This edition of Weekend Download is all about failure. Failure to escape a missile attack, failure to create a non-ordinary game, failure to climb over a wall, and failure to, well, not die. Failure is part of playing video games, as without risk there's no reward for succeeding, but the titles below use failing in some creative ways!
Aftermath (Windows, 1.4MB, free) - Oh, Mario, the adventure's you have embarked upon! Created by Yrr, this chunky-pixeled 2D platform game turns up the difficulty and challenges you to scavenge for parts to escape from a crater with your old pal Toad. The atmosphere is great, and the sense of exploration is quite strong, though at some point you'll get sick of the precise jumping required to make it through the game.
Restricted Recall (Windows, 1.1MB, free) - A short one button game that really plays with the concept of limiting your actions. Tap the [spacebar] to do each action shown on the icons at the top of the screen. One tap does one action, the next tap does the next action, and so on. Your moves cycle and repeat as you press the button, and you can't change the order in which they're performed. This lends a very puzzle-like feel to an otherwise platformer-like game, and you'll have a great time figuring out when and how to tap the [spacebar] to make it out alive!
There IS A Wall (Windows, 2.1MB, free) - Just like the name says, this game features a wall. And a protagonist. And an exit. And background music. The rest is up to you to figure out. Each of the 20 rooms looks the same, but your abilities change from room to room. One level might give you the ability to jump in mid-air, for example, allowing you to clear the wall with no trouble. You basically have to play around with the keyboard with each new level, but there's something oddly intriguing about the whole experience.
An Ordinary Shooter (Windows, 2.5MB, free) - An ordinary description for An Ordinary Shooter, your goal is to shoot the aliens and stay alive as long as you can. Even though the game is quite ordinary, the retro feel and arcade set-up make it a great game to pick up on a lazy afternoon. Be sure to pick up the falling + icons, as they build up to something extra fun.
Note: All games have been confirmed to run under Windows Vista and are virus-free. Mac users should try Boot Camp, Parallels, or CrossOver Games to play Windows titles, Linux users can use Wine. If you know of a great game we should feature, use the Submit link above to send it in!
Eek, Aftermath is giving me a virus warning. (well, Kaspersky does).
I keep getting an error trying to start There IS A Wall. The error box says "unexpected error occured when trying to start the game" after the loading bar finishes.
D0rus: The game's clean. I scan everything I feature here, so it's just a false positive.
Sheer_Cold: The official documentation suggests this is likely a Windows problem. Got any updates you could install to see if they smooth things out?
I'm so confused in Aftermath. How do you jump?
No love for Linux/WINE. Each of the games makes use of the Direct3D trick for off-screen rendering... which WINE chokes on. "Unhandled present rects" errors instead of window renders.
I'm at the point in Aftermath where
it starts snowing, I've got five coins, I have fire immunity and the red and blue blocks, and the one place left to go is the fire-covered door at the right edge of the main area, just to the right of the save point and under another door. This area is lagging ridiculously for me, and for some reason this door and this door alone will not work - it just doesn't recognize that I want to enter.
Am I doing something wrong? Have others had this problem?
niinjaa:
It's shift to jump.
Never mind, I know where the door goes now even though it's not working. Still don't know where to go...
I can't install Restricted Recall. It gives me a "CRC error, data damaged" box.
I got to the same area as Will did in Aftermath with the same unplayable lag and gave up.
JIGuest: "CRC" suggests the file didn't download properly. Try getting a fresh copy?
Once you have the high jump in "Aftermath":
The lag is because of the snow. Go to another screen and it goes away.
After you get the high jump, you need to go back and turn off the red blocks, then go turn off the white blocks, and finally turn back on the red blocks. This will allow you to reach the torch that's blocked by the white blocks. Once you do that, the rest of the game should be short and exceptionally simple to complete.
Turning the red blocks back on the second time is actually harder than the first time, because your higher jump prevents you from crossing the first pit after the save point in the cave. To make the jump, jump almost straight up, then push forward a second later so your momentum takes you under the wall to the ledge. The second jump should be cake if you got this far.
Good luck, and "enjoy" the ending.
-SirNiko
I had no trouble installing Restricted Recall. I was sorry that it was so short, because it really was quite clever.
"There Is a Wall" has some serious drawbacks. You can't shut the game down in the middle of a level. Clicking the X in the upper right corner does nothing, and there's no menu function for you to select an exit. You can exit *between* levels, but otherwise, the only way to leave the game is to Ctrl+Alt+Del and call up the task manager. And this is one of those games that takes five minutes to shut down that way. I discovered it by accident once, and tried it a second time to see if my computer was just being buggy. It wasn't.
