Interesting 2-player Game

This is not IF, but given that @MiloM and @MoyTW have been writing 2-player games, and I’ve been tinkering for months with a 2-player parser game, and this is a really fun game by one of my favorite developers, I thought I’d shout it out here.

Rusty Lake is in my top 5 game developers, and they do point and click puzzle games that are extremely creepy and often really gross. I heartily recommend all their games, and their new one-- The Past Within– is a 2 player game that came out a couple of days ago. I just played it with my BFF, and we loved it. It’s interesting in that there’s no actual connection between the games of the 2 players; you solve puzzles that reveal codes and clues that you communicate to your partner. There’s lots to do, the puzzles are fair, and it had us phoning each other and sending pictures and texting like mad and feeling very satisfied.

It helps to play some of their Cube Escape games first (which are mostly free), because there’s an ongoing story told throughout the games that applies to this one. But you don’t have to know any backstory to play it, and I imagine it’s just as fun for newcomers as it was for us, who have played every game and can tell you all the the Vanderboom family history.

If you like the 2-player experience and have a gaming partner, I highly recommend checking this out.

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Thanks for flagging this – I’ve played all their other stuff but wasn’t sure how the creepy mood would translate to a multiplayer context. Definitely adding this to my list once my lifestyle is more multiplayer-friendly again.

Umm, is that a thing we’re supposed to be able to do? Admittedly it’s been a couple years but I feel like all I could definitively say about the backstory is stay the @#$!@ away from owls.

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No. I can’t imagine it matters at all. But it was good to see creepy Albert Vanderboom again. I’m sure you haven’t forgotten the really scary shadow man who’s in all the other games, and he’s all over the place in this one.

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I’ve been playing the Cube Escape / Rusty Lake games since the beginning, and I haven’t even tried to remember who is who or when or what happened to them.

Fun anyway.

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Oh, that looks cool! Thanks for flagging it.

I think there are quite a few multiplayer puzzle-y games, I haven’t yet seen any that have attempted to be particularly narrative-heavy though if somebody finds one I’d be psyched to play it.

Aside from MUDs and stuff I also played Aspel (Emily Short) which was really cool! I’d recommend checking it out though you really should have 3 people and the real-time nature of it leads to some, uh, jank. But it’s cool to see.

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wait hold on

Like, as playable over the internet?

There’s no actual connection between the players, which is why The Past Within was interesting to me, because that doesn’t actually link the players either. There are 2 separate blorb files in my game. I know you did a lot of work for Ma Tiger on syncing the players, but what if you didn’t have to? The Rusty Lake game succeeded admirably, I think, and I think it can be done with parser, too.

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