volcane
Member
Just bought The 2D Adventures of Rotating Octopus Character.
Only played it for a brief while but I can already see why it is getting such positive reviews! It has an interesting puzzle mechanic. Manipulating the Octopus quickly while jumping between platforms takes some getting used to but I can see how you can pull of some amazing trick stunts once you get the hang of it! :-)
The animation of the Octopus is liquid smooth, at least on the first few levels that I've played so far.
Its a real fun mini. :) Its also free with PS+ in NA.
Nexus Prime
Member
Both this game and the other free PSplus game were better than I thought they would be. My only problem with it is if I quit out in the middle of a "world" there are no check points. Most Minis show the worlds and all the levels in that world as seperate levels that can be picked at any time, but not this one. Other than that, it works quite well.
I got this when it first came out but hadn't played it, til just now that is. Such a fun and fast-paced game, full of character and replayability. It's funny but thought the game was developed in Japan, because of the very jap-lish game title... turns out it wasn't, it was developed & published by an English company called Dakko Dakko Ltd.
I've played a little of this now, and while it's as charming as I'd expected (fun music, and darn those too-cute eyes), I was a little disappointed to discover that there's less puzzle-solving than I'd thought it would have. The little octopi are hidden on occasion, but it's never too difficult to figure out how to get from one point to another. The requirement to finish an entire world's 10 levels in one go is also a bit of a downer; I made it through to the end of the fourth world but then lost my last life, so that progress was lost with it.
The Challenge Mode's speedrun times (at least for the gold stars) can be cause for incredible amounts of frustration. It's sometimes so dependent on perfect timing that the slightest mistake will send your rotating octopus character way off to some part of the 2D adventure that you hadn't intended. The mode's interface seriously needs a "restart level" option rather than just "quit to menu"; I took to committing suicide every now and then because it was clear I'd gotten way off course and wouldn't make the time. Anyway, I got gold stars on all of the first world (some of that was REALLY hard, and I just lucked out eventually on a couple) but think that's it for me.
At this point, I don't think I'll be buying the game for beyond the freebie period.
They should do a licensed tie-in version of this game based on Ika Musume trying to collect shrimp. :) That series deserves much better than just an iOS fishing game.
Hey, thanks for playing!
The mode's interface seriously needs a "restart level" option rather than just "quit to menu"
If you press Left (IIRC) on the DPAD whilst in Challenge Mode, it does an instant re-start. I put that in because I, too, love time-trial modes and I used to hate it in Pac-Man CE when I couldn't do instant re-start (love that game).
As for the '10 stages' progress, I understand it can be frustrating for some, however the game was designed to have a sort of 'arcade' like feel to it, and I wanted to challenge myself to make a game which was fun to re-play through. I guess some people feel I did ok, and others feel they don't enjoy the repetition, but I'm sorry if it stops you getting to world 5 and beyond (because the music in the Japan stages is *really* great :) )
"It's funny but thought the game was developed in Japan, because of the very jap-lish game title"
Well, I guess I am heavily influenced by my time in Japan (used to work on the PixelJunk games and before that StarFox Command).
Again, thanks for playing the game guys. I hope you get to the later worlds - there is an arcade theme world with some pretty funny stage designs.
Yeah, do it! And let me know what you think (there is a pong-inspired stage, a bubble bobble layout stage... a few other homages in there).
Also, regarding the animation: I was really happy you noticed and appreciated the smoothness in your first post. The reason it is so 'liquid smooth' (thanks for that!) is because it is animated in code rather than individually drawn frames of animation. That allows us more freedom to rotate and squish and stretch according to the action in the game without needing anyone to animate it specifically for each situation.
Also, it is helped by the game being locked at 60fps. I am a stickler for decent framerates and I'd happily sacrifice complex textures for a faster-running game!
Good luck clearing the game (the arcade stage is the penultimate world, before the final ghost world).
Not at all! Thanks for being interested in the game. I hope you get off the fence :)
As this is Dakko Dakko's first game, it has been quite an adventure getting everything up and running, and we're very proud of the finished product and excited to see people trying and talking about the game. We're not stopping with this one, though! Please look forward to more from us in future...
After many deaths, including one where my last life was lost while messing up trying to get the final baby octopus in the final stage of the world, I beat the fourth world. It was exhausting, though. I promptly lost 5 lives in the second stage of the fifth world. Rhod, if it makes you feel better, I had a feeling similar to the agony I had going through Gardens 7 through 10 in PixelJunk Eden, trying to get all the seed pods and not die. :P
I understand the desire to make the game hard like a retro arcade title, but surely you also want players to stay with the game long enough to see all the content you created, rather than admitting frustrated defeat! As a suggestion: implement additional credits earned through time spent playing the game (several recent scrolling shooters do this).
