Why Eufloria? What made you buy it?

[Ytaker]

I was skimming through the special offers on steam. It was rather a slow day, nothing happened. So, I clicked on it. Ooh, cool. " It's good and you should buy it." Nice review. Simple and to the point. The metacritic 63 was a bit low, and I normally don't buy games under 80. I went online, googled Eufloria.

http://www.destructoid.com/review-eufloria-152969.phtml

Indie game, nice, I like indie.

" streamlined and minimalist interface" pretty cool, I like simple control schemes.

Main flaw "The enemy AI is so docile for about 80% of the campaign mode that, more often than not, you can beat every single level simply by building a few Dyson trees "... a bit slow, I can win it easier. Well, that's a feature, thought I. Makes it relaxing and nice to play through, I won't be stressed out of my mind trying to beat it. No really negative reviews.

So I bought it. And it was good.

What's your story?

[andermoo]

I played with the demo and very much like it. I didn't buy it yet, because it's for Windows only. I would rather like to play it on my iPad so I can sit down on the sofa or play it in bed at night.

I agree that the relaxing effect, the soothing music and overall beautiful style is an essential value also for me.

[Bonobo]

I can’t quite remember how I stumbled over Dyson, sometime in last year’s summer … I have played flOw before, and ]url=tqworld.com/]tranquility[/url] and similar games, so maybe I have searched for something the like. I have immediately enjoyed Dyson, and I still enjoy playing Eufloria, thanks also to the many free user-made levels which have expanded the original gameplay quite some and which obviously support Eufloria’s ongoing evolution.

As soon as Eufloria was purchaseable, I cashed out the money, IIRC I even pre-ordered. It’s not really a lot of money, so it was an easy decision.

As to why exactly I enjoy Eufloria … I think I can’t really tell. I even turn down its music, leaving only asteroid and seedling noise on, and watch TV beside it in a small floating window while I play, and very often I use the dev mode acceleration (blame ADD and I don’t use Ritalin). There certainly is something meditative and relaxing about Eufloria ... the fuzzy movements, the fuzzy trees, all following certain rules, but not too strictly, things happening in an organic manner; when large streams of seedlings move towards a common goal, they remind me of fast-motion films of slime moulds converging toward the place where they meet and prepare for turning into millions of spores …

Now, if only I knew how to prevent chronical RSI :-S

<edit>

Oh, I also mentioned it in the other thread: I play Eufloria w/ Parallels Desktop in a Vista Business virtual machine, no problems with that (other than a few known problems  w/ Eufloria which should be repaired soon).

</edit>

[Widget]

I bought it because I'd been following it since the PG Compo on tigsource and I'd had endless hours of fun by the time the first commercial version hit. The guys deserved the money a few times over for what I'd already played, regardless of where it went from there 

[Bonobo]

[..] I'd had endless hours of fun by the time the first commercial version hit. The guys deserved the money a few times over for what I'd already played, regardless of where it went from there 

Yeah, that’s how it felt for me, too.

[dfenwick]

I bought it for a few obscure reasons, ones that aren't often used:

-  The music is somewhat intoxicating
-  The art, while simple, is attractive and well done
-  It's relaxing - some folks might want all action all the time with extremely difficult levels.  While I like a challenge, I also enjoyed the puzzle factor built into the game
-  Finally (and this is important) they built this game on their own dime and I appreciated all the hard work they did

While the AI can be somewhat flawed and the gameplay somewhat zergish, overall the game is an extremely nice change of pace from other games.  Personally I see Eufloria as a launchpad for a much richer game.  The devs obviously have other things on their plate right now, but with a few additions and changes (many of which I and others have posted about) there are so many directions the game can go.  Right now it's a pretty simplistic realtime strategy game.  However, they have a core in place and with that core there are just so many directions they can go.  New trees, different seeds, improved AI, better defense trees, etc.

If they want to make it harder, they can do some relatively simple changes to do so.  Things that come to mind are:  Limit the number of seeds that can orbit an asteroid, limit the number of seeds you can attack an enemy asteroid with, remove lasers, remove super seeds, have modes where only dyson trees are available.  Or modes where you're limited on the number of dyson trees you can create.  The latter 2 things I believe can already be done via the LUA interface.

In summary, the game was simply fun to play.  It was $20.  It was worth every penny I spent on it.

[Pilchard123]

They can all be done, I think, apart from the lasers. Unless you mean lasermines, then they definitely can all be done.

[bryseron]

I was hooked through a steam demo 5 or 6 weeks ago, it floated onto an advert and the simple yet interesting look interested me.  I was also intrigued by maybe the best review of all time(assuming it wasn't paid for):  "IT IS GOOD, YOU SHOULD BUY IT."   wtf?  haha!
My 1 sentence review would have been -  Best game ever about impregnating things with seedlings. 
At least that would have turned some heads, I don't know anybody who's ever heard of this game.
 
Since then, I've beaten both the easy and dark matter modes, and all of the arena challenges.  But seedin a, some of these user maps are insanely hard.  I know that was the whole point, but when I'm struggling to hold onto my first asteroid after 4 minutes I get the feeling the creator was trying to tell me I totally suck at the game.  Which is of course insulting and inspiring at the same time.

But yeah, great game.  I've been telling people who might be interested, but my accurate descriptions don't do the game justice.

