ASCIIpOrtal Has Been Released

maclizard writes "After much waiting, ASCIIpOrtal has now been released. Joe Larson, the man behind the game, has made sure to provide numerous mirrors so as to avoid the Slashdot effect that killed his site several months ago. An interview with Larson (part two here) is available as well."

Re:Wait.

[MozeeToby]

But you missed why it was important enough to warrant being a frontpage Slashdot article. It it pretty sweet, but that really shouldn't be enough to warrant a front page article. I thought the important thing was that the game is a demonstration that good games are about original gameplay ideas and not about graphics. Before ASCIIpOrtal came along, it would have been easy to argue that the game play mechanics of portal would have been impossible or at least diminished without 3D graphics; now it is much more difficult to make that argument.

Re:Wait.

[eln]

Actually, if that demo is indicative of the game as a whole, then it makes a very good argument as to why the 3D graphics were so vital to the original portal game. The original portal is far more playable, and its 3D nature allows for far more interesting puzzles. The text game is, while an interesting exercise in what's possible with antiquated graphics, appears to be a far inferior game. Just the way it handles moving the scenery around while keeping the player upright would give me a headache in about 10 seconds.

Re:Wait.

[djdavetrouble]

Wrong, ASCII versions of anything usually make the front page, it is a longstanding nerd favorite.

Maybe

[cstdenis]

the server wouldn't be /.ed if the summery had bothered to include links to the mentioned mirrors.

Bittorrent

[kenp2002]

I am still amazed that we find it necessary to have 50 mirros of something when a single bit torrent link would suffice...

Re:Wait.

[VGPowerlord]

Before ASCIIpOrtal came along, it would have been easy to argue that the game play mechanics of portal would have been impossible or at least diminished without 3D graphics; now it is much more difficult to make that argument.

No, actually, Portal: The Flash Version [wecreatestuff.com] made that point nearly two years ago (the copy on Newgrounds has a submission date on it of October 9, 2007).