By the way, in the game's credits, there's a special thanks note for Phil Harrison. Is this the same guy who used to be the head (or somewhere up there) of SCEE? If so, what did he do for the game?
volcane
Member
Here is some interesting information at the Dakko Dakko website: http://www.dakkodakko.com/about.html
Dakko Dakko is a new game developer formed by people who love simple, fun videogames. The team comprises a number of veteran game makers, who have worked on a diverse range of titles, from Fable to PixelJunk Monsters, from Starfox Command to Creatures. Now we're standing on our own two feet, and our first game as dakkodakko is due out this year on PSP and PS3!
@onmode-ky Great to hear that you cleared world 4! I do understand what you mean about wanting everyone to see all content, but my hope is that there are players out there like me who enjoy the challenge and don't mind the re-starts (perhaps after putting the game down for a while, though :) ). It's interesting that you bring up PixelJunk Eden, because that is the *only* PJ game which I didn't really work on (before now)! So, I think the difficulty there is not related to me. Regarding Phil in the credits, no, not related to the Sony guy.
@evanac Your source is incorrect on this one! I used to work at Lionhead and then for many years at Q-Games (both of which were absolutely 'great jobs' though, for sure). I've never worked at Bungie, but I probably wouldn't say no :)
my hope is that there are players out there like me who enjoy the challenge and don't mind the re-starts (perhaps after putting the game down for a while, though :) ).
Hehe, yes, it's much easier to enjoy the game after you've stopped fuming over yet another untimely death. ;P
I'll probably make more efforts to see the rest of the game, but attempting to continue Challenge Mode could possibly result in collateral damage to my surroundings. For a radius of several light years.
By the way, Rhod, when I play the game on my PS3, after completing a level, there is a noticeable pause between the time the level completion message appears and the time when things become unfrozen (e.g., if the octopus is on the screen when the level completes, then there are a few seconds where it's frozen there before it suddenly kicks back into motion and heads off the screen). During this pause, the game does not respond to any buttons. This pause seems to exist when playing the game on a PSP as well, but it's much, much shorter, probably less than half a second. Do you have any idea why the pause is significantly longer on the PS3? Is the game writing to disk at that time, so it's faster with a Memory Stick than a hard drive?
I eventually beat this game (the Story Mode, not the Challenge Mode--that ain't ever happenin'!). The "over 70 levels" is 76: 7 worlds of 10 levels each, followed by an "end of game boss" world of 5 levels, followed by a final level. Oh, I don't mean there's an actual boss to beat, just that it's a "climax" world.
The arcade world, including references to Pong, Space Invaders (don't miss the cache of life items in this one!), Donkey Kong, Pac-Man, and maybe Centipede, is stages 61-70. If there were other games referenced, I didn't notice, but there may have been.
I think I will go ahead and pay for the non-PS+ edition of the game. Though it's unforgiving in its requirement of precision and gets frustrating quickly, it's enjoyable if you put it down and do something else between sessions with it.
Nice work! Congratulations. I hope you enjoyed the ending music as much as I do.
There was a Bubble-bobble inspired stage layout in there, too. :D
As for the PS3 save-pause, I can't say I've noticed the difference on my own PS3, but there are a bunch of different models out there I guess. We developers are mostly at the mercy of Sony's own code when it comes to save/load so I have no real insight into why it would be worse on the PS3 (emulated) version. Just a quirk, I guess. I hope it didn't harm the experience too much.
Thank you so much for playing. It makes it all worthwhile seeing people clear the game.
If you press Left (IIRC) on the DPAD whilst in Challenge Mode, it does an instant re-start
You remembered correctly; that works.
I hope you enjoyed the ending music as much as I do.
Indeed I did, though I enjoyed the rest of the game's music to pretty much the same extent. The visuals and music overall went very well together.
There was a Bubble-bobble inspired stage layout in there, too. :D
I took a quick YouTube look for Bubble Bobble footage, and it seems its Level 3 was what had a cameo in Octopus. This quick look made me realize that . . . I've actually never seen Bubble Bobble until now. I thought I knew the game, but I guess I've always just been thinking of Rainbow Islands instead (which I have in an arcade cabinet).
Thank you so much for playing. It makes it all worthwhile seeing people clear the game.
Especially those jerks who were complaining about its checkpoint system, eh? :D I probably would have made it to the end sooner if I had realized earlier that those arcade tokens were surfaces rather than enemies. On that level with the orbiting Invaders and the six tokens, I thought I couldn't touch anything, so I just kept trying to stay between tightly packed Invaders--which never worked. 失敗ばっかり！
What is "Dakko Dakko" supposed to mean, anyway?
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