Quick Look: Songbringer

This is some good shit, man.

This game looks sorta like Hyper Light Drifter except not as stylish and the controls don't seem as tight - haven't played it myself but everything looks sorta floaty.

Hallocinogenic Cacti? I'm in.

Lol those actually look like peyote :p

@humanity: my thoughts exactly

The music gives it a laid back vibe even during combat. Definitely one I'll pick up for the holidays.

If I had a nickel for every game that looked like this, I could buy CBS and tell GB to stop covering them.

This came out yesterday

I don't like the way this game looks. It's too busy, too much movement on any one screen. Also, that sword seems pretty underpowered.

@paulunga: Yeah, the graphics make a great first impression... But the more I play it the more I think the graphics are a little too pixellated, with too many filters and effects. Its a little hard to read the action as you're playing. I'm enjoying the game, but I'm not sure I'll find the motivation to finish it.

Diggin this artstyle.

Music is giving me some Genesis / Mega Drive sound chip vibes.

Looks pretty cool. Not really a fan of the dialog though, seems to lessen the cool factor; feels on the edge of internet speak or meme-ish, where as everything else seems to take itself pretty serious.

I think I got my fill on these type of indie games when I played Demontower in Night in The Woods.

@shagral: @humanity: I think it's borderline bizarre that they didn't even mention Hyperlight once. This doesn't look nearly as impressive to be honest.

As awesome as Hyperlight is, that game didn't gain a whole lot of traction among the staff here.

Every third word out of Ben's mouth is "ahh". Sounds like a creaking door, maybe some oil would do the trick.

Oh look, APAG

Oof, I don't like the look, music, or dialogue of this game at all. The art is too busy and abrasive. Like they tried to cram too many details. The music just doesn't seem to fit the aesthetic very well. The dialogue, as someone else mentioned, seems like the typical "dudebro" internet speak that's just kinda generic and boring.

As others are saying, the art direction is very derivative. It still looks good, but it's such a specific take on pixel art that at least three other games have done, that it feels worn-out to me.

Also, I'm not sure why this game needed to be randomized in any way. Hyper Light Drifter would have been a worse game if it had used random level design, and looking back on that game I'm increasingly impressed that they didn't use that crutch.

I think I was sold on this at the same point as Brad

Really liking the music. Feels a bit like a mix of Atari 2600 music as if played on era appropriate (late 70's) synthesizers with some hints of Delia Derbyshire's and Dick Raajimakers electronic stuff from the late 50's.

Not a fan of the writing we got to see in the quick look though, and unlike the staff I generally don't like this mix of pixel art and soft lighting effects either, though there were some things, like the area shown on the video page with the hilly terrain that gave me a pretty good vibe of 90's palette based lighting effects.

I'd give it a shot if it appeared on Origin Access or something, but I'm not really sold on it.

1) This specific type of art doesn't sell the impact of movements/attacks very well.

2) Either the music is way too forward in the mix, or the effects are not bumped up enough. Regardless, combat looks very underwhelming as a result. Some crunchy, SNES-era chip sounds would do a lot here.

3) Take the dungeon around 17:15. The odd zooming in/out causes the already low-res art to warp in weird ways, like lines of polygons interpolating poorly in old PS1 games. It creates the illusion that there's more going on and looks incredibly busy (in a bad way.) Text is borderline unreadable for the same reason, which is probably why there's so little of it in each dialog box.

4) The character design looks odd. You've got humans with pixel-thin arms and legs, then these huge, beefy monsters on the same screen. Again, around 17:15, I can't even tell what the enemies are supposed to be, partly because they're reflecting in the water, and also because there's not enough detail in their design to set them apart from the background.

I rarely find the visuals of a game to be the reason I'd avoid trying it out, but this might be the exception. It does a good job at presentation, but what it's showing is ultimately not clicking with me.

@meierthered: I hope you survived.

Meanwhile this QL has me staring up Hyper Light Drifter for the thirdish time. Gorgeous game but it hasn't grabbed me like I thought it would, yet.

Which cheeks?

The effusive praise makes me feel so out of touch. At least to me, the visuals just look like sloppy pixel soup. When you look beyond the shadows and reflections and layered lighting, the pixel art itself seems only a step or two above McPixel.

I've still never tried it. Got put off of playing it as soon as the dev mentioned the 60fps patch being in the works, then by the time that was out I was busy with other games. Still really want to play it though (in a perfect world where I don't have a dozen 2017 games that take priority).

I think it's right up your alley Brad. IT has beautiful graphics, haunting soundtrack, a very Zelda-like structure which I know you appreciate and combat that requires precision and practice to get good at.

I never managed to get into Hyper Light Drifter. I like the idea of it more then i do playing it.

I totally assumed this was from the Crawl people until they said it was the dev's first game. The movement looks very similar.

The style reminds me most of Sword and Sworcery.

@zombieclem: I was literally just typing this same comment :D

This looks like Sword and Sworcery with more typical gameplay elements attached.