If you haven’t already, be sure to check your iPhone updates for version 1.1 of ngmoco and Hand Circus’s Offworld favorite platformer Rolando [iTunes link, Lite version], which adds the promised rainbow road of five new secret levels on top of performance updates.
In its now hallowed tradition, ngmoco has also announced via twitter that the level pack is just the first in a series of additions to the game as Hand Circus continue work on Rolando 2.
Urban toy progenitor Michael Lau has officially revealed the secret lineup he teased last week, and, as expected, of particular note is Snake Square, his vinyl nod to the Metal Gear series: a squat Gardener figure decked out in an awesomely cubic/off-kilter alligator mask camo.
The fine print notes that he’s priced at HK$650 (~$80): keep your eyes on the usual suspect outlets — Rotofugi, ToyTokyo, MyPlasticHeart — for him to pop up in coming months.
For the hip-hop heads, the Rappcats blog has posted both the full version and a remix of Ghostface and DOOM’s ‘CTW’, better known as the exclusive trailer music for Grand Theft Auto‘s DS debut, Chinatown Wars (due at retail in just a few short days).
Of particular note: the full version contains 100% more DOOM than the cut featured in the trailer. Now, about that full album…
Gish and Pontifex programmer Alex Austin has uploaded a new work in progress look at No Quarter, the retro-game-mashup compilation album he’s creating with Super Meat Boy‘s Edmund McMillen.
The video shows good physical progress in ‘gun’, the platformer section of the game previously described as ‘Mario + N + Wolfenstein‘ (and apparently now codenamed Red Alpha), and the first look at the ‘art game + sim’ section, codenamed ‘tree’. Austin explains:
The first part is a test I’ve been doing for walking/running on moving platforms. As you can see in the video, by running left it pushes the platform in the opposite direction, causing the wheel to rotate. This sounds simple, but actually takes quite a bit of balancing to get the right movement while still being physically simulated…
The second part of the video is what I do when I get tired of running in a wheel: kill Hitler clones.
The third part is some early video of the tree game we’re working on, it’s taken a while to get the prototype going but it’s starting to feel like something now.
I do have to admit, that John Woo/Chow Yun-Fat power slide at 30 seconds looks satisfying. Check back here for the game’s full track listing, and direct all ire at Warner Music Group for removing the original YouTube video that showed off the rest of the games.
With pre-orders for Mezco’s official LittleBigPlanet Sackboy toys due to open on March 23rd, ToyCyte has managed to catch a few behind the scenes looks at the line-up being lovingly crafted.
The exciting bit here? In addition to the fully detailed figures, Mezco will be officially releasing a blank version, with “interchangeable parts and accessories let you make SackBoy your very own.”
I’ve already talked to a few of you about meeting up at some point, but if you’re in town and would also like to talk things Offworld-ly, show me the amazing iPhone game you’ve been toiling on for the past several weeks, or anything otherwise, you can drop me a note via brandon@offworld.com, via twitter @brandonnn, or use the handy pictorial equation above to spot me in a crowd and just wander up to say hello.
As everyone gears up to touch down at next week’s Game Developers Conference, Heroes & Villains creators Infinite Ammo are showing off their promotional wares for the show a– hold on, what’s this?
Peeking out ever so innocently from their studio lineup brochure is Power Pill, an iPhone collaboration with Fez creator Phil Fish, accompanied by an image identical to the layered-paper-caverns in his Polytron studio’s own upcoming game teaser, which I so brilliantly deduced might be titled “PP”.
More Polytron love to look forward to at the show, then, just slightly edging out the multi-rainbow flavors of their new Fez buttons.
There have been many reviews/criticisms since Noby Noby Boy released. I totally understand as this is such a unique game and I expected those reactions. I don’t mean to make any excuses. That being said, I do get depressed from time to time as I want users to enjoy the game as much as possible. But at the same time, this is what I wanted to create…
It’s going to be quite a long journey to Mars. Please be patient. This is Takahashi.
I’ve mentioned it casually a few times, but haven’t yet given it its proper due — either way, Mobigame’s retro-futuro-cubist iPhone platformer Edge hasn’t dropped off my “page one” assortment of iPhone games since its original release.
But at this point you don’t need me to convince you: Mobigame has just released a Lite version [iTunes] of the game (alongside an update to the full version [iTunes] with 17 new levels and a global ranking leaderboard) to let you try it for yourself.
To celebrate, they’ve also released the full soundtrack to the game as a free download. The game’s up for an IGF Mobile award for best audio (and both the audience and judge awards for best game), and truly is something special: the needle wavers nicely between C64-euro-chiptune nostalgia and approaches all-out Ed Banger-type dirty disco-punk in its best moments.
But, if nothing else, you should get it just for the amazing sugar-cube version of the game that graces its cover, as above.
During the Q&A that followed last night’s showing of Reformat the Planet, I noted a few questions that asked whether (as Lewis just reminded me) there was any slower chiptune material that wasn’t quite as, well, chipper, and acts that focused on something other than Game Boys.
Producer Paul Levering made special note of (I was happy to hear) one Dallas act in particular that I think fits both criteria: Paul Slocum and Lauren Gray’s Tree Wave, who list their MySpace ‘sounds like’s as: My Bloody Valentine / Stereolab / Lali Puna / M83 and Postal Service, and I can’t say it much better. Above is their video for their best track, Sleep.
Slocum’s a hardware hacker/music maker of some renown, in addition to creating Atari 2600 SynthCart and its C64 equivalent CynthCart, he’s also firmware hacked the Epson LQ500 dot-matrix printer you hear/see in the song as a programmable instrument (and created the excellent dual-paddle Monkey Ball/Marble Madness-esque game Marble Craze for the 2600).
You can order the duo’s debut EP Cabana via AtariAge, which it also appears has hit archive.org as a free download, albeit in abridged form (and without the hi-res version of the video above).
