroller with 2 button inputs and crunchy graphics/music.
I've been playing the horror point-and-click game in the pack and it's much better than actual games of this type from the 80s. Really cute game design while still operating within the confines of the retro graphics. For example, when your character gets scared the cursor shakes around and you have to fight it to click on things. And when you get a flashlight you can only see a portion of the screen through dithered blackness.
Sure, but that's a comparison most people won't be able to make. You have experience playing those games and its a fun thing to go back and compare to. Most younger people won't have that same connection and feel the same sense of excitement from something like this.
I want to emphasize that I don't have any problems with nostalgia, but I think its important for anyone to realize that their opinions on something may be affected by it, and others don't share that experience with them.
Yeah. I was raised with NES games even though that’s a bit before my time (we played that during the N64 and GameCube generations). My parents thought we’d spend less time playing video games if we only had older ones available.
I'd give it a little more credit than that.
Spelunky is a 2d game made in the style of older stuff, and easily one of the best games i've ever played, with an absurd amount of content. The spelunky dev is just one of the dev's involved in this.
I suspect there will be some duds by your standards, but at the same time I wouldn't completely write it off on appearance alone, as "looks retro, is actually amazing genre has been around for awhile now. Hell the best metroidvania i've played is Environmental Station Alpha.
Haha maybe, I'll probably give it a shot eventually; even if its just for the local multiplayer games. But I don't think I've ever had a good experience with the many "50~ games in one!" packs I've played over the years. Even if this is one of the best ones ever, its not a very high bar.
The thing is, each of these 50 games was designed specifically to be a good standalone game. The entire point of the exercise was to take the concept of a "50 games in one!" package and ask, "What if these were actually good?"
"Good" is pretty subjective though. It's not like they're packaging 50 hollow knights, stardew valleys, and metroids all in one game, its all little experiences that are meant to last for a couple hours as most. Not sure what the draw is for me when you could experience the same thing consistently with other popular indie games
Small, more compact experiences have a joy of their own, though. For example, a game with a long playtime may have more drawn out parts, or gameplay elements that start off interesting or engaging but eventually wear out their welcome. Games designed to be shorter can distill their gameplay down to the most fun, exciting parts, and end before anything gets old.
“Good” is certainly subjective; my point is just that these aren’t designed like Action 52 games (I.e. shovelware), but are made with the intent to be fun, quality experiences. So the usual preconception of “XX-in-one” collections as being of lower quality is not applicable here.
Ehhh. I have an Analogue Pocket and I've had the chance to throw some piles of older games on, which this game is trying to emulate. Sure, a lot of games you throw on, find some novelty, and move on. But I threw on Super Metroid after bouncing off it multiple times in the past, and it finally clicked about why everyone who played it is so obsessed with map layouts and backtracking. It's laid out entirely open, without a specific marker, but I found myself exploring naturally, almost always finding something along the way, and naturally figuring out how to get in places via the environment and my skills without having explicit markers. (ie the ship, which I used a mix of bomb jumps and speed boosts + shinespark.)
I played Metroid Prime, Metroid Dread, and Hollow Knight around the same time; none of them touched on how natural it felt. Metroid Prime made things interesting along the way with scans and environmental storytelling, but slogged at backtracking. Dread was a streamlined parkour experience with little of the natural exploration. Hollow Knight almost gets there, but it sprawls into levels too much past that feeling of a natural, singular environment that Super gets.
I've discovered the same general feeling from Batrider's sense of shooter spectacle, Chrono Trigger's pacing, Rondo of Blood's extremely rewarding timing and commitment to execution, DnD: Shadow over Mystara's tricks of committing you to an adventure via an arcade game... The point isn't gameplay time, (though I can play Pokémon Puzzle League for hours,) it's that some of these games still have something in the sauce, and people haven't quite figured out how to fit it into a new context. Some of that comes across from simplicity, not in spite of it.
Flashbacks to the shitty intellivision and Atari collections we had on the PS1 where 80% of the games were just garbage.
While you are most likely correct, I think if you don't have nostalgia or at least a positive interest in these sort of games, it just wasn't made for you. I grew up with Atari and the NES, so I'm likely going to pick it up even if I would generally get more enjoyment out of a modern game.
i'VE BEEN wAIting For TEN YEARS for this
It looks like it's been super well reviewed! I just learned about it so I'm wondering if you know anything exciting about the game
They've been quite tightlipped, outside of individual dev streams over the years. Now that it's here it will be very hard to sort out what I learned before now except to say that this is one of the most ambitious and thoroughly approached projects I have ever heard of. I assumed for a long time that this would be vaporware and never release!
Launch trailer here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfW0K4rRLnw
This looks great, thanks for posting it! One of my favorites are modern takes on the old formulas. I do have a lot of nastalgia for the older gamss but I really don't miss the jank at all. I'm going to keep this one I the pocket for when I'm feeling like spending a few hours in the past.
Have to say I think it's an AMAZING game. A lot of these games look simple but have a shocking amount of depth. It's got a wonderful version of windjammers, snake, a couple of great tactics/puzzle games, a few metroidvania's on various spectrum's and a whole bunch of other stuff to screw around with. Hell they've even got an idler game.
It's also got some good potential couch co-op/vs although I haven't tested that. I can see the price being high for someone who's wary but if it goes on sale at all i'd say it's almost certainly worth it.
I just bought this game because of all the hype I'm hearing here. It'll be the first brand-new game I've purchased in probably a decade.
I'll play this when I get home today but if it's bad I'm blaming each and every one of you!
This looks fun; it reminds me a bit of Last Call BBS from Zachtronics in that both are collections of fictional retro games, although that one is obviously going to have the Zachtronics programming/engineering angle.
Any have some non-spoilerly hints for the in-game [terminal]? It looks like you can tweak things, but it's (very much on purpose) very unclear how.
I have not yet but I'm sure there's something online at this point right? I haven't even gotten through like 20 minutes of every game yet, so I'm just waiting to see people figure it out first haha
HELP is a command. You will need to find a four-character code somewhere else in the terminal to complete it.
You can also use the terminal in the main menu.
okay, that helped a lot, it does some things now. Thanks!
I hope you noticed the undocumented command because the mystery is killing me right now.