wow. it's good game.
but somewhat hard.

I don't find G:plus a successful experiment; it has obstacles and targets like a circuit racing game but the action is far too fast and the controls too unwieldy to dodge and collect powerups effectively.

The design goes against the grain of the rotational symmetry of the playfield that should be the main novelty; the player is forced by the craft's movement speed to think and operate in terms of the whole circumference of a certain radius rather than of a particular position along it, but every feature (both enemies and pickups) breaks down the simmetry.

Wiser games with a circular simmetry make the perpendicular choice of emphasizing rays and angles, for example with a fixed cannon in the center that spins around: the novelty of wraparound movement is preserved, aiming in a particular direction is meaningful and the differences in playfield content along a ray are not frustrating like G:plus's alternating good and bad sectors along a circumference.

MOD: could you please update the download link to: ftp://ftp.untergrund.net/users/maw/gplus_fixed.rar
There one can find the latest version with some important changes to gameplay & code. Thank you!

Anonymous (post above): wow – that's what I call a comment. I totally understand your points of critique. The speed-issue should be moderated in the new version. But it still gets faster (with higher combos now), that's part of the challenge (and after a while I mastered the game at high speed, cause I had to play it a lot). I don't see that the enemies "break down the simmetry", except for the last ones (wich are designed to be harder), all other enemies move either along a fixed orbit or move from center to the outside. It's hard to explain, my english may be not accurate. Plus: I implemented the mix of both kinds of movement so that the challenge would get the player to think a bit "outside of the box".
Still, thank you for your criticism and have a good time! maw

It was entertaining to watch my brain trying to adapt to the circular movement. The newer version is definitely easier.

Some more variety in the powerups might make it a little more interesting, though maybe I just didn't get in far enough to see all of them.

I like the new version a lot less. Before, I could trade off risk and time. I might have been wary of entering the inner ring because I could afford to (have enough time) and knew the limits of my skill. Now, it's a pure-skill game: no fun at all. Glad I have my old copy. If you update it again, you might consider keeping both play styles available. And is there really only one bonus available now?

I like the old version a bit more as well (which I think you can still get from the Experimental Gameplay site).

Hi Marc-André,

Birne hat mich auf dein Spiel gebracht. Kannst du das auch für Linux kompilieren? Ich will es auch mal zocken ;)

Grüße, Gregor