Celestial Gardening: Kyoto Is A Very Pretty Thing
By Nathan Grayson on May 15th, 2012 at 11:00 am.
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I want to go to there.
I’ve never been a fan of designating things “games” and “not games” – primarily because that paints the uniquely minimal Proteuses of the world as somehow inferior to the rootin’-tootin’ shoot ‘em ups, high-flying hop ‘n’ bops, and other more traditional genres that have so characterized this medium’s past decade. Kyoto, in my mind, occupies a similar space.
Part tech demo, part experimental homage to the Japanese city of the same name, it’s positively languid – but more like a peaceful, moonlit river and less like a half-salted snail. Basically, you interact with a neon-lit tree and the celestial landscape around it, poking and prodding to figure out how/if things function. Resulting sights range from barely noticeable to glorious rainbow eruptions worthy of the end segment from Peggle. However, a word of warning: Kyoto definitely requires patience. I really wasn’t feeling it at first, but I’m also terrible at relaxing. So consume it slowly – like a warm glass of milk. Maybe even consume it with a warm glass of milk. But don’t literally consume Kyoto. The game or the city, I mean. I should stop talking now.
via rockpapershotgun
From the website:
What is "Kyoto"?
Spiral into audioreactive obscurity as you are transported to a mysterious and melancholy land. Kyoto is an interactive ambient musical experiment that serves is an homage to the wonderful city that I currently reside in.
This short and sweet game serves as half audioreactive experiment and half tech sandbox.
Download
Download Now (Win32) - 7.1MB
This build is currently in beta. Gameplay, graphics, and sounds are subject to change. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Enjoy!
I have been receiving reports of the game crashing on ATI cards. If it crashes, please make sure your ATI drivers are up to date and please email me (eddie@illogictree.com) the LOG.txt file if the crash persists. I am scrambling to fix it!
Current build timestamp: May 15, 2012
Press
Rock, Paper Shotgun: "Celestial Gardening, Kyoto..."
IndieGames.com: "Beta Build of Kyoto Released"
IndieGames.com: "Demo: Kyoto"
IndieGameMagazine: "Dreamy New Build of Kyoto"
VG247: "Near Complete Kyoto Build"
The Bit Bag: "Illogic Tree Releases Almost Complete..."
True Gaming (Arabic): "Near-Finished Version of Kyoto..."
More Info
The game is produced and distributed for free as a labor of love from its developers. The programming, art, and concept is by Eddie Lee. Sound design is by Jack Menhorn. Game design is by Jack Sanders.
"Kyoto" was developed using C++ and OpenGL from a game engine that I have been developing, called "FunkEngine". It has bindings to GameMonkey Script for quick development and uses fmod for sound.
Feel free to contact me at eddie@illogictree.com or follow me on Twitter @eddietree.
There is a DevLog and IndieDB entry of Kyoto. The game began development on Janurary 27th, 2012.
7.1 meg
---EDIT---
The link is working now!
graylox
