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Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

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Re: Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

#71

Post by cvoss »

rjh29 wrote: post #39

All of the critically acclaimed puzzle games seem to be sokobans. I have no idea why sokoban is so popular; I find it very tedious to move blocks around manually, especially if I already know the solution and I'm just making it happen. For me games like Artisan of Glimmith, LOK Digital, Tiling Town and Lingo are the most fun, followed by deductive games like The Roottrees Are Dead and The Case of the Golden Idol.

A good sokoban should not be busy-work. Well designed puzzles should be pithy and not require a lot of running around. The distance between discovering the solution and executing it should be very short.

Re: Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

#72

Post by cvoss »

Twirrim wrote: post #32
npinsker wrote: post #2

Stephen's Sausage Roll is my favorite puzzle game. But more interestingly -- it's a near-universal opinion within puzzle communities that SSR is one of the all-time best. I've never heard of such a strong consensus in other subgenres of game. Unlike other consensus "bests", it's relatively unknown to the public (which is understandable for many reasons). It's very likely that if you're a puzzle game devotee, you will…

It would surely sell more if people would actually explain what the game is, without using niche words like "sokoban". The article talks about how the trailer for it didn't really show anything about the game either, which arguably gets you into pretentious/artistic territory. After reading the linked article, and the comments here I still have zero clue about the game. It's a puzzle game involving sausages and a lar…

[dead]

Re: Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

#73

Post by smrq »

lanfeust6 wrote: post #20

Good sokoban, but maybe my fastest rage/impatience quit on a puzzle game at 10-ish hours. I find it too difficult.

This is more or less my take, but at least for me it's not about the level of difficulty exactly. It just feels very transparently like exploring a state space, where the "a-ha" moments just boil down to breaking into a different neighborhood of that space. To be clear, the puzzles are very well designed, and also very hard; but I don't find solving them satisfying at ALL. Compare with Baba Is You, where the "a-ha"s feel to me more like having a grand insight than finding the right very specific sequence of moves.

Put another way, it's been years since I played Baba and I can still remember the key insights to some of the sneakier puzzles. I couldn't even begin to do that for SSR.

Re: Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

#74

Post by jrz53 »

gowld wrote: post #28

Is this what Jonathan Blow is trying to copy with Sinking Star?

Not sure, but Sinking Star it is an (authorized) amalgamation of pre-existing sokoban games so there's some relation there.

From this post by one of the original devs: https://bsky.app/profile/draknek.bsky.social/post/3m7qybidq7...

Re: Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

#75

Post by GolDDranks »

Waterluvian wrote: post #17

My list of must play puzzle games is far too short: Portal, Portal 2, Demon’s Souls, and Baba is You. It’s amazing to me that I’ve never heard of a game this lauded.

Little known, but a warm recommendation, both for the puzzles and atmosphere: The Swapper. (disclaimer: I did some coding work for this game)

Re: Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

#76

Post by jader201 »

Mond_ wrote: post #3

No shade thrown, but I always preferred my game with some amount of story or artistic ambition beyond mere puzzling. I'd take Void Stranger or probably even Deadly Rooms of Death: The Second Sky over Stephen's Sausage Roll any day, I imagine.

Everyone’s different.

I’m good with zero-story puzzle games. I’ve spent many hours in Simon Tathem’s Puzzles [1] on my iPhone, just for the 100% pure logic goodness that they are.

[1] https://apps.apple.com/us/app/simon-tathams-puzzles/id622220...

Re: Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

#77

Post by cfiggers »

werdnapk wrote: post #51
Twirrim wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would surely sell more if people would actually explain what the game is, without using niche words like "sokoban". The article talks about how the trailer for it didn't really show anything about the game either, which arguably gets you into pretentious/artistic territory. After reading the linked article, and the comments here I still have zero clue about the game. It's a puzzle game involving sausages and a lar…

Almost anybody who grew up with video games in the 80s played Sokoban and knows exactly what that refers to. It was THE puzzle game in the early days of video games... that and maybe millipede.

I only know what "sokoban" means because of the sokoban levels in NetHack.

Re: Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

#78

Post by the__alchemist »

ghostly_s wrote: post #26
npinsker wrote: post #2

Stephen's Sausage Roll is my favorite puzzle game. But more interestingly -- it's a near-universal opinion within puzzle communities that SSR is one of the all-time best. I've never heard of such a strong consensus in other subgenres of game. Unlike other consensus "bests", it's relatively unknown to the public (which is understandable for many reasons). It's very likely that if you're a puzzle game devotee, you will…

Some of my favorites are puzzle games but I guess I’m not a member of the "community" (is there a message board?) and I’m surprised to hear there's any consensus on anything- my experience has been that most puzzle fans have a very specific subgenre they enjoy rather than enjoying "puzzle games" as a whole. I've had such little luck finding new games I enjoy that I don't pay any attention to puzzle game recommendatio…

Same reaction - I love puzzle games (The Witness, Talos principle, Blue Prince, Myst series, Baba is You, Antichamber, Obra Dinn, Opus Magnum etc), but haven't heard of this. I guess I should give it a try!

Re: Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

#79

Post by saghm »

werdnapk wrote: post #51
Twirrim wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It would surely sell more if people would actually explain what the game is, without using niche words like "sokoban". The article talks about how the trailer for it didn't really show anything about the game either, which arguably gets you into pretentious/artistic territory. After reading the linked article, and the comments here I still have zero clue about the game. It's a puzzle game involving sausages and a lar…

Almost anybody who grew up with video games in the 80s played Sokoban and knows exactly what that refers to. It was THE puzzle game in the early days of video games... that and maybe millipede.

So is there any way to explain it to the people who grew up in the half century since then?

Re: Stephen's Sausage Roll remains one of the most influential puzzle games

#80

Post by iamwil »

Twirrim wrote: post #32
npinsker wrote: post #2

Stephen's Sausage Roll is my favorite puzzle game. But more interestingly -- it's a near-universal opinion within puzzle communities that SSR is one of the all-time best. I've never heard of such a strong consensus in other subgenres of game. Unlike other consensus "bests", it's relatively unknown to the public (which is understandable for many reasons). It's very likely that if you're a puzzle game devotee, you will…

It would surely sell more if people would actually explain what the game is, without using niche words like "sokoban". The article talks about how the trailer for it didn't really show anything about the game either, which arguably gets you into pretentious/artistic territory. After reading the linked article, and the comments here I still have zero clue about the game. It's a puzzle game involving sausages and a lar…

Sokoban is a common word within puzzle game fans and devs. That article wasn't written for people that didn't like those kinds of puzzles in the first place.
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