Game Diplomat

Game Diplomat


Dustforce

September 21, 2016

Platformers stress me out. My reflexes aren’t great, and the genre famously punishes players like me who can’t execute fast movements.
But Dustforce is different.
Its calming music, smooth gameplay, and gentle themes and art are relaxing. You’re always moving forward, even when facing obstacles or at a slow pace. It’s a clever game that finds more interesting and less frustrating ways to challenge you.
Dustforce is meditative, beautiful, and challenging — everything I love in my games.
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Watch Me Play It (Badly)

Watch an Incredible Speedrun (Not Me)
(Skip to 1:48:00 for start of speedrun)

How It Works

* The world needs to be cleaned up, and you’re going to combine some sweet moves with some sweet grooves to make it happen.
* Pick from a cast of characters with different cleaning tools (broom, vacuum, pom poms, etc.) that give slight variations in movement and playstyles.
* Run through levels, sliding down hills, leaping up ledges, and performing gravity-defying acrobatics to sweep away every surface/animal that’s covered in leaves.
* As you combo clean-ups, you charge up a super ability that mass-cleans an entire area (and useful for getting out of tight situations).
* At the end of the level, you’re given a score and can see how other players performed. This is when you figure out if you’re the sort of person that’s content with what you got and moves on, or if you’re the kind of person that begins obsessively trying to achieve a perfect score and shorter time than the people on the leaderboard.
* Unlock levels by scoring well on the ones you have access to, and then find them by exploring the overworld that functions as the map between levels.

Why You Should Play It

* Put those dirty leaves in their place and show them you’re the broom master!
* The music, visuals, and fluid movements make the experience soothing, almost like a music rhythm game.
* There are plenty of low-difficulty levels for simpletons like myself to play with and enjoy, but the hardest levels are designed for people with esports-levels of dexterity.
* Playthroughs are fun, uninterrupted by the usual bash-your-head-til-you-succeed failure points that plague the genre. Here, the challenge is in replaying levels to find ways to be more efficient/complete in your cleaning. It’s an important change that keeps me sane and smiling.
* You can watch anyone’s playthrough of a level, to see how they did so well and learn some tricks (or just drool over their crazy skills)
* Lots of community tools and content, including hundreds of custom maps!
* The player-made maps are high quality and often quite clever, such as a version of the game’s beginner map rotated 90 degrees so it’s entirely vertical.
* I’m a happier person when I play Dustforce, and that’s the highest calling I have for my games.
* All of the characters have little quirks that make them fun to tinker with on different maps, and find out which fits your playstyle best.
* It will trick small children into believing that cleaning is fun. Quick, brainwash them before it’s too late!

Get It Now!

* Costs $10
* Direct from developers (in...