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svrman
Created : 19 June 2007
 

Geometry Wars on PC

Too little, Too late?
Wow.

Ok when I first heard and played Grid wars, I honestly had no idea what geometry wars even looked like or what gameplay experience was like.

Seriously I'm telling you, I was so not into xbox gaming that I didn't even bother reading about it. Even with the headlines shouting "indie games coming to consoles", didn't even prompt my curiosity.
I did give Gridwars a go though and was blown away.

It was I who offered to redraw some of the sprites used in Gridwars, of which most were used in the final version of the game - notice I said redraw because that's all I did, really.
I don't know if I had caught a glimpse of Geometry wars beforehand or that I had a glowing lines fetish at that time but I just *had* to play gridwars with neon colours. Strange huh?
I was like "this looks totally rad", self-congrats and pimping my ego, totally oblivious to the fact that I was trying to make Gridwars look more like Geometry wars (which I believe MarkInc, the programmer for gridwars, wanted to avoid, i think. - I think also some other people had similar objections but at that time I had no idea what I was doing!)

But anyway, I was laughing hard after I actually went to google Geometry wars. I was like "oh crap.. grrr ... umm.. should I go and take it down or sumink".

Meh, I was kinda worried - you know what with that "fine line" between remake and copyright infringement - but I did get some approval for it later (i think!).
Besides, seeing the enemy "snakes" in the game all bright and beaming and bright, imho made it totally worth it.

For those who have followed the Gridwars story know it was taken down because the developers of Geometry wars made a complaint to MarkInc that customers were getting confuzed between the two games (/me takes a bow) and it was effecting the sales of their game.
MarkInc responded by obliging to their request out of respect.


So now Geometry wars is available on PC via Valve's Steam and I must confess I got a copy of it today. It's priced at $2.50 which is quite frankly a giveaway (thanks to Gridwars maybe?)

So now, this morning, I have had the chance to play it and as it was back then, I am blown away... again!
It is fun and flashy and bright and beautiful! Definitely worth it!

If I had to compare the two games, Gridwars and geometry wars, I'd say that gridwars would be the more "developed" or "sophisticated" over the two in that it gave you "more".
Also Gridwars was more or less everybody's game; multiple inputs and contributors - more open and without restriction.

I kinda liked that aspect of the indie community.

Anyway time to end this.
Thanks for reading and... er... FIGHT THE POWER!!!

 

Comments
Tuesday, 19 June 2007, 09:15
Jayenkai
 		That's very much a Power Mousey style rant, there, svrman!

But, yes, we all knew it was going to happen* when Blizzard+MS went around kicking people's arses for making their own clones.

Hopefully, now that it's actually out, they won't be as touchy about the subject, and we can get back to cloning the heck out of it!
Or maybe not.

Did you know... They're also releasing it onto Wii and DS, too.

*By which I mean the eventual PC release.
Tuesday, 19 June 2007, 10:39
svrman
 		haha it wasn't actually supposed to be that long, but I see what you mean Forgive my babbling!

There was actually many many clones at the time Gridwars was out, as listed in indygamer's article, but only Gridwars was taken down. So yeh, I think that phase has more or less passed.

Hmm, I guess it'd be interesting playing GW using the Wii controller.. not sure about the DS though.
Tuesday, 19 June 2007, 14:16
Prospero
 		For that price, I'm tempted to snap it up. Since the UK / US exchange rate is so good right now it'd only cost just over a quid
Wednesday, 20 June 2007, 14:09
Lineraf
 		Me and my poor Mac...
Wednesday, 20 June 2007, 17:47
LostMember
 		Geometry Wars doesn't work on my computer. Sound, but no graphics. At least Gridwars still works!
Thursday, 21 June 2007, 02:57
svrman
 		lol I completely forgot about that! Gridwars is cross-platform!

Gentlemen, I do believe we have a winner...
Thursday, 21 June 2007, 05:18
Lineraf
 		Yes, firemaker103 alerted me to that fact; hurray for Gridwars!

Thanks man!