Indie Game of the Week 70: Offspring Fling

Eschalon: Book I, which I wrote about around a month ago, was the oldest game I had covered in this weekly feature. Offspring Fling, conversely, is the "Indie Game of the Week" entry that's been in my collection the longest: I bought this in a Humble Indie Bundle way back in the halcyon era of 2012, a few years past the point when the Indie market had truly landed but early enough that you could still follow all the major Indie releases. Even so, I never did find a spare moment to get around to playing this cute little puzzle-platformer from Kyle "KPULV" Pulver (who most recently worked with Team Meat on Super Meat Boy Forever levels) with music from Alec Holowka (who most recently composed the soundtrack for Night in the Woods).

The premise is simple enough: as the "Momma" creature of a vaguely rabbit-like species (which remind me way too much of the bunnies of Trip World, possibly by design), your nest is disturbed by an enormous dinosaur predator and your many babies are scattered to the winds. Each stage requires that you get all your babies, and yourself, to the exit. Babies don't wander around on their own - it's not Lemmings, mercifully - but will stay put until you pick them up. You can also throw them, as per the name of the game, which sends them flying horizontally across the screen until they hit something. The game's 100 stages continually introduce new hazards and obstacles to overcome, and their completion times generally range from a handful of seconds to a minute in length once you know the stage's solution. Even if you were to struggle on some of the later stages for a while, you're looking at a lean two or three hours of total game time if you just wanted to see the end.

However, the game's big longevity-expanding idea is reaching specific completion times on each of its stages: you can earn a gold flower for getting in below the par time, and a rainbow one for completing the "go perfect or go home" time set by the game's developer. The latter requires knowing every time-saving trick in the book, such as constantly jumping through narrow tunnels and catching your offspring mid-leap to increase your vertical height (running and jumping while holding offspring produces a lesser effect due to their weight, and this penalty increases with the number of offspring carried). The game does at least throw you a bone for those punishing rainbow score times: as well as the ghost of your best attempt to race against and learn from, earning a gold flower causes the ghost for the ideal rainbow flower run to appear, which means if there's any tricks involved you can observe this ghost to learn them. These time trials are extremely tight and reflexes-dependent, but at least it won't leave you in the dark about some miracle sequence-breaking approach, and you're rewarded with some diabolically difficult bonus stages should you sweep the board with golden and rainbow flowers if that's the motivator you need.

That's really all there is to the game, though. As befits an Indie title released in 2012, the concept's simple but the design expands on it with as many permutations as it can find without producing multiple instances that feel too similar. You'll tangle with hungry crocodiles, tenacious bees that follow you around the screen, venom-spitting frogs, rising pools of acid, switches which toggle the on/off states of colored blocks in the vicinity, very precise throws as you jump and fling your offspring through narrow gaps, and the emotional trials that come from the frequent imperilment of adorable baby creatures. I was ready to walk away after completing the original 100 stages (including a final boss fight and an ending cutscene), as I rarely see any merit in time trials in puzzle games - it's like retaking a quiz to see if you can complete it faster, despite already knowing all the answers. As a throwaway (so to speak) Indie puzzler from the medium's Bronze Age, its straightforward mechanics and 16-bit aesthetic still hold up well.

Rating: 4 out of 5.

I endorse this score. Offspring Fling is easily in the upper third of my own Humble Bundle heap, and I also found myself becoming a little caught up on trying to beat developer par times in courses. How deep did you go down the Humble Indie Bundle rabbit hole?

@jeffrud: I mean, I believe I've bought all the mainline Humble Indie Bundles (besides 12 and 14, which were mostly games I got elsewhere) but I think I've played most of those games by now for various blog features on here, or at least the ones I have any intention of playing.

That said, I've still got a few games older than Offspring Fling on my shortlist that I've been sitting on for a really long time. Dunno when I'll ever play them though; I'm using one of those random chooser apps to pick out future IGotW games for me from a big list, and I kinda keep adding to it...

I'll need to browse your findings to see if you've covered Lugaru HD if that's the case. That game is my go to example of a one star effort and I'd be curious to see your findings on it.