The established Flash developers at Dissolute Productions have finally released Epsilon, a casual portal-physics game that's been in production for 14 months. Originally, the developers planned its release to coincide with Valve's Portal, although it obviously stayed in development a bit longer than expected. Perhaps that's a good thing, because the result is a well-polished game with concepts paralleling the flash version of Portal, as well as other titles like Shift 2 and Cursor*10. Instead of being a simple portal manipulation game, Epsilon explores two other physical properties aside from spatial relativity; time and gravity.
Epsilon employs the same humorous test-subject theme that we've seen in Portal, Shift 2 and Falling Forever. Your job is to manipulate an orb to collect energy points and make it to the goal before time runs out. The story's a little thin compared to the heavy, theoretical physics-based theme of the game. However, the loading screen displays a brief summary of the real-life Large Hadron Collider experiment, perhaps offering the game as an homage to the research that's currently being done.
Epsilon features 35 levels across five modules (sections), not including a brief tutorial to help you get acquainted with your new wormhole-controlling dashboard. The first section is devoted to moving wormholes from place to place in order to guide your orb around, collecting energy points before you can exit the level via the goal portal. Each stage is a two-dimensional layout with open spaces and barriers. Wormholes can only catch the orb on edges of the level with an opening. The ball begins by following the traditional laws of physics, being subject to gravity and momentum. In later stages when things get a little more difficult, you'll find yourself madly bouncing the orb against walls and barriers to manipulate its trajectory with the wormholes.
Controls are simple: just use the mouse to click and grab the wormholes, allowing you to drag them around the edge of the screen. Pressing and holding [space] lets you suspend your orb in time, which serves two purposes. First, it lets you halt the action so that you can get portals in position before the orb reaches them. Secondly, it stops the level timer, giving you time to think about your next move. Since you're timed throughout levels, you've got to figure out how to complete the puzzle as quickly as you can or else the level will restart. You also have the convenient option of enabling an auto-freeze in the config menu, which will freeze the ball any time you begin to move a wormhole. It allows less button-pushing, but in later levels, you might find that you need the tactile control of using the spacebar.
Epsilon includes an interesting element called "ghost rooms" that can be turned on or off. When activated, you'll see semi-transparent copies of the level surrounding your room. These ghost rooms swivel around your real room as you move the wormholes around, giving you a virtual view of where the orb will move based on locations of the wormholes.
In later levels you'll be able to manipulate your little space-time continuum even further, to the point of reversing time and manipulating gravity. In levels that it's allowed, you can use the [X] key to stop time and reverse all your actions back to your starting point, with the clocked rolled back to zero. Any energy points you collected will still be in your possession, allowing you to utilize the time-reversal to collect energy and make it to the goal in a time-frame that you wouldn't be able to otherwise. You'll also get to use gravity shifters, stationary rifts, and more.
Analysis: The direction that many of these Portal-inspired casual games are going in is an exciting one. We're beginning to see more action/puzzle games that think outside the box, employing real-life game mechanics like physics, space and time. Whether it's just a fad or casual gamers are hungry for brainier games, it's opening up a new genre of gaming that exercises the mind while still offering an action component instead of just solving static puzzle after puzzle.
Epsilon deserves special attention for its spit-shine graphics polish and catchy soundtrack, not to mention an intuitive control system that doesn't get in the way of solving the puzzles. The main drawback is that although your current section is auto-saved, there's no way to return to the exact level you were playing if you leave. You'll have to start that section over from the beginning, an annoying setback that could have easily been solved by an unlockable level selector. That withstanding, Epsilon marks another successful Portal-inspired flash game of its kind, attractive to any action-puzzle fan.
game doesnt work with the provided link.
What doesn't work in particular? It seems to load just fine here, and I've checked all the links in the review, and all appear as they should.
Wow. Portal really started something, didn't it? These test-subject type games are wonderful when done right.
I like this game, so far. A well-paced learning curve, interesting mechanics, and visual rewards for doing stuff correctly.
dfgdg-
Try disabling Adblock mods if you're running them on Firefox, or using a different browser. If you're using a default, un-modded version of IE, do you have any third-party ad blockers or firewall software installed? Sometimes they block preloaders on certain games by mistake.
I can't stand all the animated menus and stuff you have to sit and wait for before you can get to play.
I'm completely stuck on the 10th level of the "Further Challenges" module. The player has no way to alter the orb's path, and it goes inevitably to a halt. What did I miss?
Level X seems to be broken... the angles don't work properly and it's not a level the player can do anything to.
A very fun game marred by a totally unnecassary time-limit on completing the levels.
I was mistaken about the designation of the level I talked about: it's level X, and like Xero77 said, it seems broken.
