Top-down action adventure games?

ID:95615
 
May 17 2010, 12:11 pm
I'm looking for more "Let's Play" videos to help me design a randomly generated project. New titles for top-down action adventure games would be appreciated. Video links would be even better. (Especially if they have commentary.)


A natural start was The Legend of Zelda: A Link To The Past. (I believe the Magic Man is working on a multiplayer interpretation if you're interested in joining his test server.)


Next, I satisfied my curiosity about Alundra. While it sparked some boss and dungeon ideas, it appears to have chosen the wrong perspective for its jumping puzzles.


I can remember playing Star Tropics back in the NES days. The single-tile jump and its puzzles look useful.


Dwarf Complete doesn't offer action, but some of the puzzles are interesting.


Engage to Jabberwock offers some of the arcade action I'm looking for. Unfortunately, I can already hear the potential whining about difficulty when multiple enemies are on the screen. (It would probably be coupled with a misinterpretation of the form of permadeath I have planned.)


...I just thought of Where We Remain so I'll toss that in too. ;)



Any more suggestions?
May 17 2010, 2:28 pm
An interesting reflection of the different ways to go with it. Personally, I think I prefer a bit more Legend Of Zelda and a bit less Where We Remain or Dwarf Complete. Games that make you think about the game, in terms of deep game mechanics with a good understanding of exactly what needs to be done. Not games that insist you come up with a deeper meaning (modern art-style) nor puzzles with a great deal of ambiguity to them (Dwarf Complete seemed hard for all the wrong reasons).
May 17 2010, 2:51 pm
Omg... Star Tropics was THE game, when I was a little kid. o_o
May 17 2010, 5:27 pm
Ever consider a Children of Mana style?
May 17 2010, 6:33 pm
@Shadow Void: I've watched a few videos after your suggestion. It leans too far towards RPG level grinding, but I might get something out of the action segments. =)
May 17 2010, 6:45 pm
I have fond childhood memories of Goof Troop, but it's pretty heavily puzzle-based. Some fun boss fights, though.
May 17 2010, 9:00 pm
I'd be happy to field a few suggestions, but other than "top-down adventure" and "randomly generated" I'm not sure exactly what you're looking to find in these videos.
May 17 2010, 11:02 pm
@Geldonyetich: The randomly generated portion will be on my end. I'm mostly picking out small enemy and puzzle concepts at this point, but I'm leaving room for other ideas. If I knew what I wanted other than "top-down action adventure" then I wouldn't have too look. =)


@DarkCampainger: I watched the whole LP. I'm not sure if I'll be adding sliding block puzzles. Perhaps I could create a casual puzzle game first to test a random generator.
May 17 2010, 11:12 pm
Blaster Master is kind of a hybrid, but it has a top-down action concept to it and recently has a new game released in the series.
May 18 2010, 11:39 am
Given that small enemy and puzzle concepts is your main focus of research here, I can see why you choose the ones you did.

Perhaps ZZT or Kingdom of Kroz would be worth looking into for you. Some interesting-but-doable concepts can be found therein in regards to tile-based puzzle and enemy engagement.