[iOS] Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP | iPhone version out now(ish) +universal app

Lunker

Who: Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP
What: A curious blend of modern art and retro video games -- a mashup of point-and-click adventure, puzzles, and combat, strewn through a filter of art-house headfuckery
Where: Apple touchtronic devices (iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch)
When: March 24 for iPad, likely a late April release for iPhone and iPod Touch
Think: "David Lynch demakes Quest for Glory," or "Shigeru Miyamoto makes a director's cut of Memento"

I've been stoked about this game for ages, and now that it's finally coming out this week more details are emerging that only reconfirm my interest in the game. It's essentially an indie reinterpretation of a classic adventure video game, with gorgeous pixel art, a mix of exploration, puzzle-solving, and one-on-one combat, and multiple layers of art-house style. Much of the game's specifics are being purposefully obscured right now, but going by the revealed media and buzz, it's something that's right up my alley -- and I think it might be yours, too.

The game is a hot collabo between three separate, small indie entities: Pixel-art film operation Superbrothers, musician Jim Guthrie, and some of the folks at developer Capybara Games (who made the cult classics Critter Crunch on PSN/iPhone and Might and Magic: Clash of Heroes on DS/XBLA/PSN). You may remember Superbrothers from their Dot Matrix Revolution video that made Internet rounds a ways back, but another work of theirs that's stunning is The Children of the Clone.

For a better idea of the game's style, check out this Audience Calibration Procedure video.


Gameplay

Superbrothers wrote:

S:S&S EP is a 21st century interpretation of the archetypical old school videogame adventure, designed exclusively for Apple's iPad, iPhone & iPod Touch.

It's a mix of laid-back exploration, careful investigation & mysterious musical problem-solving occasionally punctuated by hard-hitting combat encounters. S:S&S EP is an unusual genre-bending effort with an emphasis on sound, music & audiovisual style that has been positioned as 'a brave experiment in Input Output Cinema'.

S:S&S EP has been recently described as "... an unlikely mix of Zelda and art house cinema. The game is equal parts Robert E. Howard, Shigeru Miyamoto, Tim Schaefer, with some David Lynch thrown in for good measure — but there is more to S&S than these inspirations." (link)

S:S&S EP won the IGF Mobile 'Achievement in Art' award in March 2010 and has been eagerly anticipated in some quarters ever since.

A Capybara rep on NeoGAF also describes the game as "a point-and-click adventure game with punch-out style combat, heavy on atmosphere and exploration, with puzzles, miracles and social networks mixed in."

Media
Trailers: Audience Calibration Procedure | Walk in the Woods | First Look










Press/Impressions

Touch Arcade

Joystiq

Renzo

This looks hot. I am all over it once it hits iPod.

Lunker

Renzo wrote: »

This looks hot. I am all over it once it hits iPod.

I'm torn between waiting for the iPhone version or just springing for the iPad one. I rarely use my iPad for gaming (it ends up being a really expensive web browser and PDF viewer), but the killer art seems like something I'd love to see on a bigger screen.

Nimble Cat

I'm sad the iPhone version isn't out for another month. I want it NOW!

harvest

Hell that looks pretty. I really love me some well-designed pixels, and these ones look very nice. Be nice to have a more 'traditional' game on the iPad, too.

brynstar

I'll be there day one for the iPhone version! I'm hoping this game catches on and more games like it follow.

Drunk_caterpillar

I would kill for this to be a universal app. Going to wait for the iPhone version though because I won't be getting an iPad for a while.

Lunker

More hands-on details about the beginning of the game and more on the mechanics. I only broadly peeked, as I'm trying to avoid reading specific details until I actually play the game myself, but if you're wondering "what the hell is this game really?" (and I really wouldn't blame you, it's vague as all hell) you should check it out.

Touch Arcade wrote:

The game is controlled like most other point and click (or, point and tap, I suppose) adventure games in that you can drag the camera around with one finger and use familiar pinching gestures to zoom in or out. Double tapping makes your character move to that location, or you can press and hold to move continuously in that direction. Once you've got a handle for the controls you're quickly introduced to "Girl", "Logfella" and "Dogfella", the three supporting characters you'll spend a considerable amount of time with on your quests.

Throughout the game, you'll need to use both sword and sworcery to progress. Drawing your sword to enter battle involves rotating the iPad 90 degrees, at which point a button appears for defending with your shield as well as attacking with your sword. As mentioned in previous S&S articles, combat works a lot like classic NES Punch-Out!! with emphasis on timing. Fights range from being very simple, requiring only blocking and counter-attacking to multi-phase boss battles.