Holy cow. Awesome sauce. Nice job, guys. This looks and feels like 14 months.
I, too, am stuck on level X of Further Challenges. Also I wish the buttons said "Quit" and "Retry" instead of the confusing "Abort" and "Restart", but that's about it for criticism.
wow really great game
I don't understand why ghost rooms are supposed to be helpful.
And I'm stuck on level 5c :/
Great game. I absolutely loved portal and its flash version. Great to see more games are following in that same vein.
I didn't have any problems with level X though, did it get fixed so quickly?
Any help for 5k? Sadly totally stumped on it. Loving it so far though.
Uh.. level X doesn't seem to be possible. At no point does the ball ever touch a place where I can put a portal, yet it gets stuck..
Huh. Actually, there *are* no portals in level X. Feh.
Rather enjoyable game, though it's frustrating that the final level is broken. And it's too bad that there's no way to save your progress, because even if level x were fixed, I have no interest in replaying all of module 5 to get to it.
Other than that, the only gripe I have is about the "time's up! reinitializing" sequence. It's rather jarring, and takes too long.
great game, thank you!
i need more levels, finished it very fast :(
(or are there more levels after X?)
I can't get past level 5k. Any help?
I know it's still fairly early in the year, but.. this will be a contender in the Best of 2008 awards on this site.
Fantastic. Short, but complete. Begs for expansions. Tastes like jmtb.
Mmm.
I haven't played the game yet, but based on the loading screen, it's gotta be good.
And what a coincidence, I've just started reading a book from Dan Brown (author of The DaVinci Code) yesterday, and the CERN's LHC plays a role in the story!
Just wanted to share this.
I can't get the game to work! It loads fine, but when I click enter on the first screen, it just stops! Help anyone?
Looks like a fantastic game though! Hope I can get it to work!
I BEAT LVL X!!!
Actually, you just fire the ball.
You go in the portal, and then it says: UNKNOWN ANOMALY DETECTED. Then it screws up, reboots, and says: Participant not found. Starting phase 2...
^Ending. It has the *evil mad scientist* thing you've all been waiting for *wink* Oh yeah, it's been (fixed.)
Yo, for people who need help with 5k.
Here's a little hint:
"Go back to the beginning" and think about it.
Sheer_Cold, what do you mean by "You go in the portal"? You can't go in the portal if you haven't caught all the balls, and you can't catch all the balls when the orb loops and stops.
I wonder if it's a matter of version of the Flash player. Mine is 9.0 r124 for Firefox under Linux.
Great game, first thing I thought of was Portal though. Love the ending, a bit creepy, but pretty ace.
I loved Portal, and was glad to see another take on the genre. Great concept, great learning curve. I think there needs to be another limitation on each level. The time limit is just pointless because you can either just hit "x" to reverse time, or the level is just easy enough to finish. Maybe restricting the number of times you can go through the portal. Also, I wish there were more techniques you could use to manipulate the path of the ball.
Level X worked for me.
Too short :(
Wow, beautiful.
Gameplay is great, too, but... wow, beautiful and polished.
Level X worked for me too. The Ghost rooms were more nauseating than helpful, but a cool idea. Thank goodness you can turn them off. Fun Game, but for 14 months you think it would be longer...
It took me a while to figure out 5k, so I understand the frustration. For 5k:
You need to save that gravity changer until the end in order to get into the portal, right?
So how are you going to get all of the other balls before getting the gravity changer?
Get the top and bottom ones first.
You bounce too high to do that? You can fix that, can't you?
Walls are very good at lowering the bounce of a ball (ceilings, too).
Okay, so you line up one of the wormholes under you, and another under a ceiling that's just above the ball height.
Go until you bounce off that ceiling, then pause really quickly, and put the spare wormhole under the bottom ball, go get it, and repeat with the top ball.
Now you're stuck with a ball that's not not bouncy enough to get in?
Well, you can undo that problem, right?
Hit X, go back to the beginning.
Line up one wormhole below you, and one off to the left, aimed at the last ball.
ooh i can't even pass level 5c
Can anyone help with 5L? Can't even figure out how to make any difference to the trajectory
I still don't understand why gravity changes when the ball goes through a portal... Also the ghost rooms seemed to be designed to destroy old computers. I'm really glad they added the turn off option, since they are in essence pointless.
Also... the menu system design seems to have come straight from Syndicate wars... now that was a game...
There's a simpler method for 5k:
Get the balls one by one as you would normally do. Just hit X just as you reach them. If you get the timing right you will avoid hitting the gravity device.
