Quick Look: Road Not Taken

This is clearly the best candidate for Frog Fractions 2 speculation.

I've been playing this since it became available on PS+, and I have to say it's one of the most frustrating little puzzle games I've ever played.

There's just so many obtuse mechanics in play, and it has such a harsh penalty for failure it just becomes annoying really quickly.

On the road again something something.

I was just thinking this would be a good iPad game? That being weird as I don't own an iPad, I own a Vita! Shows you how much hope Vita owners have in their own platform. Just didn't cross my mind as an opinion, lol.

@aishan: I found it just gets way to cluttered way too quickly such that I find myself running out of energy while just trying to formulate a solution, never mind executing it. Every time anything moves it could change the parameters in such a way that suddenly your prior idea is totally invalid. Maybe randomized puzzles are not such a good idea after all.

It's like playing Sokoban, except the warehouse is on fire.

I tried playing some of this the other day. I didn't really care for it. I might go back and play a little bit more though, I dunno.

God damn mix masta Vinny is on fire.

This looks so rad! Love the references in the flavour text, I'm sure I'm only catching half of them.

Poetry time with Vinny and Alex.

This QL was fun because of all the random stuff going on, but it really doesn't seem like something I'd want to play. Some of the writing is pretty good, though.

Also why the heck would a game like this need a perma-death mechanic. Seems really unnecessary.

Vinny is a poet.

Reading. My. Mind.

This game is the anti-fun. trust me

The puzzling is giving me a Catherine vibe, it has that "this doesn't look right" feeling about it.

I can't understand why you play as Orko from Masters of the Universe...

Oh god I couldn't help but cringe on Alex's behalf when it wouldn't let him throw the statue to the other room. It took me a while to learn that if there is an object right next to the threshold on the other side, you can't throw an object through the door or it bounces back.

This makes a lot of sense that it came from the same studio that made Triple Town. The art style and mechanics are very similar.

Daaaamn Vinny. You guys should do freestyle rap battle features.

Yeah, I can't remember the last time I was so put off by a game so immediately

Vinny Caravella & Alex Navaro: new Heads of the Giant Bomb Poetry department.

Road Not Taken PS Vita Version “Severely Delayed”

A Vita version was planned but is going through difficulties now. I'm hopeful though. Game looks sweet.

My fiancee loves this game. Loves it. She played it till midnight the other night.

couldnt have said it better myself.

I really have to say, and I usually never feel like this, this game is weird.

I am playing this game a lot and I don't quite know why. There are so many mechanics, it makes it difficult to feel like you really know what you're doing. It often seems like I'm solving puzzles by banging my head against them, rather than by thinking them out. That's not a good feeling for a puzzle game. That said, I have made it up to year 8 and I keep going back to it. There must be something there if I can't put the game down. And the earlier levels have become much easier, so I may be absorbing the mechanics on a subconscious level.

EDIT: I just went back and played after watching this quick look and it finally clicked for me. After several hours, the odd compulsion I felt to keep playing this game despite enjoying it very much has paid off. Of course, now I'm afraid that compulsion may turn into full blown addiction.

12:35 You can Zelda those pots and break them! Two broken pot shards = a stool (for some reason) and Cat + Shard = Pot.

I also cringed just seeing Alex throwing pieces of wood around without combining them, I think by now it's a solid game trope that when you're in the forest you need to make a fire.

Hard and frustrating, but oddly addictive.

I don't like this game, there's way too many formulas and mechanics. Unless you want to spend your time memorising a huge list of "craft recipes", you'll have to constantly look up stuff and even then the puzzles involve a lot of trial and error.

And for reasons I can't explain, nothing really feels satisfying to me in the game. Controls don't help there either, and I don't want to spend all this time in the game world learning stuff because the world isn't immersive at all to me.

And I also really don't like the art style, it just feels way too much like a phone game.

Basically, I don't like anything about this game. :p

See, this is why I like Alex; Robert Frost reference in the first minute.

1:15 and this is already one of my favorite QL's.

Throw goats instead of mount them??? What is gbeast coming to

Vinny is poetry.

Well there you go, sigh.

Sick rhymes in the beginning Vinny. Sick rhymes.

This game has a Social Link system?! Magnificent!

I'm trying to understand...what's off-putting besides dealing bunnies to strangers? It looks okay?

I'm not saying it's a bad game, just really not for me. Nothing about it seemed fun at all, and I haven't run in to that in a long time. Usually I can find something I like in a game.

Boy have Alex and Vinny been playing alot of games that have board game like square-by-square movement...

There once was a man

from Nebraska

Whose wife couldn't tell you directions

if sh'you asked'a

When asked if she knew

where to get bacon

she said, "On the Road Not Taken."

And then I just stumbled right past'a

Vinny

@brianp: For what it's worth, I felt the same way. Played it tonight and deleted the game almost immediately. I have not been so quickly turned off by a game in a long time.

Fucken' hell Vinny. That was excellent.

I liked the aesthetics and the atmosphere of this game, but just couldn't keep playing it past day3.

Came for the Quick Look, stayed for the poetry.

This game looks interesting and frustrating. The basic gameplay, hub world, and story seem crazy and interesting. But the game totally fucking you over due to obtuse rules and just expecting you to memorize those does not seem like great design. A few little strategies you need to learn, items to understand, or secrets to uncover are great. The entire game being weird, unexplained combinations and interactions that all need to be managed perfectly is terrible.

Though also continues the grand tradition of wanting to yell at the screen during puzzle QLs. So many bad moves and wasted energy just moving things around incorrectly or not seeing how to move things over properly.

@mooseymcman: Yeah I jus bought it, it is really cute and all but... something about the gameplay seems boring?\

I guess this is by the same dev as Triple Town.

I'm still trying to figure out how to be good at Triple Town. I want to like the game, but it seems like no matter what I do the bears always make me screw up my town eventually. Seems unwinnable without spending money on power-ups, which is a real bummer since I spent the 4 bucks or whatever to unlock infinite turns.

At least this seems to be a proper game with no microtransactions, so hopefully it's actually balanced? It looks kinda like what I wanted Triple Town to be. If it ever gets an Android release (and they don't shoehorn in microtransactions) I might pick it up.

Professional child thrower Alex Navarro.