PEGBRJE: I want to be a Triangle and Fugue
Greyscale 4 days.
I want to be a Triangle is an adventure game made by LeCroissantCyclope, a solo indie dev out of France. This was their first project made in Godot as a tester to see if they wanted to move forward, so let’s see how it turns out. Within, our hero Rector the Rectangle lives within Geoshape Prime and has a burning message for the Princess Triangie, but is shackled by a single problem; only triangles are allowed in the palace. How will he tell her now? Well, by changing his fundamental shape!
Players will explore this simple town in a style reminiscent of adventuring titles that lack combat and focus primarily on solving puzzles through item acquisition and understanding how they interact with their surroundings. Each item gets stored in the inventory, but only one is in the ‘quick item’ section — indicated at the top right — which will be utilized when conversing with strangers or interacting with objects. If the right item is present, a trigger can happen to cause the item to be useful, such as giving a package to someone or opening something else. If it is the wrong item, nothing will happen; thankfully, the game allows for the items to be cycled at the press of a button so no need to fumble around in menus. This sounds relatively simple, but thanks to a lack of upfront explanations at times it can be a tad tricky trying to figure out some of the items that need to be used (I’m mostly thinking about opening the phone booth, that took me a bit). This isn’t a slight against the game by any means, just that it can be deceptively vague about what exactly players should be doing in order to fulfill Rector’s goals.
Speaking of which, what truly carries this title is in the writing style and execution, especially Rector’s relationship with the mysterious Narrator. They go back and forth constantly, the narrator being much more sassy than Rector but both having their genuinely funny moments in their quirkiness. The Narrator continually points out Rector’s bizarre habits thanks to this being a video game and is completely self aware of the fact that they are both in a game, but keeps Rector oblivious to the entire ordeal. Other characters chime in with their own wit either through self-awareness or just sheer awkwardness depending on which fits the tone of the interaction. The lines are snappy and to the point, which keep with the consistent tone. There’s also the debate on the possibility of different underlying tones within, such as the need for Rector to alter his entire body to be something he ‘isn’t’ in order to meet with another person. It’s somewhat depressing at first, but there is also some discussion that offers the opposite viewpoint after Rector completes his transformation and visits his best friend. How players interpret the message given will be completely up to them, if they even decide to dig deep — after all, this isn’t necessarily meant to be a philosophical piece.
At under an hour of length, I want to be a Triangle is an adorable short story about one simply wanting to deliver a message. The dialogue is fun and engaging, the quests are all over the place and the characters themselves are all relatively enjoyable. It’s not trying to be something grand, rather an experiment by LeCroissantCyclope to see where they may take game development in the future. These types of games always reveal something interesting, and if you are a fan of simple games that want to tell a simple story of humor, this might be what you are looking for.
Fugue is a music-based puzzle game made by Shawn Pierce, a solo indie dev out of the United States with a knack for simple aesthetics and pencil drawing assets. In this title, players will be following a group of birds that are attempting to reach their home nest, only the way there requires crossing those that reside on a curious looking power line.
The rules of Fugue are simple; get the bird from the left of the power-line staff to the other where it’s bird nest resides. The only caveat is that the number on the bird must match the number of the nest when it arrives, which can be altered thanks to our feathered friends who are perched. These little avian creatures will have a number associated with them, and players can move them up and down the staff to alter their number; lowering goes to 1 before entering the negatives, and raising goes up to 12. When a bird flies over these birds, they gain the number that has been assigned to the bird, creating the core gameplay loop of addition through birds. To send a bird towards the nest is a simple button click, but the entire pattern needs to be set up prior or else the bird will be scratched and the player will need to restart.
Now if the musical symbolism of the staff and the cleff were completely beyond some, the musical notes that are played will definitely help. Not only do these birds rest on a staff of electrical power, but they also make tonal noises based on their location when a bird flies over them. The higher the bird, the higher the tone, and when the main bird flies over them the entire thing is played in sequence, repeated on a success to give a lovely melody. To add even more fun to the musical construction, certain birds have the ability to shift a tone up or down depending on where they are facing, as some birds are looking upwards and others are staring at the ground. Once a bird flies over them, they will play their note before shifting down a whole tone for the next bird to trigger their sound. Not only does this add complexity to the puzzle — shifting downwards causes the number associated to lower as well — but it also creates a fantastic sound as the piece changes instead of remaining static.
Fugue marries together the fun of addition-based puzzles with the beauty that is the relationship between math and Western music theory. One gets to create a cadence of notes that call and respond to each other while solving some fun puzzles because of the musical aesthetic. It’s essentially gamifying math with music which could be very handy for helping younger children understand music and math. For those of us older, however, it’s still a fantastic showing of puzzles with a flair for the musical, and if you love these simple styles of puzzle then this is definitely one to try out.
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