Phase Shift

Overall★★★★★★★★★★3.69
Fun★★★★★★★★★★3.63
Innovation★★★★★★★★★★3.51
Theme★★★★★★★★★★3.54
Graphics★★★★★★★★★★3.18
Audio★★★★★★★★★★3.40
Humor★★★★★★★★★★2.47
Mood★★★★★★★★★★3.53
Coolness★★★★★★★★★★67%
Try to escape the city where while avoiding the blast wave! You can shift between two dimensions, each with a different set of buildings, to avoid obstacles.

Use the arrow keys to move and the spacebar to shift between dimensions. Press escape to quit!

There are four levels of ascending difficulty. (You can keep playing past level 4 but the difficulty won't increase further.)

Written in C++ using DirectX 11 and FMOD. "Graphics" are mostly procedural with a little help from Photoshop. Music and sound made with Ableton Live and Audition.

Compatibility notes:
- Requires Windows 7 or 8.
- The game runs in a 1280x720 window. If your screen resolution is lower than that--first of all, greetings, time traveler from the 90s! Second, the game won't fit your screen. Sorry!

screenshot

Comments21

Piscythe25 Aug 2014, 03:41
I saw this in the blog, but reached it through the rating system. The game did a very good job of creating a constant feeling of danger and I loved the dimension-warping mechanics, but things often felt random - I would get stuck with no time to find a way out.
DoobieDoctor5000
DoobieDoctor500025 Aug 2014, 04:00
"Critical Error: Unable to create pixel shader 'effects/mapfx.efx'"

:(

Not rating this game due to it being unplayable for me.
otresnjak
otresnjakauthor25 Aug 2014, 14:24
Anyone who's having trouble running this, I'd be interested to know what your Windows version and video hardware are. :)
SpringPowered25 Aug 2014, 19:37
It was fun, hard, and a bit random. I liked it :)
SenorDiablo
SenorDiablo25 Aug 2014, 19:38
Nice atmosphere and easy to learn mechanics. Fantastic audio
rjhelms26 Aug 2014, 04:07
Interesting take on the theme. Great visual and musical style.

It'd be a bit more accessible if you didn't start at the beginning each time you got destroyed.
JordanFitz26 Aug 2014, 04:21
This game is really cool looking.
Docjekyll
Docjekyll26 Aug 2014, 05:02
I had a lot of fun with this. It's a simple gameplay mechanic, but well executed. Bonus points for procedural level generation!
RFMTeam26 Aug 2014, 16:57
Really tense, the plane shifting is hard to pull of correctly but when you pull it right and escape it feels great
KeyMaster
KeyMaster27 Aug 2014, 19:18
Found this because we chose the same name for our games (and the basic mechanic is kinda similar as well :D) Really cool game, I liked the minimalistic graphics and gameplay. Music was also quite nice, however the loop was a bit too harsh. Really nice entry!
Canyon28 Aug 2014, 11:07
I couldn't finish level 3 but I thought this was great. I would stay and play this all night if I wasn't on a rating mission.

I loved the music too.
dickpoelen
dickpoelen28 Aug 2014, 11:16
Cool. I love how smooth it feels!
Dissiden7
Dissiden728 Aug 2014, 22:43
Very interesting concept and nicely executed. Played the game for a fair bit.

My only criticism is that the level generation felt too arbitrary. I could get a level 2 that I could just walk forward and or I could get one where I'd get blocked by both dimensions in a big area.
43iscoding
43iscoding28 Aug 2014, 22:53
Game feels very pleasing! Graphics/colors/music is neat
Posva
Posva29 Aug 2014, 17:45
I like the concept and the game is fun. Good job!
DoobieDoctor5000
DoobieDoctor500031 Aug 2014, 03:39
otresnjak - I'm on Windows 7, using a Toshiba C655 laptop.
jprogman
jprogman31 Aug 2014, 09:21
Interesting concept, but it mainly relies on luck. Sometimes you can clear a round with no problem, but the majority of times have rounds that felt impossible to clear. The dimension changing bit is pretty cool, but there needs to be some way to generate the levels accordingly.

FYI, it's rather unfriendly to have no way to readjust the game's window resolution, especially since it's quite higher than average. Be courteous, even for those from the 90s!
ericdpitts2 Sep 2014, 12:16
Really awesome idea, I liked it a lot. The shifting mechanic was cool, really well done!
Tosic11 Sep 2014, 19:20
Oh my god, this is so awesome I love the graphics the sounds, the idea, amazing!
Teesquared
Teesquared15 Sep 2014, 08:54
Great game. Nice arcade feel. It's very challenging but it keeps you playing. The level layout seemed random and the pace is really fast. The mood makes you feel super stressed. Good job.
Rehacked15 Sep 2014, 09:42
Goodjob on this.

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