Shadowcat on 1/1/2011 at 05:21

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Okay, this game is great, and everyone who said so was right.

I had ignored it until now, due to a combination of (a) apathy towards the ultra-retro graphics, (b) obliviousness of the kick-ass soundtrack that goes with it, and (c) fear of the sheer difficulty.

(a) becomes irrelevant extremely quickly. The full version turns on a 'smoothing' option by default, but I greatly prefer it 'clean' with all the pixels nice and sharp.

(b) might have caused me to try the demo sooner, had I heard some of it (although it probably works better in the context of the game). It's also (http://souleye.madtracker.net/buycd.htm) for sale.

(c) still applies somewhat (I've only played the demo levels so far, so I'm not sure what I'm in for yet), but the restart points have thus far been numerous enough that you're never repeating very much of the game at any one time.

Try the demo. Do it right now.

(http://thelettervsixtim.es/)

If you're still hesitant, you could always read this:
(http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2010/12/07/the-games-of-christmas-%E2%80%9910-day-7/)

Al_B on 1/1/2011 at 12:30

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Yes - this is key to the game. Although a few of the shiny trinkets require several (many!) attempts you never have to replay whole sections of the game. For the price it's now being sold for (£1.66) it's well worth it.

Shadowcat on 1/1/2011 at 13:19

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So I finished the game 3 trinkets short of the full complement. "Doing things the hard way" is one of them, unsurprisingly. I'm undecided whether I'll actually try to get that one... the rest of the game is pretty friendly (relatively speaking :), but I can envisage that one possibly taking hours, and driving me nuts.

There's another trinket that I can't spot an entrance for (more exploration needed), and the third appears at first glance to depend upon collapsing a platform that can't be reached without exiting the screen (and therefore causing the platform state to reset), so I haven't figured that out yet.

Anyhow; the full game is great fun, and is easily worth the current sale price.

Shadowcat on 1/1/2011 at 14:45

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I actually looked it up just after posting (spurred on by one person's comment elsewhere that it was an unfair puzzle, which it actually isn't), and I'm a bit disappointed with myself for not figuring it out -- I did have all the information necessary; I just hadn't put it together. Definitely the most devious trick in the game, that one!

edit: So I've done that, and I finally spotted that hidden entrance (tricky), so it's just "Doing things the hard way" remaining. So far I can get to the reversal point fairly often, but I'm not having much luck going back. Harder to practice that. I'm calling it a night... Hopefully I can get through that tomorrow :)

Muzman on 1/1/2011 at 20:32

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This is one of those games where, after some investigation, I have to admit it seems novel and not without depth. Which was a little surprising.
It still has hideous retro graphics (retro among retro at that) for no discernable reason and gameplay predicated entirely on jumping/timing puzzles. This means I'm never going to play it.
Someone made this fan cutscene video in 3d that looked rather cool. If they make a sequel like that I'll give it a chance.