Disillusion
Author : True ValhallaLink : http://gmc.yoyogames...isillusion&st=0
It's been a while since the Game Maker Community's third community jam. An event that brings the community together in order to complete a small game around a theme in under 48 hours. While for I haven't ever really been able to compete for personal reason, submitting a game I made in around 6 hours to the second jam, I do very much support the idea. YoYo Games also seem to share this sentiment offering a copy of GM : HTML5 to the winner of this jam, a prize True Valhalla was able to use to his advantage. YoYo Games graciously offered him one of the modules for the now ever closer Game Maker Studio since it turned out True Valhalla like many of the prominent members of the Game Maker Community already owned Game Maker: HTML5.
I must admit I've been putting off this review for a quite some time. I wish I could say it's delay was because I was waiting for some of the hype from the jam to die down but its long since died. In reality I've been far too busy most weeks between university, work, personal projects and excessive drinking. Disillusion was good enough to win the Game Maker Community Jam but is it really that good? Disillusion is by no way a bad game but I don't think is a great game. It doesn't seem to bring anything new or innovative to the table but does one expect a game made for the Community Jam to do any of this?
You play as a typical hero type character, the only hint of any sort of goal being a non-playable character that appears to be your master, you are expected to traverse all sorts of unnaturally positioned pillars of stone or dirt and unquestionably kill all those who cross your paths including chicken-cow cross breeds, a creature which has a pallet reminiscent of a chicken but appears to walk on 4 legs There a few different types of enemies to fight in the two beautifully rendered levels but none of them feel like they are any different from one another. The platforming aspect consists of jumps to tiny platforms that while not floating may as well be and one false move or not being quite aligned correctly will mean imminent death but of course this isn't the only way to die in a game involving combat, if you can call it combat. It is simply hit them harder before the hit you, there is no blocking, dodging or counter attacking. In fact it rather reminiscent of older games, nostalgia is a powerful force but it just hasn't worked in True Valhalla's favour here. It is upon death one of the aspects I like most appears, death messages.
The death messages range from gaming references such as a remark about searching the action house for better armour and a shout out to Notch, creator of Minecraft. A common practice upon death is utilised here tinting the screen to a red colour that for many represents failure, it only becomes more prominent on the cave level.
The graphics are wonderfully 8-bit. Other than the previously mentioned cow-chicken hybrid I can't really fault them. They won't be to everyone's taste especially not the latest generation of 5D HD super awesome voxel based graphics kiddies but I for one love them and I believe this was one of the greatest contributors to Disillusion's success. I particularly liked the effect lava had so much I just had to replicate it to play about with. The cave level makes use of an effect many on the GMC seek to utilise , a fog effect that blacks out all area around the player except for a small circle. Disillusion appears to use it to make planning your moves difficult but it doesn't seem to manage this, perhaps it was just to make the cave feel more like a cave – devoid of natural light. Each level has little aesthetic features that caught my eye, the rain was one of my favourites that just make the level feel more alive.
When you play this game with the music the game suddenly feels a lot more fluid. The music is reminiscent of the music older role playing games play while in towns or cities. The song is called Idyllic Memories and comes packaged with the game. I honestly feel that the music is the best part of the game and would recommend picking it up just to hear the tune. Though to really see how this game fits the theme of the jam you will need to play the entire game through and I suggest doing so it order to get the most out of this game. So what is the verdict? Disillusion is a nice little game that is very reminiscent of a variety of older games with a brilliant sound track but doesn't actually bring anything new to the table. I asked earlier if a GMC Jam game needed to innovate, this game obviously was good enough to gain the community vote so I suppose this question has already been answered but I do feel there should be something that feels new in each and every game.