Like any good adventure game, there's a hefty amount of puzzles. Completing these requires "singing the song of sworcery," or, holding your finger on the Scythian until she is enveloped in a colorful halo of light. You will then be able to interact with the environment to complete puzzles that involve both music and logic.

...

I'm reluctant to get much more specific in this preview, but the gloves will be off for our full review when the game launches this Thursday. What I will say is that having played all the way through Sword & Sworcery already, I think it's incredible how Superbrothers have managed to combine both action-oriented gameplay through sword fighting and incredibly existential puzzles through the sworcery components. I enjoyed the game with a partner, who is great at decoding musical puzzles, while I handled the fighting and movement. It was an incredible experience, even more so as our two play styles managed to complement each other for completing the two distinctly different modes of gameplay.

Lunker

Sword & Sworcery EP reportedly only $4.99 on iPad! It's up in NZ now, will ripple its way across global App Stores during the day, so in NA it should hit around 11pm Eastern. I was expecting it to be more, honestly, but at this price if it's as good as it looks I'll certainly double-dip.

Lave II

Egads! Come on time zones. So very, very excited by this.

Drunk_caterpillar

So tempted to steal brother's iPad for this. So tempted...

Lunker

Bought this morning!

Don't have time to play until tomorrow!

Threepio

I spent a good chunk of time on a plane today playing this. Headphones are a must.

It's charming, weird, and fun to play. I'm enjoying it so far; the art style is fantastic, and the gameplay is very intuitive. Half the fun is the fact that nothing is explicitly explained.

zeroomegazx

Game has been freaking AWESOME so far. On Act III myself finally. A lot longer than I was thinking too! If you own any iOS device you owe it to yourself to grab this. Don't play it without headphones!!!!!!!

Lunker

Just played through Session 1 and Session 2 this morning. I love that the game is broken into discrete chunks, as it gives me an opportunity to put it down.

My first impression (and this is probably good for a lot of people) is that the game doesn't take itself nearly as seriously as it might have seemed. It's pretty goofy and self-aware with the dialogue, which I love and is clever up the wazoo. There's also an option to integrate the game with Twitter -- and so far virtually every single piece of dialogue is Twitter-ready, which is a clever way to promote the game, but I think will irritate some people who have friends playing it. :P

The audio is fantastic, and headphones really are recommended. It's got tons of Zelda and video game references all up ins; the gameplay is a split between point-and-click adventure in a "Gobliins-slash-Myst" kind of way -- nothing really explained, you play around with hot spots and characters to try to figure out solutions -- and the combat, which is reaction-based Punch-Out-slash-Quest for Glory. All drenched in that crazy beautiful pixel-art style. I do wonder how the game will transition to iPhone, as I love zooming out constantly on the iPad to see the art less zoomed-in.

joshofalltrades

Oh god dammit, I don't own an iPad and my ancient iPhone would have a stroke trying to run this.

I really really want, though

Kemal86

I finished the game but the main menu is only showing me at 99% complete. Loading my game puts me in the last chapter right before the "point of no return". I did the following extra stuff in my game:

I went into the Dream World and found the hidden grove where Jim Guthrie hangs out. In the dream world I fought the nudist Boor and spared his life. I found the key to the Moonlight Grove after that and used it a couple times to adjust the moods of the moon. I tried going into the Dream World in Chapter 4 to look for Girl since she goes missing there but I couldn't find any traces of her. When I beat the game it was under the half-moon that we naturally have right now.

If anyone knows what I need to do for the last 1%, please put it in a spoiler for me!

Sceptre

Can't wait for the iphone version.

Lunker

Midway through Session III, and this game is wonderful. It's a lot more musical than I expected -- the boss battles are very much rhythmic Punch-Out, and the little jam session in Session III is very Electroplankton.

Also, it's gorgeous.

NailbunnyPD

Is there any indication that this will make its way to home consoles? I won't be buying an iPad, and I fear the iPhone won't do this game justice.

Lunker

NailbunnyPD wrote: »

Is there any indication that this will make its way to home consoles? I won't be buying an iPad, and I fear the iPhone won't do this game justice.

I don't think so; I'm not that far in, but already one puzzle kind of relies on having a multi-touch surface. Also, the dev team is super-tiny and this was a collaboration between three different "groups." I'd love to see this everywhere, as it's so far a fantastic game, but unless the puzzles are redesigned it's not the kind of thing I see with an analog stick. Maybe a DS or NGP touchscreen.

