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Brain frazzled, looking for an extremely chill indie game to play for a few minutes? You may want to try Together. I could describe it as fl0w but with lovers instead of ASCI bacteria. I could also say it vaguely reminds of both Robot Unicorn Attack and Today I Die. But really it's an experience unto itself and all I can say is take a look.
The game is of particular interest to me because... well, I almost made it myself. Sort of. By which I thought about maybe making it sometime in the indeterminate future and then decided to spend the foreseeable indeterminate future doing myriad other things. I had this vision in my head of a game that was mechanically very different but which attempted to capture the same feel of lovers drifting through the sky.
My idea was different enough that I might still do it someday, but basically the thing I wanted to accomplish is already done so I can just enjoy it.
[ August 10, 2010, 09:14 PM: Message edited by: Raymond Arnold ]
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posted
It was fun for a little while. After the third or fourth heart I decided to let the monster catch me, and that was that. Definitely a type of game I haven't seen before.
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The monster isn't the end of the game (not sure if you stuck around long enough to find out). The handling of the monster is actually my favorite part.
The "win," you will need to make you sure catch all the other hearts BEFORE the monster catches you though. As well as make sure you're in the Stratos layer when it happens.
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I was playing using my laptop touch pad. I think it would have been easier to control using a mouse.
The game froze when the monster touched me, and at that point I decided I'd played it enough anyway. I'll have to try it again. I wasn't in the mood for the subtlety of the game last night.
Do you start going back down through the layers eventually?
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as I said, you really need to be in the right mood. The primary "mechanic" (i.e. interactive device from which you are meant to derive enjoyment) is the drifting around, experiencing the ambience. The hearts are just there to provide some structure to the experience. It's a type of game I appreciate because my day job involves a lot of the same sorts of brain exercise that, say, StarCraft II would, so having a really mellow game to relax to is good for me.
"Spoiler":
If you want to experience the whole thing in one go, (and the game does have an ending, about 10 minutes of play if you know what you're dong), then start by heading up, collecting hearts from them middle and upper 2 layers. Then head down, collecting the bottom two, then return to the place you began the game at and let yourself be eaten by the monster.
Then do your best to return to the point of origin, again. (Escaping from the monster will move you a bit, so try to head back the way you came).
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On that note, since I think the old one has disappeared, I think I shall officially turn this into the new "neat little indie games" thread.
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I'm confess I am a little disappointed that, as far as I can tell, to experience "Together" in full you have to pretty much nothing other than sail DIRECTLY up and then DIRECTLY down. The fact that it is almost completely impossible to see the end otherwise is rather discouraging, even judging the game by its own terms.
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I actually found the experience of "Together" to be... I don't know... frustrating. Chasing love while being chased by a monster was almost nerve-wracking at times. I kept thinking "I'm almost at the heart!" then I'd have the deal with the monster, letting the heart escape. Quite sad.
I do really want to see the end though, so I'll probably play it again when I'm in not quite so melancholy a mood. Posts: 2827 | Registered: Jul 2005
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I recently randomly decided to play "Together" again. It may just be my imagination, but I think the hearts were significantly easier to catch, and appeared slightly more frequently. He may have updated the game in response to user feedback. The hearts seemed to change direction less often and moved slightly slower (only exception being the final heart, which was approximately as hard as the game was originally. I'm fine with that, since it's effectively the "boss". I still got it without much difficulty, since I had experience with the game before).
The website I played it on was different, which might also have something to do with it:
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