I don't like games that interfere with the normal function of the computer like that. If you have to shut down in a hurry, the game could cause your computer to lock up. I wish someone would warn game designers that they need to be sure a player can exit without risking harm to the computer. How hard would it be to add an "exit" button at the bottom of the screen, or at very least, make the game recognize and respond properly to the big red X.
SirNiko,
I don't think it's because of the snow at all. When I load my game, I spawn inside a cavern with no snow, no background. My computer - which once ran the game without any problem - grinds to a halt so badly that I cannot do anything at all with my computer and ultimately have to shut down the computer manually.
@ Tabs
Actually, you can exit TiaW by pressing Escape. I don't remember wether it takes one or two presses but a window pops up with the usual "all progress will be lost" message. and presents you with the option to quit.
@Tabs
Pressing/holding Esc will allow you to quit the game. I agree with you on the poor design though.
With respect to Aftermath, it seems there's a pretty big memory leak in his save coding. I think the slow-down is related to save information.
@Reozul and Snifit
Thanks to both of you for letting me know that. I tried the Esc key once without getting anything, but I realized I tried it after trying to close by hitting the X. Possibly that had something to do with why the key didn't work for me. Anyway, I gave it another attempt, and behold, you were both right. I appreciate the feedback.
I still prefer that casual a game let you hit the X for fast shut-down in case you need to stop suddenly. I'm also not crazy about games that hold you hostage until you complete a level - not this one, obviously, but I've run into similar issues before with other download games, particularly games you get from foreign websites. That's actually why I started visiting JayIsGames - I like finding the games here because they're good quality and they aren't as likely to nuke my computer, and the feedback is awesome
how do I get past wall 5?
I'm guessing I'm missing something REALLY obvious here.....
@Tabs: Note that "End task" on the Task Manager is pretty much equivalent to simply clicking the X in the corner on post-XP systems, so pressing the X and waiting five minutes may well have done the same thing
A good way of quickly shutting something down (most of the time) if you're having trouble with it is instead to kill its process on the "Processes" tab - just highlight it and click "End Process". Be careful doing that though as if you end the wrong process bad things could happen (especially in my case audiodg - if I ever end that in an attempt to control CPU usage my audio device hangs until I reboot the machine)
Restricted Recall was a fin game and had a great concept, but it was really REALLY short. It's only a 3 or 4 minute game if you don't die. I would love to see a longer, more complicated game with the same concept.
From the SECOND I started playing Aftermath, I was thinking "cave story." Haha. It is basically the same game. I mean, even the spikes in Aftermath are the same from the classic game. But I got frustrated after 5 minutes of trying to jump over the first fire hazard. It is WAY too touchy. And shift is NEVER a good key because of sticky-keys on windows.
TISAW was fun for a while, but I really wish the creator had put the levels in a set order with somewhat of a difficulty curve. The controls seemed to be really touchy and the physics seemed really off. I hated the selective bounciness of the walls as well.
For There Is a Wall, here are the levels I've figured out. I don't have 11, 12, 14, 15, or 17, either because I couldn't understand them, or I never got to them because the ones I couldn't understand stopped me.
Wall 1: click square and bring to exit
Wall 2: press ‘w' 3 times
Wall 3: go left
Wall 4: wall is transparent
Wall 5: ctrl to jump high
Wall 6: infinite jump
Wall 7: portal a la Portal, head right to see
Wall 8: click square and move it up and down
Wall 9: exit moves instead, wall is transparent
Wall 10: space to float up, click again to stop
Wall 13: jump around to find invisible steps
Wall 16: space to make wall transparent
Wall 18: ground moves up and down
Wall 19: click square and move it right and left fast
Wall 20: You can fly but space makes you float away
Done 11, 12 & 15. Stuck on 17, but have some clue. Haven't done 14 yet.
Wall 11: Pick box up with mouse and move half way through wall
Wall 12: Jump half-way trough wall
Wall 15: press 'End' button
Wall 17: Wall is sticky, but don't know what to do yet
Wall 14: click the 'exit' box and move it
Wall 17: Press down on arrow keys, the wall will move down
the rest of the solutions for 'there is a wall':
11: Drag your square through the wall, halfway up is a hidden path,
12: there's a hidden path about 1/4 of the way up the wall. you can jump into it but you have to hit it just right, or you'll bounce away.
14: Drag and drop exit box.
15: hit 'end' key
17: Press the down arrow key to lower the wall.
@JohnB
yeah, kaspersky finaly confirmed it was a false-positive. Didn't expect anything else ;)
Probably because of the weekend it took them so long to response.
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