Kuratosu

Like everyone else I'm waiting for this to hit iPhone. Month seems like such a long wait and those screens aren't helping.

joshofalltrades

I just picked this up and all I can say is damn, other game developers on iOS need to step it up. I've only played the first chapter of it so far but it's excellent.

I can't imagine playing it on an iPhone. The big iPad screen makes this game, for me.

Krathoon

I do not own the hardware for this. Hopefully, it will be ported some day.

admanb

So great. I've gotten a bit stuck a couple times, but the enjoyment I get from just walking around and listening to stuff made the trial-and-error enjoyable.

Big Red Tie

really like the lunar stuff
fell asleep at a part i was stuck at, woke up able to accomplish the puzzle in the day

nonstop sworcery entering the dream worllllld

Big Red Tie

also. this game has delivered so many good wallpapers for my iPad like dang
they have some on the website

Big Red Tie

i really wish i could play this game rotated the other way, so i could have it propped up w/ the cover while i do something on the computer

i am moon watching! and having it open w/ the sounds is peaceful. except for when the gogolithic mass comes around..

joshofalltrades

I am sort of stuck on Day 3

I got to the meadow but there's nothing to do except talk to the ghost. I'm assuming I need to wait for a particular lunar time in real life? And that's supposed to happen tomorrow? But I don't know. I can't always plan my schedule around the moon.

DesertChicken

About moon cycles:

Look for the Moon Grotto.

zilo

Soundtrack! It's coming out on April 5th, $8 on iTunes or $9 on some other site that doesn't use DRM but whatever, we all have iPods. It's called (of course) "Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery LP".

Big Red Tie

joshofalltrades wrote: »

I am sort of stuck on Day 3

I got to the meadow but there's nothing to do except talk to the ghost. I'm assuming I need to wait for a particular lunar time in real life? And that's supposed to happen tomorrow? But I don't know. I can't always plan my schedule around the moon.

yeah pretty much this
i was a little miffed (what kind of game makes me wait) but it actually is okay i mean waiting and watching the moon i was having fun

and then the gogolithic mass rolled up and it had the screaming music and man this game

Big Red Tie

beat it
may have cheated

Ragnar Dragonfyre

Anyone else see this?

http://toucharcade.com/2011/04/07/somoga-announces-lunar-the-silver-star-for-ios/

I'm super excited.

Lunker

So this is finally coming out on iPhone! Lovingly titled "Superbrothers: Sword & Sworcery EP Micro." And the iPad app is actually going universal, meaning us dudes who already bought it are getting the iPhone version for free! Plus the iPhone only version is a mere pittance of $2.99, which is stunning cheap for something this awesome.

I think it's going live tonight. Sadly, I still haven't finished this (a little thing called the Nintendo 3DS came out, you might have heard of it, it's kind of popular!), but part of that is because I want to carve out an uninterrupted chunk of time for it, and my work is not letting me do so.

desc

It went up for iPhone last night. Only had a chance to play the first session so far. Game is excellent! Get it get it!

AshtonDragon

Been looking forward to this for awhile. Bought it for iPhone, haven't actually started it yet.

Kuratosu

Bought it really late last night. Before I knew it, it was 4 in the morning and I was about halfway done. It's exactly what I wanted out of it. Orgasmically delicious ear and eye candy.

It's the kind of game that I really want on a bigger screen. It almost makes me want an iPad. Almost.

Cannon Goose

Sword & Sworcery is a delight! Loving the soundtrack.

Lunker

Cannon Goose wrote: »

Sword & Sworcery is a delight! Loving the soundtrack.

Luckily for you (and me), the soundtrack is available separately to buy!



Stream it and/or buy it from Bandcamp here, ($7.99 CAD), or you can also buy it straight from iTunes for, IIRC, $8.99.

Jim Guthrie's Sword & Sworcery LP: The Ballad of the Space Babies

Some of the songs on this record directly inspired the creation of the collaborative art+music+video game project known as Superbrothers : Sword & Sworcery EP, " a brave experiment in I/O cinema with an archetypical video game aesthetic" available for Apple's touchtronic machinery on the iTunes App Store. Other songs, like The Ballad of the Space Babies were created specifically for S:S&S EP. For more information about the project you might want to stop by swordandsworcery.com.

The limited edition vinyl version of the album was so popular that they'll be running a second print, I believe.

Cannon Goose

Yes.

This is what I want.