Bundles: Indie Game Stand and Humble Indie Bundle 8

Pid

Pid is a puzzle platformer, one of many in the indie landscape. This game's gimmick is a gravity manipulating light beam. The game's protagonist, a young boy named Kurt, can toss a ball of light onto surfaces, which creates a narrow beam that drags objects (and Kurt) in whatever direction it is facing. Kurt can use this to cross gaps, move objects, and damage certain enemies.

At first, this gimmick works pretty well. There are some clever and challenging puzzles centered around the ability, and it's generally an effective way to manipulate the environment without feeling too awkward. Unfortunately, this changes as the game progresses along its 7+ hour long adventure. Puzzles become more and more frustrating with unfair level design, brutal bosses, and repetitive platforming segments. Pid doesn't seem to offer a fair challenge, and is content with pounding you repeatedly until you give up.

I've got to give a special shout out to the boss in the above screenshot. He is the notoriously difficult second boss, who was apparently even more difficult before a patch adjusted him to be more forgiving. You have to use the light beams to direct bombs to the underside of his head, which stuns him, then use springs to bounce to the top of his head and throw beams into a hole under his toupée, all while avoiding his attacks and enemies which spawn. This was a brutally difficult boss, and even on this "adjusted difficulty," it took me well over an hour to finally crush him. I don't think I could've gotten through this game without a surplus of Bombcasts to listen to.

Other than the difficulty and general repetitiveness, Pid is a stylistically solid game. The artwork is excellent, and the game's soft pastel palette is quite unique. It wouldn't be a stretch to call some scant outdoors segments breathtaking, with fascinating vistas and beautiful alien landscapes. Unfortunately, most of the game takes place inside, so this aesthetic is somewhat stilted.

Pid is definitely not the worst indie puzzle platformer out there, but it's far from the best. It may be worth a playthrough if you've exhausted all other options and gain some form of masochistic pleasure from repeatedly fighting a giant balloon man.

Little Inferno

Coming from the latest Humble Indie Bundle, my favorite purveyor of bundle related goods, Little Inferno is a bizarre little game that is most definitely worth playing through. The game is only around 2 hours long, and is really more of an experimental sandbox than an actual game, but it's a unique experience which isn't comparable to much else.

The core gameplay centers around burning objects in a Little Inferno Entertainment Fireplace. You can purchase items from a catalog, and then systematically burn them to gain more money and purchase more items. There's an odd sort of pleasure derived from burning all kinds of weird objects in a fireplace, and it kept my rapt attention throughout the adventure. Occasionally, you'll receive letters from other fireplace owners, which provides a sort of narrative backdrop to drive the flame related action, and it is very well done. I don't want to spoil it, but it's a sight to behold, and again, not comparable to much else.

Purchasing items was one thing that I felt could've been tweaked about the game. It felt like the only reason there was a time limit before the object would appear in your inventory was to artificially extend the game. Towards the end, it took upwards of two minutes for each item to spawn in my inventory, which resulted in me tabbing out and doing other things while waiting, which definitely broke the flow of the game

Beyond that, there's not much to say about Little Inferno. It's great to see how each object interacts with your flame, and the "story" that unfolds is interesting, and worth the current price of admission (only a dollar in the still running Humble Bundle). The experience is short, but satisfying, despite its flaws.