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Patrick's Parabox

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Seems to be inspired by Tom7's "You can't win this game, it exists only to destroy your mind" [1]. Tom7 is like an indie intellectual/artistic hero of mine. Be sure to check out his other stuff. [2]

[1] http://entire.spacebar.org/ [2] http://www.tom7.org/

I really loved his approach to art -- crap art! http://crapart.spacebar.org/

Perhaps the zooming presentation was, but the mechanical inspiration was a different jam game, Sokosoko.

https://juner.itch.io/sokosoko

Oh man, you just reminded me that he usually uploads something around april fools so we have some new stuff to look forward to soon

SigBovik[0] is next Friday, he often drops something interesting and breaks the curve for whimsy there.

[0]: http://sigbovik.org/

I'm not sure if it's still true, but for a while this game had zero negative reviews on Steam.

I'm quite far in now, but I think there's still a while to go. The game purportedly had 300+ puzzles.

More than anything I'm really enjoying how comprehensively the rules are explored. There seems to be every permutation of rules used in a puzzle somewhere and the number of different 'rules' or 'ideas' that it gets out of a relatively simple premise is pretty staggering - probably more than most sokoban games I've played.

On that note, I'm really enjoying the glut of quality puzzle games recently. The Witness, Stephen's Sausage Roll, anything by Alan Hezelden (Good Snowman, Cosmic Express, monsters expedition), Bonfire Peaks, Pipe Push Paradise, Baba is You, Recursed and more. It's a good time to be a puzzle gamer.

I think your 3rd paragraph is the highest praise a puzzle game can receive. The most satisfying feeling when I’m playing a game is when I think I grasp the scope of the rules, and then they go there with it, and I’m like oh no they did not…

You have a very expansive definition of 'recently'!

That's the best thing about puzzle games - they age like a fine wine.

All the games above came out in the last 7 years, use modern technologies and are available on modern platforms. I'd contrast that to older puzzle games that need special compatibility tools to get running (Myst) or haven't been updated to modern resolutions or other devices like touch or controller support (e.g. Braid).

Some more of my favorites along the same vein include Snakebird, Jelly no Puzzle, and ilomilo.

I thought Baba Is You and Stephen's Sausage Roll broke my brain. I'm ready to suck at this.

I've played it. The mechanic is interesting and the game is overall very well-polished. There's a free demo on Steam.

Another sokoban game with a twist: https://store.steampowered.com/app/316610/A_Good_Snowman_Is_...

This looks pretty good, and reminds me of Recursed, another recursive puzzle game sitting in my backlog: https://store.steampowered.com/app/497780/Recursed/

I've played Recursed, and it's quite fun. This definitely gives off the same feel, especially if you can squeeze one minimap cube into another.

This looks super fun! Reminds me of the "first-person recursive puzzle game" Maquette: https://store.steampowered.com/app/762840/Maquette/

It looks like an amazing puzzle game. I hate it and will never play it, but it looks amazing.

I get anxiety from looking at it. Similar to the movies “the cube”

LOL. Exactly that! I took one look at this thing and started to think about harming myself haha

I'm not a puzzle player but give the demo a try. I think you'd be surprised at how fun it is.

Is there a mechanic I'm missing here? It just looks like sokoban with recursive visuals.

EDIT: Apparently when you exit the side of the level with your character, they appear on that side of the "level" block you are pushing around.

The mechanic is that it's recursive sokoban.

There's a lot more to it than that. I would sincerely recommend playing the demo which does a good job of showcasing the strengths of the game.

There is more to it, but I would add we are in a golden age of sokoban-likes, each with their own twists that make them worth attention if you like the genre. A few of my favorites:

* Stephen's Sausage Roll

* Bonfire Peaks

* Baba Is You

* Sokobond

* A Good Snowman is Hard to Find

One of these days, if I'm ever bored and just have nothing else to do, I've always wanted to screw around with cellular automata built on a similar principle, where something triggers the cells to subdivide and/or unsubdivide, and there's some sort of flow back and forth between the levels. Seems like some interesting things might happen. (I've also thought the subdivided cells might run at a different time scale, too.) Not infinitely recursive, but similar in idea, I think.

This zooming in effect is really similar to how THC affects me except it's in reverse i.e. zooming out. In addition to this, I am made a total observer who's entirely out of control and forced to watch myself thankfully act in character. It's an incredibly uncomfortable feeling if I'm not in a comfortable & safe environment.

If you want to be uncomfortable in a safe environment, the level right after the one depicted in the GIF zooms out as you describe.

This is great. I do think I'd get sea sick from playing it for an hour though.

Yep, this is in that category I put a lot of VR games. I'm excited that it exists but I will definitely not be playing it myself.

The game itself doesn't involve this constant slow zooming. It's just for effect for the trailer to demonstrate the recursive nature of the game.

The constant zooming is straight from a specific level in the game. The next level is similar and constantly zooms out. Those are the only two I've experience so far with that mechanic.

If anyone gets to one of those levels and is unable to play due to the visual effect, you can hit 7 on your keyboard and it switches to an alternate view. I think this actually works on all levels, kind of an interesting feature.

A puzzle game which uses unusual animation to visualize a unique gameplay mechanism, but which also accommodates people who are put off by the animation… is pretty much the gaming equivalent of finding my soulmate without knowing what I was even looking for. Or even knowing I was looking for anything at all.

I’ve pretty much soured on trying new games several times over the last decade, only to be delighted by a new game or class of games which tickle some niche fancy for me. Given this and some of the other recommendations in these comments, it looks like I’ll be starting another iteration.

You can turn off the zoom animation in the settings, thankfully.

sokoban <3

Not to be played on acid.

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