I’ve got two posts. This first is the announcement. The second is HOW DO I PLAY?
… How many IFs do you know of that have been spun off into 3D platforming adventures?
Today I present what is possibly the first and definitely the most recent:
River Rescue Obby (RRO)
You can see plenty of screenshots at the link.
I created this Roblox game over several months based on scenes, characters and situations from Dragon of Steelthorne, Vance Chance’s Choicescript entry into Spring Thing 2024. Vance picked the Roblox project I was offering as a prize. The whole game takes place in a sunshower, which makes it a bit lyrical, and I’m pleased with my original music.
(Note: In the game synopsis on Roblox, you’ll see a space between “Steelthorn” and the E on the end of it. This was deliberate to pass the text with Roblox’s automod. And a current Roblox bug means the synopsis has no linebreaks)
I want to give a huge shoutout to @aschultz (Roblox: fourpwood) who was the main tester. He created and honed his obbying skills in the process. My nephew also tested.
I’d love for you to play RRO let me know your reactions. This could be your chance to find out what Roblox is like. It could inspire me or others to do more IF spinoffs in future. Also, you can trade tips/questions in this thread.
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RRO is G-rated and without violence or enemies. If you have or know young folk on Roblox, you can let them know about it, or play it with them.
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If you experience any obvious bugs or weirdness, please PM me. But don’t think of your playing as obligatory testing – just play.
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I also welcome screenshots; I could use them in the game’s gallery. If they don’t fit in a PM, you can get at my email through my EMAIL page. (Edit - Added link to email page)
-Wade
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HOW DO I PLAY RIVER RESCUE OBBY?
To play, you just
- Make a Roblox account if you don’t have one (this is free) and download the Roblox app for whatever computer or device you’re going to play on
- On that same device, visit the game via the link I gave in the first post. This link: https://www.roblox.com/games/17508826606/River-Rescue-Obby#!/about
You need the link to get in the first time because the game’s too new to be searchable by title on Roblox. After one play, it’ll show in your recent plays in the Roblox app.
HOW DO I REALLY PLAY RIVER RESCUE OBBY?
An obby is a Roblox genre of obstacle course game. Most have no story and concentrate on presenting increasingly difficult platforming challenges, often grouped by type.
River Rescue Obby is different in that it has a (simple!) framing story, some JRPG-ish NPCs, and a continuous and varying natural environment to explore.
It starts really easy, so any clumsy adults can try. As you progress, challenge increases…
Controls on desktop:
WASD to move.
Space to jump.
Hold down the right mouse button to move the camera. (Or press shift to toggle a camera view mode)
Hold I or O to zoom in or out.
The mousewheel governs an overhead vs behind angle change. Try it and you’ll understand.
- The camera is important! Like a lot of obbies and Find-The games on Roblox, RRO gives you full control of the camera, and your skill with it (using the mouse in one hand while you jump and move with the other, or, on a touch device, doing finger ballet) becomes a good chunk of the technique in the long run.
-Wade
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Thanks @severedhand ! Definitely one of the coolest prizes offered for the Spring Thing.
My game is getting a second announcement on the CoG forums on 5th Sep, so I’ll give you another shoutout on that date.
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Notes from a tester who’s a bit biased in favor of this game:
I can verify that being able to rotate the camera vertically (from 0 degrees to the ground, to 90) helps a ton! The one downside is that you don’t see the cool scenery if you’re just trying to get through.
I don’t want to give outright spoilers here, but I know once I started moving the camera that way (I’d tried to–but I used the left mouse button,) my testing got a lot more efficient, and I was able to persist a lot more at tough jumps.
I was really bad at Roblox obbys when I started, and maybe I still am, but I still got better and enjoyed learning and even plowing through the earlier levels with the new techniques I learned.
So the game gave me a few a-ha moments where I first saw how to solve a puzzle, then how to solve it more easily, or how to make earlier jumps easier so I didn’t mentally exhaust myself beforehand.
I had a few times when I would get close to the end kind of late at night but keep missing jumps. Then I would wake up the next morning and be sharper and hit the jumps to solve one area and figure the start of another out. (I had the advantage of being able to warp around the various parts of the course.)
I think there’s a lot of opportunity for trading methods and observations, especially at the later levels. There’s more I’d like to discuss, and if this becomes a discussion thread, I will (e.g. stuff from testing that may be amusing,) but I don’t want to spoil anything for others first.
3 Likes
I just had a report that the game may appear in portrait mode (vertically?) on mobile phones. It didn’t present like that in Roblox’s device emulator. Anyway, just letting everyone know, I know about this, and if I don’t get a chance to attend to it today, I will in a week when I come back from a holiday.
EDIT! - I’ve fixed the above-described problem.
-Wade
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Inspired by Pacian’s effort, I finally got through the 2nd-last area. (I am really NOT good with Roblox. However I was REALLY really not good once I started.) I really enjoyed reverse-engineering how to get there … with the tester cheat codes I worked my way backwards from the checkpoint ahead. It was really cool to me how some jumps looked physically impossible, and they are in the real world, but not in Roblox. They make logical sense, in fact!
For many of the trickier ones, you need to make a sharp turn while in the air.
I think there’s a definite niche for people sharing videos of how to get through the tougher levels. I was actually on the same time as Pacian, and I noted we figured different ways through a few of the later levels! I generally went with the super-safe slow ways that might need more jumps, while he went with the more enterprising and creative ones.
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I know few are paying attention now IFComp 2024 started, but River Rescue Obby now has nine badges you can earn. Outside Roblox these would typically be called achievements:
-Wade
3 Likes
Okay, I just discovered something really useful! In the Roblox app’s search bar, you can find this game directly if you use double quotes.
i.e. Search for “River Rescue Obby”
Without the quotes, Roblox’s search will first list a few dozen games with similar names that are more popular, followed by 1000s of games that don’t even include one of the search terms you used…
-Wade
