It’s not a secret that Bytejacker loves us some one-switch games. It really, really, really isn’t. So we can be forgiven for thinking we’d seen it all, right?
Glorg, as far as we know, is the first and only one-button dungeon-crawler that exists. Martin Jonasson (aka grapefrukt), the game’s creator, took a concept he’d been working on for procedurally generated dungeons and changed it to a one-switch after GAMMA IV announced it as their theme last August. He’s been working on it (among other things) over the past year, and as of today, it’s finished! Here’s the release trailer:
Neat, isn’t it? If you’re curious about the gameplay, I’d definitely recommend checking out this video from 3:33 on – it’s from a presentation Jonasson gave at No More Sweden 2010 just over a month ago. In it, he demoes a nearly-final version of Glorg, and spoiler: it looks like it totally lives up to its concept. You can’t not love that timing-based Paper Mario-style combat.
Right now, Jonasson is trying to find a sponsor to put the game out – interested parties can contact him via his website. While you wait for that to happen, definitely take some time ogling (or should that be ogre-ing?) the Atari-style irrelevant cover art Jonasson’s colleague Jonas Åkerlund created for the game. Incredible work, both of y’all!
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its an interesting idea, i’ll definitely try it, but if you aren’t making any actual choices, then it falls under the ‘press x to not die’ category of games. aka button mashing. now this isnt due to the fact that its 1 switch; there are ways he could have allowed the player a more active part in the game. for example, you dont choose which way to go, so the only thing that the procedurally generated dungeon affords you is probably variable difficulty based on whether or not you find the weapons/heals you need, and what monsters show up. what i would recommend here, is to highlight each room, one at a time, and when the player presses the button, proceed to that room. this will allow the player to feel like they’re exploring the dungeon, not watching someone explore a dungeon. as for the fact that it switches your weapons automatically if the new one is better, why not prompt the player to press the button if they want to take a new weapon, while displaying the statistics of both weapons, with a timer. if the player doesnt press the button before the timer goes off, they keep the old weapon. yes i am aware these sorts of changes would slow the games pace down a bit, but games where you dont make choices are not fun. Maybe not even games. CASE STUDY: http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/495903