steam sale: Summer camp special

[Cyborg]

Because I can, here are some thoughts on today's specials, mostly the less-well-known ones.

I guess everyone kind of knows about Braid by now, but it's still technically an indie game.  If you like platform games at all, DO IT.  It has a fairly clever set of mechanics, very good level/puzzle design, and excellent art/music, and it all comes together quite well.

Similarly, if you're at all into logic puzzles, go get SpaceChem right now.  It might have "fake chemistry in space" as a theme, but it's actually more like "multi-threaded programming: the game".  If you want a challenge that requires some incredible leaps of logic that are extremely satisfying when they finally come to you, this is exactly it.  It also has a surprisingly engaging story and even more surprisingly epic background music that makes you feel really awesome whenever you get something right.

Finally, Just Cause 2 is anything but an indie game, but for $5, it's a steal.  It's 400 square miles of sandbox third-person shooter with the twist that you're equipped with an infinite supply of grappling hooks and parachutes.  Hilarity ensues.  Constantly.  It also doesn't take itself remotely seriously, and the storyline is so ridiculously over the top that it's hard not to sit there staring at the screen going, "Wait, did that really just happen?" at several points.  Heh.

I have a couple questions. Is spacechem challenging? I have never bought it because it said casual, and I have been burned before by puzzle games meant for children. I do like puzzles, though, and if it's hard, I'm in.

Also, about the second game, I never purchased it because I similarly had some preconceptions about the game. I didn't realize it was a sandbox shooter. Maybe I should learn a bit more about it.

[Nalgas]

I have a couple questions. Is spacechem challenging? I have never bought it because it said casual, and I have been burned before by puzzle games meant for children. I do like puzzles, though, and if it's hard, I'm in.

SpaceChem starts out pretty easy and obvious in the first few levels just to explain the mechanics, but after that, you're pretty much on your own.  Once it tells you what all the buttons do, it expects you to figure out how to take advantage of the mechanics entirely on your own.  You can do some really crazy things once you do figure out how they work, and in the later levels you pretty much have to.  If you start competing for the leaderboards for best solutions (fewest pieces used, shortest time, etc.), it quickly reaches completely preposterous levels of complexity.  Try the demo, and make sure you get past the tutorial levels to where there's a jump in difficulty.  Then keep in mind that there are several more jumps like that throughout the game, and if that sounds like fun, you'll like the full game.

Also, about the second game, I never purchased it because I similarly had some preconceptions about the game. I didn't realize it was a sandbox shooter. Maybe I should learn a bit more about it.

I totally didn't think I was going to like it at all when I first heard about it, but I'd seen a couple good reviews of it, and it was on sale really, really cheap one day (might've been the Steam holiday sale last winter, actually), so I bought it on a whim not expecting much from it, and it turned out to be surprisingly fun.  The setting is kind of a cross between North Korea and a Southeast Asian island, and the tone of the game is basically reenacting the movie Team America, liberating the people to death by blowing up the entire place, because explosions are fun.  It's a very silly game, but there's something to be said for flying around with your grappling hook/parachute raining bullets and grenades on unsuspecting guards that makes you feel like the Latino version of Batman.  If he didn't have a thing against guns.  Heh.

[BobTheJanitor]

Is spacechem challenging?

The short answer is yes. The long answer is YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS.

Seriously, even if you're the bizarre love child of Albert Einstein and Stephen Hawking (what a night that must have been) you'll eventually hit a brick wall in Spacechem. It's the Super Meat Boy of puzzle games. For an similar-ish free game from the same guy, try this: http://www.zachtronicsindustries.com/the-codex-of-alchemical-engineering/

Spacechem is just as challenging as that, but the controls are less fiddly. Meaning you'll only have yourself to blame when you can't figure out a level and feel like beating your head on your keyboard.

In other words, it's a great game.

[vordrax]

I'd like to chime in on SpaceChem. It's possibly the best puzzle game I've ever played. If you're at all interested in procedural logic, it is amazingly fun. Otherwise it could be very frustrating or boring. It appeals to a programmer nature, I should say.

[Nalgas]

you'll only have yourself to blame when you can't figure out a level and feel like beating your head on your keyboard.

That's pretty much it.  It tells you exactly what everything does, on a very, very, very basic level, and that's all it does.  The entire rest of the game it just throws progressively more difficult puzzles at you and requires you to use raw brain power to pull something out of your ass to deal with them, with no hints or anything.  It does progress reasonably in difficulty and build on earlier puzzles like any good game should, but it's very much so a "you must invent/discover 99% of the mechanics of the game by being clever" kind of thing.  It's very rewarding when you finally figure out a new trick to do something you previously thought was impossible, though.

