Thursday, October 10, 2013

IOS Spotlight #18: Type:Rider

Title: Type:Rider
Developer: Cosmografik
Platforms: IOS Universal, PC, Mac, Linux
Price: $2.99
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I've never seen level designs quite like those in Type:Rider. While the platforming and basic aesthetic may owe a lot to games like Limbo and NightSky, Cosmografik has developed a fantastic game with a style all its own.
You control a colon, which function as a pair of wheels, and travel through the timeline of typography from the earliest cave paintings to the computerized pixels of today. Each of the game's nine worlds is stylized around a font, from the origins of writing to Gothic and Garamond and beyond, with their own atmosphere and themed obstacles. Yet at the same time, the fonts and their history are the levels. You'll travel across the pages of the Gutenberg Bible, work your way through the innards of moving type and letter press, around and under the swampy world of italics, and more. Backgrounds are collages of information pertaining to the current font and you'll unlock pages that deliver short historic lessons about a font's usage, important figures of the time period, and other typographical elements. Each world is filled with collectibles to find, some harder to reach than others, which offers some replay value as well.
The game's controls are just as well designed as its overall aesthetic. I found the intuitive scheme the best, since it's simple and unobtrusive (hold either side to move in that direction, tap to jump) but the game also offers buttons and tilt controls. Type:Rider is a game crafted with style and atmosphere in every aspect, from the wonderful surreal landscapes of fonts to platform and puzzle through to the menus designed as a series of books to flip through. You can purchase Type:Rider now for $2.99 on IOS or get it soon on PC, Mac, and Linux. A demo of the first five levels is available to play here.

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