Super Mario-esque, in Reverse
- Sorry about this, I couldn’t resist.
It’s not in our nature to think backwards in time[1]. There are so many different permutations to playing through a Mario stage that it would be highly difficult, without aimless trial and error, for a player to figure how it was properly played through the first time over. It’d be great to see this more fleshed-out, but I imagine that some of the time-paradox logic problems would be a nightmare to properly implement. Or something. Like Retrograde, it happens entirely in reverse and the player is left with making the present happen as it already did. Jump On Mushrooms will draw the inevitable comparison to Braid, in that it’s a time bending platformer, but it’s more akin to another backwards-in-time indie game, Retrograde. As the TIGSource thread points out, it’s kinda buggy with many logic issues — other seemingly normal situations do get counted as fails — but it’s a short experience and it’s worth the trouble.
It takes a while for it to click and for you to realize why you are being fast-forwaded (press ESC to skip) in seemingly normal situations, but once it does it’s pretty awesome. It’s hard to describe, since we’re not tuned to thinking this way, so just go and try it yourself (if you have a PC.) In this sense, you can’t die (because Mario already succeded) but you do “fail” by creating, essentially, time paradoxes — impossible situations that couldn’t have happened. Mario has succeeded and reached his goal without dieing, and now it’s up to the player to recreate that backwards. Excuse me for pointing to another indie platformer game, but the concept was too good to not mention: a Super Mario Bros. game that you play in reverse.
Excuse me for pointing to another indie platformer game, but the concept was too good to not mention: a Super Mario Bros. game that you play in reverse. Mario has succeeded and reached his goal without dieing, and now it’s up to the player to recreate that backwards. In this sense, you can’t die (because Mario already succeded) but you do “fail” by creating, essentially, time paradoxes — impossible situations that couldn’t have happened. It’s hard to describe, since we’re not tuned to thinking this way, so just go and try it yourself (if you have a PC.) It takes a while for it to click and for you to realize why you are being fast-forwaded (press ESC to skip) in seemingly normal situations, but once it does it’s pretty awesome.
As the TIGSource thread points out, it’s kinda buggy with many logic issues — other seemingly normal situations do get counted as fails — but it’s a short experience and it’s worth the trouble. Jump On Mushrooms will draw the inevitable comparison to Braid, in that it’s a time bending platformer, but it’s more akin to another backwards-in-time indie game, Retrograde. Like Retrograde, it happens entirely in reverse and the player is left with making the present happen as it already did. Or something. It’d be great to see this more fleshed-out, but I imagine that some of the time-paradox logic problems would be a nightmare to properly implement. There are so many different permutations to playing through a Mario stage that it would be highly difficult, without aimless trial and error, for a player to figure how it was properly played through the first time over. It’s not in our nature to think backwards in time[1].
- Sorry about this, I couldn’t resist.
