Lysis blog

3rd August 2013

All about Cube Turpin

It's been ... rather a long time since I posted anything here. I'm going to try to put up some of the unpublished games I've written over the next few months.
So here is a new game to play : Cube Turpin.
This game was originally written for a short programming contest with the theme 'greed'.

So Cube Turpin[1] is about stealing coins and evading justice. Greedy enough by itself you might think. But wait! - theres an additional dynamic. You have to bribe the poor so that at your trial they won't find you guilty. If you are found innocent you can either go back to your old ways - try to rob more coins against slightly faster escalation - or retire with your ill-gotten gains[2]. (note to completists - retire with at least 50 coin for the happiest ending.)

The peasants are also greedy, and need regular bribing to keep them on your side. Although there are eight, only three make up the jury - so you can play conservatively, paying off all the poor all the time, or more greedily, only paying off a fraction at a late stage - and hope for the best.

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I think the most original thing about this game is the trial. Getting caught isn't necessarily bad, because being found innocent "wipes the slate clean" - and is also necessary to get a satisfactory conclusion (although the greediness of the player affects what that is).

The graphical style is because they're essentially programmer graphics made in the short time-frame of the original competition. While I could have replaced them, I kind of like the style and decided it fit the mood of the game. In that vein I am very pleased with the somewhat anachronistic sound effects and music the game now has, particularly the wonderful chase music by Holy Konni.

I hope you like it.

[1] Dick Turpin was a highwayman in England whose exploits have been romanticised. ↩ return

[2] When I was young there was a TV series about him which I remember with great affection. As I recall he was portrayed as practically a saint. Several times leaving the life as a robber to "live until you're 99" was mentioned, which inspired the retirement angle of my game.↩ return

G15015
U18024
m18662

Can you make some new Magic Layers remixes?

Hey Lysis, do you think you could make 4D? It is like 1D but you can see
everything like a 3D person but everything is double. Also at the end of level 5
which is like level 3 (you don't have a map except the maze is longer)you get to
see your path in 3D instead of 2D.

Oh, comments.
hloen, there is a distant possibility that I may at some point port Magic Layers
to another platform. New levels might come about then. The general complaint
seems to be that the later levels are too hard, but I think they were massively
more difficult to design. There may be ways around that, but I can't promise
anything at this point. Magic Layers does seem to be my game which spread most,
but it didn't gain massive attention and I didn't get much from it in any sense.
ihminicle1324, I have to say you are the first person I've met for whom 1D wasn't
confusing enough.

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