Talking about it is making me wish I could play more, but while I was doing reasonably well at making intermittent progress at it before, it's completely impenetrable at the moment without my ADD meds, to the point that it's not even worth bothering trying until I get that sorted out and can sit there and stare at a puzzle for an hour until the solution comes to me.  Heh.

[Cyborg]

Sold. Sounds like something I can chew on.

[KingIsaacLinksr]

Spacechem is HARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRD.  But fun, whenever I get around to it these days, though I've hit a wall. 

King

[KingIsaacLinksr]

Zenith Remnant is a selectable prize in the Summer Camp Sale Prize Booth - albeit listed as a "MAP".

So how exactly do we claim this prize?  I'm really confused on this. 

And as for me, I am keeping an eye on Steam sales, but not really buying too much this time around, I went overboard during Christmas so I'm holding back until I've whittled my games down. 

King

[Nalgas]

So how exactly do we claim this prize?  I'm really confused on this.

Similar to the most recent Holiday Sale, each day there's a set of tasks/goals/achievements listed (on the main store page, below the postcard but above the daily deals; click for more info), most of which are accomplished within various games.  For each one you complete, you get a ticket.  Each ticket gets you one entry into the drawing for the grand prize of winning the top ten games on your Steam wish list, but you can also redeem three tickets for a prize of your choosing from the "prize booth".  You appear to do that by possessing three tickets and clicking on the prize you want.  Most of them seem pretty underwhelming so far in my opinion, so I'm not too upset that I can't play 90% of my games with one of the drives in my desktop dead and the replacement not arriving until next week.  Heh.

[vordrax]

My friend and I just snagged The Zenith Remnant reward. I am quite pleased.

[Cyborg]

spacechem was a good choice! I got my "science is an indoor activity" badge and had fun doing it. Combine that with joining that steam group and setting up an empty Facebook account, I can redeem my first prize.

I have to say, that game reminds me of Mod comp class from college, where you construct diagrams of a head and a tape, with all kinds of symbols to handle looping and writing.

[Echo35]

spacechem was a good choice! I got my "science is an indoor activity" badge and had fun doing it. Combine that with joining that steam group and setting up an empty Facebook account, I can redeem my first prize.

I have to say, that game reminds me of Mod comp class from college, where you construct diagrams of a head and a tape, with all kinds of symbols to handle looping and writing.

Ditto to all that, though I've had the fortune of owning a good number of the games already. Space Chem is fun! Oh, and my first Ticket prize was the Magicka map.

[KingIsaacLinksr]

So how exactly do we claim this prize?  I'm really confused on this.

Similar to the most recent Holiday Sale, each day there's a set of tasks/goals/achievements listed (on the main store page, below the postcard but above the daily deals; click for more info), most of which are accomplished within various games.  For each one you complete, you get a ticket.  Each ticket gets you one entry into the drawing for the grand prize of winning the top ten games on your Steam wish list, but you can also redeem three tickets for a prize of your choosing from the "prize booth".  You appear to do that by possessing three tickets and clicking on the prize you want.  Most of them seem pretty underwhelming so far in my opinion, so I'm not too upset that I can't play 90% of my games with one of the drives in my desktop dead and the replacement not arriving until next week.  Heh.

Ok, for some reason it flew over my head when I looked at it...at 1:00AM...so maybe not the greatest time to be looking at the steam store as I might accidentally buy a lot of games that I never meant to...

So many thanks

King

[Cyborg]

Up to 10 tickets now. I unlocked alien breed 2: assault(free game, can't lose), magicka DLC(they make everything fun it seems), and dwarfs DLC (sucks so bad).

[Nalgas]

I went for as many of whatever they called the ticket-equivalents in the last sale, but I'm mostly ignoring them now, mostly because I have to.  I'm bored enough waiting for the actual holiday festivities to start this weekend that they'd be a decent way to kill time...

I'm also getting kind of disappointed by the daily sales themselves, because they keep all being either things I don't want or things I already have.  Almost everything I've been hoping to see show up for a good price hasn't so far.  Darksiders for $5 today is a great deal, if you're into ultra-macho 90s comic book takes on Zelda, but I already got it for $10 last fall.  Similarly, I already have Magicka and PvZ and Super Meat Boy, all the Half-Life games and BioShock, too, all from previous sales.  Throw me a frickin' bone here, guys.  Heh.