That’s because this is a music video as directed by Llamasoft, creators of tripped out, gamer-bewildering titles like Tempest 2000 and Space Giraffe. The song? Electronic musician Tiga’s “Mind Dimension.”
Jeff Minter’s Llamasoft is so very pleased with PC Gamer UK’s 92% review of the PC version of Space Giraffe that they’ve spilled the beans on the release date for their next title, Gridrunner+++.
Llamasoft’s Space Giraffe is, shall we say, one of the more critically divisive Xbox LIVE titles. Its brand of rock-hard psychedelic blasting and crazed art direction splitting gamers into love and hate camps more effectively than Marmite sushi.
When the pricing was announced (both times) for Xbox Live Arcade puzzle-platformer Braid, the vocally frugal gamer crowd bemoaned the higher than average cost. Too bad, really, as it’s one of the best XBLA titles I’ve ever played. Still, there are folks who can’t get past the 1200 MS Points pricing — that makes it one of the more expensive downloadable games, but still cheaper than Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness.
It’s been a while since the Space Giraffe kerfluffle where Yak Minter threw a hissy fit in his blog regarding poor scores given to the XBLA psychedelic shooter (and the point where it was compared to Joyce’s Ulysses, but I came across an interesting piece recently that talked about Space Giraffe in reference to (wait for it) a piece of literary theory known as ‘authorial intent.’ The post-structuralist conception is (at least in part) that the critic’s will and opinion always supercedes that of the author. What does this have to do with Space Giraffe? Well, it’s one way to look at why there was such heated discussion over Space Giraffe:
Fan of all things hairy, bearded and woolen, Jeff Minter, dropped word on his LiveJournal today on the follow up to the loved/hated Space Giraffe for Xbox Live Arcade. Llamasoft’s Gridrunner++ is currently in the redesign process for XBLA which will undergo a 3D transformation and will be “a much more involved game than the PC-only predecessor”.
For those unfamiliar with Gridrunner++, demos for the PC and Mac are currently available at Llamasoft. For those who can’t be bothered with the half-dozen clicks required to run it, the game is a “twitch gaming shoot ‘em up” featuring “glorious, retina scorching, psychedelic themed parallax scrolling levels.” It sounds like Robotron. It’s fun. Go play it.
iPod touchness [Jeff Minter's LiveJournal] More »
I’ll be honest. I haven’t played Space Giraffe, because my Xbox 360 is still in the intensive care unit. (Have you? You like it?) Paper mag Official Xbox Magazine didn’t dig the game much at all, giving it a 2/10. Over at Something Awful, Space Giraffe creator and head yak Jeff Minter called the review “the most extraordinary example of egregious fuckwittery” he’s ever seen. Right or wrong, the magazine is certainly entitled to its opinion! Just as Minter is entitled to make t-shirts lampooning that review. They’re available for purchase, too. Buy one if you like. Wear it, too.
Fuckwittery. Gotta remember that one. Funny. Minter Makes Shirt [YakYak] More »
Jeff Minter and Llamasoft’s Space Giraffe is currently bugging out the brains of some ten thousand-plus Xbox Live Arcade gamers, beggaring comparisons that range from Joyce’s Ulysses to Minter’s own Tempest 2000. But in a LiveJournal appropriate lamentation on the need to get away from it all, Minter says his experience dealing with the XBLA re-approval process—Space Giraffe’s got some bugs, you see—is akin to a “massive, spirit-crushing inertia.”
Poor Jeff. Lay off him already, Giraffe haters! If you love Space Giraffe, though, show Minter some love. Maybe a nice fruit basket or hand knit yak hair sweater would cheer him up.
Via GameSetWatch comes an musing on Space Giraffe, Yak Minter’s psychedelic shooter that people seem to either love or hate. The author is Jonathan Blow, the guy behind Braid, and he says you either get Space Giraffe (and love it), or you don’t (and hate it, giving it 2/10 when you write your review). This game is about expanding your perception. It demands that you learn to see. Most of the reviewers who gave the game low scores, I claim, were too closed-minded; they weren’t receptive to this kind of teaching, which the game is obviously telling you it wants to do, if you are quiet enough and listen.
