Mass Attack, by kbaum games, is an enjoyable action puzzle game based on the very simple idea of balancing weights on a scale. Each of the 7 increasingly more difficult levels have 4 parts that must be balanced within the maximum difference allowed to advance. Just press the mouse button to create a counter balance weight. The longer you hold down the mouse the larger the weight that is created. Mass Attack is a good distraction and worth a few minutes of your time.
If you enjoy balancing weights, you might also enjoy Sean Hawkes' Weight game from our very first game design competition.
Cheers to Drondh and Gregory for suggesting this one. =)
Ooops. I seem to have found a bug.
On level 4 4/4 I should have only had 2 weights. just as it was calculating whether I'd passed on not, I clicked again (force of habit) dropped another weight which shouldn't have existed, I got a cymbal clash to signify that I had balanced the sides exactly, but then it was all locked up and I was stuck :o(
Tried it... not very fun. Although I haven't beaten level 2, it looks like it might be identical to level 1 but with a tighter boundary value. The things I don't like about it are:
1: It's not forgiving. You just click, and release when you think it's 'big enough'. Which means you have less time to determine if it's the size you really want it to be. A better implementation would allow people to fine tune the size a bit more - slow down the ball growth, or allow it to grow and shrink. Sure, I could have gotten better at judging and creating balls if I had spent more time on it, but:
2: It's repetitive. The fact that it has those numbers also makes it easy in a way, if you can consistently create balls of size X00. But otherwise, the whole game is about making sure that the ball you create is of the right size. And while I'm sure the game will introduce more innovations at the higher levels, I think it'll be more of the same.
Namely, balance 4 trays instead of 2. Yuck. But mostly I don't like it because:
3: There's no real thinking involved. Just give the numbers a quick glance, and it removes even the need to determine how large the balls are. I suspect this is another feature at later levels - the fact that they remove the numbers, forcing you to judge the size of the ball you'll be needing. But the problem still is that the game boils down to clicking and holding until you think you've got the right size ball.
Those are my opinions, and your mileage may vary.
After writing this, I decided that if I was going to bash this so much in a review, I might as well play it more to see if it does get better in some way. Level 4. 2 chances to make it within range 5. Yeah... boring, repetitive. Level 5. 2 weights within range 1. At this point I gave up. Level 6 and 7 are probably one weight within range 5 and 1, respectively.
This has THE best music i have heard in a game for a while. As for the game play. Meh. Not much to it sadly which is a shame as it's nice to get right back to basics. I'll give it a 'melon' on my fruit scale (highest being strawberry, lowest being fig.
Though all-around repetitive, the game was a lot more addicting than I thought it would be.
But the biggest thing I have a problem with on the page is Rick's fruit scale. Figs are delicious!
Strange. After reading the previous comments I feel weird saying I think I found my new office Zen game. (Previous Zen games for me were Text Twist, Wone, & Brick Break.)
This is a purely visual weight game which really doesn't kick into the 'tough' category till level 6. I'm more into classical music so I'm glad the mute option is there. Too bad it has so few levels. If they were to create a similar game using other polygonal shapes & more balance beams they could really take off, sit back & watch as a bunch of clone wanna-be's create similar games to theirs.
I think it's because of sites like Jay Is Games that many indy & pro developers are beginning to make mute/save progress/graphic quality controls available to all free game players.
Great concept, Kbaum! :o)
I love the music in this game.
This music is awesome. I'm not sure that it fits the atmosphere of the game, though. I feel like it wants to be in some sort of nifty futuristic platformer. If music could want anything, that is. At any rate, the gameplay gets dull pretty fast. I stuck around until level five, when I finally decided I'd had enough of the music for now. It needs more variety, not just "do the same thing over and over with increasing accuracy". It's also not particularly clear how much a unit is. But that music! I love it!
I enjoyed it, too, Corona, and the comments just serve to underscore that, as game players, we all have different expectations about what we look for in a game.
Granted, this game is based on a very simple idea, and it doesn't stray much from that formula, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. :)
love the music =)
The music - nice.
The game - brainless, repetitive and boring. The weights grow too fast to have any reasonable amount of control over them, and it's all pure guesswork anyway. The game is cakewalk until level 5, which is hard, and after that it becomes near impossible.
Still, it WAS kinda fun for 5 minutes or so.
I think that to say this game is a flop purely because it is repetitive is being a little unfair to the thinking that has obviously gone into making it. Yes, it is quite difficult - the balls do grow very quickly, but if it wasn't a challenge then it wouldn't really be worth playing.
I really like the combination of lightning maths quiz and reaction test - as the levels started to get harder I found myself using print screen just so's I could add up the ball values correctly!
Although the balls do expand very rapidly it isn't too quick to make size selection completely arbitary, and the fact that you can't add high scores until you've completed the game is a nice feature to keep a player hooked.
As a hint to the weighting, each unit has a value of approximately 20, although the rounding means that a mass difference of 21 will be given a weighting difference of 2.
The game IS repetitive, but it has the ability to make you keep coming back to try to finish that level. And, of course, there is the music to entertain you while you pull your hair out because your first ball was too big....but I digress.
A lot of fun and a fine casual game. It would have been good entry in the last competition.
Very polished game. As others have said, the music is great. After playing level 5 about 30 times I gave up.
Cherry or Pineapple should be at the top of the fruit scale. Though fig definitely deserves to be at the bottom.
As far as the game, it was fun, until I realized all the levels are basically the same thing. I was hoping for multiple scales to come into play.