I found the game fun at first, but then both easy and repetitive towards the end. I didn't find a use for the ghost rooms. I also found one level where the portals had to be lined up pretty exactly or the ball would not go through them - slightly buggy, but eventually solvable.
for me the X doesn't work it stucks in the kind of wawe thing and then it comes back and stucks to the upside down L
For those who need help with 5c
Portals work both ways you know ;)
Any hints for 5b?
Fun game - I love games that play off of physics like this.
I did hit the x in the corner thinking that I was aborting a game (instead of waiting for timer) - and had to start back several levels...would be nice if it saved actual level.
For those of you who want to see the end and pass level "X" try this
Press the spacebar to slow the ball down a bit. It worked for me so try it yourselves. Oh, and once it gets passed the place it got stuck in the first place. Stop pressing space.
Can someone help me with 5e? thanks
Tom, when you say there was one part where you must line up portals to the pixel, I think situations like that are where ghost rooms come in. They're helpful for making sure the ball doesn't caught around corners because one of the portals is a little too much to a side.
I smell a sequel.
I'm stuck on 5b, the ball keeps getting stuck in the bottom right corner and won't go through the wormhole. It does it the first time around, but then won't do it the second time, any help is greatly appreciated!
i agree with jd. i'm stuck on 5b and the ball wont go throught the portal.
exactly the way life works: i figured out 5b just after i posted.
Here's a hint:
use the ghost rooms to find out why the ball won't go through the portal
OOOOOH, SHIIIIIINY. I thought it was a little short and kind of easy once I got the gist of the basic controls.
The ghost rooms come in handy when the portal is wider than the opening in the wall:
When you use the ghost room, watch the "exit" portal (whichever of your two movable portals it is currently, I'm not talking about the "move on to the next stage" portal). The ghost room it is connected to will make it look as if the ball is entering the playing field at that point, so it helps line up and aim the ball.
The ending was cool to me, probably only because I'm a computer science major :P
I didn't like the ran-out-of-time sequence. I agree it was pretty jarring every time it happened. They could have just done something like make the screen flash white and reset it all, and I think it would have kept to the spirit of the game and the story just fine.
It would also be nice if they had a little thing on the screen telling you if you could use the time warp on that level or not. Like a little box that "lights up" when you can use the recursion power.
Oh, also, the game wouldn't load for me at first on my home computer (it worked on school computers). It was stuck on the mostly white screen that has "EPSILON" across the top.
The problem was that Norton 360 (formerly Norton Antivirus) wasn't letting the game preloader execute (as Josh pointed out) or something like that. I opened up the firewall settings and found the stuff for the Adobe Flash player and set it to enable:
HTTP Adobe Flash Player SWF Code Exec
HTTP Adobe Flash SWF Plugin Code Exec
HTTP Adobe Shockwave Version ActiveX DoS
HTTP Adobe SWF Remote Code Exec
Don't ask me what these are because I don't really know. They sounded like the right things to allow. I don't know if I needed to enable all 4 of them, but I did.
I refreshed the game screen after enabling these and the game loaded perfectly.
I suggest re-disabling these things just in case malware can somehow use them to get onto your computer ("Remote Code Exec" doesn't sound completely safe to me).
5e????
This game will keep me occupied for a while. It's great!
5i? im stuck. But it is quite awesome.
Absolutely great stuff!
Level x doesn't work for me either.
The angles are off at the bottom by a tiny fraction, but it seems to be enough to kill the level for a smattering of people. Probably depends on your computer or browser. I'm on a Mac, using Safari. What are other people using who have this issue?
Seems a shame for such a well polished game to be plagued by such a tiny error right at the end.
HELP WITH 5e PLZ!?!?!?
I don't understand the design of 5c. There's no way to accelerate the ball fast enough to enter AND exit the lower portion of the center chamger, as going through the shortcut zaps all your momentum.
Level X breaks for me as well :(
How do you do level 4e?
I assumed level X was intentionally broken, since it worked for me after a couple tries, and what came after seemed to fit that.
how do u get past level 5c i'm stuck
Can someone help me with level 5I? I don't get how to get all of them and then get back to the portal.
aha, i figured out 5l after a bit of work, here's how u do it
1. grab the gravity ball and the gravity shifter thing then quickly hit x.
2. now put a portal in the hole on the right, and a portal in the hole at the bottom. let your ball fall through the gravity orb thingy, grab ur objective, and again quickly hit x.
3. keep the portal on the bottom, and move the one that is on the right hole, to the left hole. press space, and once you grab the other ball hit x.
4. you should now see 4 worm holes, 1 gravity shifty thingy, and the exit. keep the portal that is on the bottom and move the other one up to the top hole. press space and you did it :D
lovely game... but too short.. and very easy, once you get used ot the physics!
