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Jan 28th, 2008 at 19:16:15 - Papa Louie (Web) |
I was of the opinion initially that the game was fairly simple. Indeed it is compared to other games like Warcraft or Age of Empires, however, it isn’t just another simple online game. It is addictive in nature and has a simple yet strong story line. Critically speaking, I wouldn’t want to play the next version of the game! but having said that I must say that the current version is as good as a side scroller game can become.
I started with from where I left last. It has multiple levels just like any other game. However, this is with a twist. The story is of a high-rise apartment building where pizzas have been delivered to each room and monsters from the piazzas are holding the inmates hostage. Thus, each floor of the building is a level in the game. Also each floor level many rooms, and so each level has multiple stages. The main character (Papa) goes into each room, one at a time and is immediately teleported to a place like the multigrain fields, or the jungle ruins.
The graphics are very nicely done, especially the onion enemies. They look really grumpy and in the jungle ruins level, they are in the attire of Red-Indians. I did not like the cheese pizza monsters though. There is a sneezing sound accompanied by these monsters spewing out balls of cheese. I feel this may gross out some people even without being explicit. Typically there are 3-4 of these per stage and thus the main character (me) has to kill these and pick them up in pizza boxes and eventually rescue the people.
Well these were random thoughts. Let me elaborate on some of these.
LEVEL DESIGN: Seems like the designers spent considerable time designing the stages. They are essentially side –scrolling. They did have hidden areas which could be entered by breaking rocks or climbing ladders or ropes. These areas could be guarded heavily. I feel it has decent detail without jeopardizing the side-scrolling theme. I liked the power jumps and the gas balloons, which even changed shape slightly with the character perched on it.
CHARACTERS: The main character (Papa) has been created with a lot of care. This is evident when the Papa is attacked. For example when Papa is hit by a cheese ball, he freezes. Pressing space (jump) actually shakes Papa on screen and helps to shake off some cheese. The pizza monster is also done decently and does not appear tacky.
GRAPHICS and ART WORK: In certain places the artwork is lacking. The enemies do not have sufficient animation frames when they are killed. They did explore some variations but mostly they look like as if they are bumped off the screen. Their movements however are pretty nice. The music sounds appropriate. The inmates of the building who are to be recued look almost like match-stick characters. It is like as if they didn’t have time left to make them. Overall, I’d rate the graphics as good.
GAME THEME and OBJECTIVE: This was an eye-opener and a lesson. They created a game out of something as simple as delivering pizza! In the development of our game, we had trouble deciding what the theme of the game should be. The objective of the game here is partly to rescue the people, but more importantly, to stay alive till then. Intertwined in gameplay is a subtle strategy thrown in. Papa can collect coins and buy pepper bombs. Pepper bombs are very useful to kill enemies from a distance, much like a hand grenade, but cost much so one has to do resource management.
Certain tips are provided like “Beware of the onion tribe”, or “rolling stones can ricochet” which is very helpful. It took me a lot of time to reach till the third level and it was surprising to play an online game that got this intense.
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Jan 27th, 2008 at 14:17:18 - Papa Louie (Web) |
The website called www.miniclip.com has an impressive list of online games. They call themselves the largest online games website in the world. I didnt go as far as to verify the truth of this claim. However, the games they host were pretty impressive.
I decided to play the game called "Papa Louis". On a first glance, it seemed like a silly game. It is an RPG where there is pizza delivery guy and cheese monsters. The cheese monsters can be killed and they turn into pizzas! Wasn't quite sure if I wanted to play it. But curiosity got the better of me. And I wasn't disappointed.
It has been created by Flipline Studios in what seems to be the year 2006. The full title is "Papa Louis - When pizzas attack" !
GAME CREDITS: I think this was sort of overdone. Looked like they tried too hard to be different. It certainly was in the theme of the game but ... anyway, I'll leave it at that for you to judge. The Credits screen looks like a menu card. It reads:
Game design by the slice
Matt Neff $4.75
and Tony Solary $4.75
additional toppings $1.75 each
art, graphics, programming ...
You get the idea.
GAME INSTRUCTIONS: For an online game it has a very effective way of informing the user of the use of the various controls. It has like a wizard interface with next and previous keys and each screen has pictures of keys on the keyboard, and a two-line description of what it does. Whats really nice is that the main character is animated in these screens to show the user what exactly happens when the keys/combination of keys are pressed. The length of this tutorial also seems to be just right. Any longer and I would have lost interest.
It deviates from the standard instructions interface of most side scroller games by actually going the extra mile to make the user comfortable and interested. The user also gets a rough idea of what to expect. It cautions the user of possible enamies and how to neutralize them. I also feel, for an online game, the level of commitment is low. All one has to do is close the browser and so, with these features, this game does a good job of user retention.
INTRODUCTION and LEARNING THE BASICS:
Good graphics for an online game. A short video introduction (cut-scene) introduces the story which goes like free pizzas were being given out to residents of a place until the cheese in the pizzas turned to monsters and the cook gets teleported to the multigrain fields.
This is an instructional stage where the basics are taught. Pretty good for it actually constitutes the first level. One can collect coins which can be used to buy “Crushida pepper bombs”. These bombs can also be picked up in the level. The enemies are sandwiches and really grumpy looking onions.
Finally when all the cheese monsters are boxed up as pizzas, one has to collect them and use the weight of the pizza boxes to free caged prisoners. The pizza boxes are placed on a platform which serves as the cage release lever. Pretty elaborate training level and simple enough not to scare away the user.
Pretty good so far.
Gotta go now, more on this later.
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