I like the music, I think it's somehow very fitting with the concept of constantly trying to balance things just right.
I'd just like to mention that you can actually practice creating weights to get a feel for how long it takes to grow the correct sizes, by pressing the mouse button underneath the scales. Fortunately, the game doesn't penalize you for dropping weights off the bottom of the screen, so you can do it as many times as you like.
Granted, it doesn't tell you how heavy your weights are when you drop them off the screen, but it might take the pressure off a little when you know you can play with the weights' sizes before committing yourself to dropping one on the scales.
I found this game quite intuitive. About half way through Level 2 I was getting a lot of the puzzles spot on with my first weight. But I gave up at Level 5 as the game play got a little repetitive.
HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
Thanks to Jay and the gang for this awesome site!
I visit everyday :)
I found a bug regarding the sound effects/music, at least on my machine. I eventually got tired of the the music, so I muted the game. However, a while later I tried re-enabling them, as I was missing the nice "gong" when the scales balanced. Unfortunately, it seems that once muted, the sound cannot be unmuted. The bouncing "boings" still can be heard at the main menu, but not in the game itself, and the music never returns at all.
Agh! I just found out that actually, it /does/ penalize you if you drop them below the scales... luckily I was able to salvage the level all the same, but still. (:
I liked the gameplay and the music. I admit I found myself wishing there was more... variation, but all in all, it was fun.
Great game, but there's a glitch to be fixed.
If you click to start creating your ball while the starting weights are falling, but just before they hit the scale: time freezes and you can use your own ball to position the other balls into the center of the screen. Then let go and watch them fall out of site. Now the player can release tiny weights on the scale and pass through with ease.
Denzel:
Really? It penalized you for dropping weights below the scales? I've tried many times, but as long as I dropped the weight sufficiently out of reach of the scales, it wouldn't end the stage until I'd dropped the required number of weights on the scales. o.O Did you do anything specific when you got penalized?
I apologize if my observations were inaccurate. I'm glad to hear you still salvaged the level!
I need to know who made the music for this game. This is my new favorite song. I would buy the album!
I enjoyed this game very much, and I do like a good challenge now and then. Although at one point, I was just fiddling around with it, and wanted to see how large the ball would grow!
It was enjoyable diverting (like Minesweeper) for the first few levels. After 10 attempts at level 7, the controls defeated me. If I only have one shot *and* the margin of error is 2 (e.g. a 400 and a 441 don't balance), there's no way for me to be accurate enough to get 4 in a row (or frankly even 2 in a row) except by luck.
Wahoo! Finally beat it! Level 7 (even level 6) were way too hard. Especially because one small screw up on stage 4 means you have to start all over again.
It would be nice to know what the scores are based on because I had a score of 1346, and left the game on all night and day because I needed to break up the monotony and frustration, so I'm wondering if time was factored in to the score.
I think this game could use a save feature or at least level codes; would be offering a better interface with those.
most amazing music.
:)
I'm completely addicted, the music is awesome!, and I'm obsessed with hearing the gong of perfection!
the game is cool, but the music is awesome... does anybody know the name of the song and who it's by?
While fun, it also annoys me in a couple of ways.
1: I haven't found out how the weight of a ball is calculated from its diameter. Is it proportional to the square (size of disc on screen) or cube (volumne of real ball)? I started to have a hunch for the size to use, and I'm guessing I should go by the size of the visible disc.
2: The numbers that appear over the ball and the number shown at the end of a round appears to have no relation. What are those numbers?
3: If the game lags, which does happen, you fail. At least I automatically release the button when it appears nothing is happening, and that means dropping a very small ball. Since timing is everything in this game (there really is nothing else)
Still, I played it through to the end. I does have some charm.
/L
OMG! I beat levels 1-4 pretty quickly, but level 5 was really hard. Strangely, level 6 was mildly easier... And level 7... Is FRICKIN' IMPOSSIBLE!!! If anyone has tips. Thank you. Great game, though. The sound track is also really good.
The artist is Honeycut, the name of the song is "Aluminum City" and the album is "The Day I Turned to Glass."
Hope that helps for the people interested!
Sweet Music Kept Me Playing Good Work :)
Great game
Keep Me informed on any more good games
Thank u much
what's the track called?
Maybe I'm crazy, but I enjoyed this game! And I think that the things people thought were BAD in the game were good! For example:
Quick growing ball size: I find that a good thing. If not for that, people would be complaining the game to be too slow! It adds a challenge, and thats what some overly-simple games need.
No way to adjust ball size: What would be the fun in that exactly? If that were possible, all you would have to do is remember the numbers above the ball, add them up, then adjust your ball to that number.
Repetitive: Yes, but most games are. It's a relatively simple game.
No thought involved: It's partially a skill based a game. When playing, say, one of those "run around and collect the stars" kind of games, do you really use more thought than this game?
And I agree: good music. The game could do with some polishing up - meaning more variations (#of scales, shapes instead of balls - maybe even a way to move the balls around and just let them roll around. It's things like these that make games such as the Fancy Pants Adventures more fun).
I passed all seven levels my first try in under 10 minutes with a score of 96. Go figure. No, I don't want a cookie.
How could i have possibly missed this review??? I just met this game elsewhere and wanted to suggest it - luck I remembered to check it first... But in Oct 2007 I was a regular visitor here, how the hell did i miss this one then??? I must be blind (would explain my sciores in many games...).
Love the music! (The game is fun too...)
Update