Level X worked like a dream for me! First time... was so cool :D
I need Help with level 2e.
the best game in its genre since portal possibly even beter definatly in need of a sequel
all the ones after i are so easy itist even funny so maybey theyll revamp it then make a sequel
I'm stuck on level 4e.
What do you do?!?!?!?!
Cheers.
Very cool. Only needed help on 5L, thanks StealthFlame. Liked the ending,
Phase 2, bring on a sequel!
whats the song at the end its gnar...
Yes, person reading "Angels and Demons", CERN is involved.
I've read all his books. :)
Anyone help me on 2e? I'm so vexed on that one, and ughh haha
DANGIT 5c!
Somebody HELP ME with 5e...i completed it the other day and now i cant remember how!!! Please Help me...
5c is easy: if you don't have enough momentum to get out of the central bit, use your "x" button to get out!
that's the only level i found hard cos i forgot bout that button. good game.
lol i glitched the game i was going back in time and the ball got stuck xD
im in dire need of help on 5c. i read that the "portals work both ways" but i cant figure out how to get the ball wayyyy up to the other portal. im sure its some simple answer and im overthinking it. please help. thanks. oh and btw whoever said that the time limit is unnecessary i totally agree!
how do you get past 4e?
i need help with 5i whenever the ball goes through the portal it doesnt go far enough for me to actually do anything with it
anybody got a walkthrough for 5m?
I'm stuck on 5n. I know how to do it, but can't finish it in the time limit. Does anybody know a fast way to do it?
Wow dude......i can't figgure out how to get it through the top L figure with enough speed
5B!!!
So...when you start off you get the closest ball-orb thing, reverse it then get enough speed by putting one wormhold at the bottom right corner, and another where the slant starts....then stop the ball drag it up to the 2nd orb thing...and you know what to do after that
for 5 c , whenever you go through the shorcut move your portals so that they make it go back through the shortcut the oppisite way
4e:
Put the portals on the left in the top and bottom, sit back, and relax
Please, some help with 5c! I know portals go both directions but I can't seem to make the ball go back the other way!
how do you get past level 5f?
5e
get the orb in antigravity orb in the middle. took me a while to see it...
i need help with 5c, see the rediret the portals thing, but what does that mean? speak english?!?!?!
on 5n, here is how u do it fast.
you just have to pause a lot so you can move the portals more efficiently. for example, dont just leave one portal on the top, like what i did the first time, but instead, move them around each time.
I need help with 5c!!!!
I understand how to get in and out of the center part, but...how do you get the two things on the bottom????
5c:
5c:pretty tough =o
1) there should be 2 exits at the bottom left, so put on portal in each, then let go of the ball
2) The ball will bounce/roll and pass the 2 point things, and the moment it passes through the second, pause and restart the whole thing (this is to make sure the ball will fall straight).
3) move the left bottom portal,(which is facing right) to the top right exit (which is facing down), then let go of the ball. Let it go through the portal, and by the time it has gone through and is about to touch the bottom, pause the ball, and move the bottom left portal to the exit that is facing the other portal
4) let it gain some speed, and once it cant go much faster, pause the ball.
5) leave the bottom right portal alone, and move the other one at the bottom left, the exit *facing* the blackhole thing. The speed will catch it, and it will teleport the ball to the last point thing
6) reverse every thing to the start, and move the bottom right portal to the top left, the one almost facing the finish, then let go of the ball.
I need a walkthrough for 5d! I can't complete the level in 4 seconds..even though I can freeze time :S
That...was...COOL! I gotta admit that the ending invoked the "What???" reaction, probably mostly because I wasn't expecting it when it came. Usually I'm not very good at physics-based puzzles, but once I got the hang of this one, it was just challenging enough to keep me guessing, but not to throw me into despair. Well done, Dissolute Productions!
Wow, that was a blast! I have to admit, I was stuck on 5b for a few rounds, but after that beast was tamed, I went right on from there to beat the game. Level X was strange, cuz, I, uh, didnt really do anything,. But hey, all good!
OK 5e:
1) move one of the portals under the ball, and move the other one to above the end orb thing. Let the ball fall. it'll go through the portal, grab a point and smack into the floor.
2) pause the ball after it's smacked into the floor and move the portal that was originally under the ball at the beginning to the side (pick one) to grab the other orb. The ball will go through the top portal and grab the orb and smack back into the portal. When the ball has gone through the top portal...
3) move the side portal to the other side to grab the orb. and then you're done
info on 5i
use the black holes for more speed, (don't let the ball stop moving unless in time stop, or it won't go again)don't let the ball touch the wall
[Edit by Kayleigh]
I just finished the game today and made videos of every level. Here is the link:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xUMui0f25ho&feature=PlayList&p=34AC748875426B81&index=0&playnext=1
This game kinda made my mouse go peculiar...
Update