[blueskirt]

For me it was back when it was still called Dyson, when the very first demo was covered by indie news outlets, the demo with just the asteroid belt. Months later I saw an updated version of the demo was released and played it, version 1.08, the one with 5 levels and the crazy aggressive AI, in the asteroid belt level, I remember that by the time I had conquered half of the map, the AI that started on the opposite side of the map had conquered the other half, it was such an epic battle, it was after that mission that I knew this game was a must buy.

Then version 1.20 came and AI seemed different, weaker, in the asteroid belt level enemies barely conquered more than 3 asteroids, but I was still giving the commercial version a chance since some fan levels were as frantic as that epic battle I had the pleasure to play in v1.08.

And I don't regret it since an epic battle, one that dwarfed just every other battles I had in any version of that game, happened in the Dark Matter version of Colliding Worlds, where I screwed up 10 minutes from the start, lost tons of seedlings, let the enemies gain the edge. After 25 minutes I was back to 4 asteroids, each of the four enemies that surrounded me had much more, a part of me was willing to restart the mission from scratch, a bigger part of me knew if I did that this humiliating defeat would stains my gaming record for the rest of my life. I didn't give up, it took me more than 2 hours, partly because I helped my 4 enemies when they were attacked because I wanted that it was me and nobody else who'd deliver them the death blow, but I did it, and it was great.

[kerrpe]

I can give a different opinion.

I was looking for an involved game which didn't include soldiers, dragons, or insane asylums (good luck!)
Maybe because I'm female I tire of those things pretty quickly.

I've been "gaming" since the days of Zork, but find little to grab my attention any more. Eufloria is brilliant. Many of the same concepts with an awesome evolutionary "scientific" bent that's no more violent than chess. I, too, appreciate all the hard work that went into it.

I'd be interested in knowing what games other eufloria fans are into - I might find something else.

[Pilchard123]

I'd be interested in knowing what games other eufloria fans are into - I might find something else.

Portal. Though "asylum" may be usable there, too.

[kerrpe]

Portal. Though "asylum" may be usable there, too.
[/quote]

No, I quite like Portal too. That's "asylum light".
I've got a few dragon, war and asylum games. I just don't need 1000 variations! 

[Sniped50]

I like Portal too...

Anyway, back to the original question... My dad got me hooked on Dyson. He apparently came across it on the internet, and when I saw it, he got me a copy. I've been following it ever since, all the way through the versions and past the point when it re-emerged as Eufloria. Ahhh...

Good times!

[Mr Frank]

I came across Dyson on the forums for another game I ran into.  I liked Dyson and liked how the development team paid attention to the forums, and I figured the extra $20 would make it more likely that the bugs would get fixed.  Of course then I had to wait quite some time before it was un-seeded enough to run on my computer, but whatever.  It works and it's a good little game.

[Widget]

I PM'd this to kerrpe since I felt a bit uncomfortable linking to someone else's games here but they're all freeware or with substantial demos so hopefully it's okay. Maybe someone else would be interested in some more peaceful, non-violent games.

I thought it might be a bit cheeky to use a Eufloria praise thread to link to another developer's work but Nicklas "Nifflas" Nygren's games sound like something you might enjoy. He's created a great selection of platform games in which your character is totally non-violent; there are enemies that can kill you but they're treated as obstacles rather than cannon-fodder. Beautiful ambient soundtracks aswell, they're very relaxing most of the time.

Knytt, Knytt Stories and Within a Deep Forest are all free to play and while Saira's commercial it has a very generous demo. FiNCK is pseudo-commercial (the full game is free but you can buy some extra stuff) but it's in a very different style to his other games, being closer to Super Mario Brothers and Lyle in Cube Sector, so probably not the best place to start.

If you enjoy playing Knytt Stories there's a huge library of fan-made levels aswell, ranging from totally safe, pure exploration levels (tagged as [Environmental]) to absurdly challenging platforming, with a variety of challenges, puzzles and mazes in-between.

[Alex]

I love Nicklas. Knytt was a beautiful experience for me, and I absolutely loved WADF. I haven't been so impressed since then though - Saira and Night Game didn't set me on fire and I couldn't even get down with Knytt Stories very easily.

[Widget]

I'm glad I wasn't stepping on too many toes  
I think Knytt had an elegance of design that Knytt Stories diluted somewhat with all the extra features, and WaDF was such a breath of fresh air it's a lot to live up to. I like them all very much but if you'd said there were only two that really worked for you those would've been my guesses.

[Rudolf]

As a big fan of Nifflas feel free to promote his work all the time on this forum. :-D
In fact, many indies deserve our love!

[Nachadept]

For starters the simple and yet elegant style. From the graphics to the gameplay the game is pleasant and enjoyable.
I think that the whole concept of tipping the scales is just too much fun. Great game and thanks!

[Aino]

What made me buy it was that I played the demo, then I looked at the map and began to change some values... Then I saw how much you can do with this game, suddenly I was dying to get it xD

[ChakraBsharp]

I bought this game for one reason only. Because my good friend Brian Grainger made the entire soundtrack for this game. After paying through the first few levels, I fell in love with the game. This game so addicting and has an awesome score to play along with. Very fitting with he theme of it all. That being said. If you enjoyed the music, I would highly recommend Milieu, Coppice Halifax and Brian Grainger. all music by the creator of the soundtrack. 

[themute88]

I played the demo awhile back and saw it on my dl list and played it again.  I learned that simple + complex = eufloria. 

[sillytuna]

Simple + Complex - yes indeed!!!

[Rudolf]

Yeah, it has been fascinating to try to make the game simple in mechanics and concepts, yet allow for a deep level of complexity and strategy in gameplay. A fun challenge and it has taught me A LOT of new things about game design.