Tri-achnid… and Manhugs

By: Derek Yu

On: March 23rd, 2007

I had the privilege of getting a personal demo of Tri-achnid from one of its creators, Edmund McMillen (the other being the programmer, Florian Himsl). In this game, you control a tri-achnid, as he searches for his brothers.

The atmosphere in this game is phenomenal. The graphics, music, and sound work together wonderfully to bring the three-legged protagonist and his world to life. You start caring for this critter almost immediately. It’s hard to forget when he first grabs his egg sac and lets out a little cooing sound. And when he slams into a rock too hard, you feel palpably hurt for him.

The thing that makes this game difficult to get into (and probably the reason why it didn’t qualify for IGF this year) is that it is hard to control. Watching Edmund play is great, because he can really get around and do some cool stuff, but for me it can be frustrating to even get from point A to point B. There are moments where the legs just don’t move as quickly as you’d like and it’s easy to get stuck… darn.

But regardless, I find Tri-achnid to be a real wumpus of a game that should definitely have made it into IGF this year.

Speaking of which, check the extended for some totally (not) poignant IGF reflections:

Funny thing about running a website where you “review” games and sometimes punch them around a bit: you end up meeting the people who’s games you’ve panned. Case in point: the aforementioned Sir Edmund McMillen! As you may recall, I didn’t have a, well, favorable reaction to his casual game Blast Miner when it first came out. I still don’t really love it, although I must admit, the new Puzzle Mode is a lot of fun!

But yeah, wouldn’t you know it… this guy has a kiosk set up a few feet away from us at the IGF section! Awwwkward! Well, at least it could have been, if Edmund wasn’t such a freakin’ great guy. He and his (wonderful, hilarious) wife Danielle gave me a well-deserved ribbing (more like a nut-punching) for my post, but we got along pretty famously after that. In short, by Friday’s end I decided that I basically love him. Is that gross? I don’t know, there’s something about GDC, especially amongst the indies… there is just so much manlove and passion for games going around, it’s insane. I’ve never been more proud to be a part of this community.

I even got to talk to Russ Carroll, who Kenta Cho knows I have been making fun of Game Tunnel since the moment I took over the site. Also a great guy. Can’t say I like GT much more than I did before, but I do have to give Russ his due respect for having the kind of passion that he does for his family and his work.

So, in short, manhugs all around! Well, except for that old bastard at the Arcane Legions kiosk next to us. If you want us to turn down the music from our game you can ask us nicely. Your game looked nice… why did you have to be such a dick?

But yeah, manhugs for everyone else!