In early 2021, Rusty Lake announced their first two-player game “The Past Within” (hereafter referred to as TPW), and everyone applauded and cheered, novel and anticipating, and then…the wait was two years. Players try to find hints about the launch time in each development log, while comforting themselves “don’t worry, there are few people in the studio, do it slowly”.
Just yesterday, TPW finally went online, but it seems that this is the first time that such a situation has appeared on Steam: some players think it is still the smell of Rusty Lake, while others feel “extremely disappointed and cheated”, and even called on everyone to quit. payment. Even the hot comments under the official blog are like this.
So, is TPW “planted” this time?
I beat TPW with a friend last night and wanted to talk a little bit about it here. It is indeed not as brilliant as the previous series, but it is still a work with a classic flavor of Rusty Lake, and it is also suitable for novice players to happily solve puzzles together.
The basic gameplay of the game is as follows: two players are required to cooperate together, that is, to buy two copies of the game, one for each person and one screen, and play while exchanging clues.
Left and right are the perspectives of different players
At the beginning of the game is a letter from Albert to Rose in 1926 – our favorite father-daughter duo! Albert, the youngest son of the Vanderboom family, left behind a mysterious device connecting time and space in the year he was killed.
The puzzles of the two time and space are related to the advancement, and some of the pictures are still in the classic 2D plane perspective, and there are classic designs such as clock digital passwords, cutting ears (Van Gogh and Gerard: do not cue), sacrificing the body, etc. Interspersed;
The other picture is another attempt of the Rusty Lake series, the 3D cube. If you have played the “The Room” series, you may feel intimate, interacting with the cube box in front of you to activate certain mechanisms, clanging music boxes, clicking buttons, delicate gear handles… a bit like mechanical puzzle solving. .
The atmosphere is the same. It was a normal picture at the beginning, but gradually appeared in the back of the corpse’s broken teeth, a piece of meat with a mouth, and the little black man was slowly approaching his face… That kind of subtle, seemingly ordinary and creepy feeling, in the At the end (in Rusty Lake), it reaches its peak in a never-before-seen animated vision, and it’s an enjoyable experience that no other game has by any means.
crawling darkly.jpg
Just like that, peek inside the cube and solve the puzzles outside; or activate the electricity outside to turn on the lights inside. One in the past and one in the future, guiding Albert’s destiny together.
However, there are some flaws in the wall, and the difficulty and richness of solving the puzzles this time are far from the classic Rusty Lake works such as “Hotel” and “Paradise Island”. According to the Steam comments, the process is basically “find the password – read Come out – enter the password”, “just have a mouth”. This is also the main focus of bad reviews from old players.
Indeed, in the process of experience, a large number of repeated puzzles made me repeatedly think of question marks. Is there no complex transition of scenes? No clues in circles associated? Isn’t there a question that makes people stuck for two hours and enjoys it? It can be said that if you and your friends have a tacit understanding of the level of “do you want to eat this today? No, eat that”, you can solve it smoothly without any problem.
But actually, if you look at the reviews of players who played Rusty Lake for the first time with friends, they had a lot of fun.
Yes, the fun of this game is mainly about “relaying riddles with friends”. If I were alone, pretending that I was playing with my friends (my own version), it would not be impossible to pass the level, and even enjoy the brooding and gradually creepy atmosphere of the bland parts of Rusty Lake… but like It’s a simple pile of sand that loses 70% of the fun.
But if you are with your friends, you can’t help but look at each other’s screen and communicate completely by voice – the experience will be sharply upgraded to a deluxe version of Lego.
In one scenario, you describe the other person in detail:
I saw a coffin with Big Brother Albert lying in it.
What’s wrong with his chest!
Wait, I’m moving here! See if you have changed there!
Playing and playing, in order to let the other party keep up with you clearly, you will recite in great detail:
I cut off something from my ear… Put it on the beaker stand… Hey, I have a password here is xxx, you can see if there is such a style…
The friend on the other side moved his eyes and brain nervously.
Or something like this:
Did you find it?
Did you find it?
(both together) Your IQ is worrying my friend!
Whether it’s the spit that you draw I guess, or the unison when you have a good heart, it will make people smile.
I went to check the information. In fact, in the previous official development log, the problem of game difficulty setting has been repeatedly mentioned, and the offline exhibition has also continuously tested this:
“The goal of the game is to allow two people to obtain a satisfactory puzzle-solving experience through communication, so a relatively balanced puzzle difficulty is crucial, which requires constant testing.”
This is also what the official has always pointed out, the original intention of developing this game: two people happily solve puzzles together.
Overall, this is a solid puzzle game that two new puzzle players can enjoy together. If the old players lower their expectations a little, they can also use 30 yuan to get about an hour and a half of happiness with friends or lovers. What’s more, its quality itself is not that low.
If you still feel that you can start after reading this review, then it is recommended to buy it now, it is still a half price discount, which is very cost-effective!
Finally, let’s point out the big cake that the official mentioned before, which may be forgotten by many people – they will have another game this year. From the split-screen perspective of “White Door”, offline ARG puzzle solving all over the world to this two-player and 3D, Rusty Lake is constantly jumping out of its comfort zone and the player’s adaptation zone, playing new tricks in puzzle solving. In any case, after playing “The Past Within”, I look forward to the new game even more.
Game Name: “The Past Within” Online Platform: Steam/Android & iOS (Overseas) Price: The original price of Steam is 26 yuan, and the limited time discount price is 15.6 yuan. The discount ends on November 10. The mobile version costs $2.99 and supports cross-platform.
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