Atomic Worm

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	Great fun! posted by micahcowan @ 64.125.181.74 on Mar 30 2009 6:46 PM
A very addictive game. I've never really liked the "snake"-style games, but this one is quite addictive. It takes the same general idea as the classic, but places it on various grids with (potentially) non-rectangular polygons. Some levels have a variety of polygonal shapes, and some also dynamically warp the shapes during gameplay, which keeps things interesting. Once you get to levels with moving enemies, it also gets to be somewhat PacMan-esque, as consuming three of the same shape consecutively provides you with temporary invulnerability, which is wisely used in smashing your foes. The baddies will even freak out and try to run away from you, like in PacMan. :) One minor caveat is that with smaller gridlines it can be difficult to control the worm's movement. Support for an analog joystick would be perfect. Also, on my system sometimes the display will inexplicably and suddenly switch from fullscreen to windowed mode, which is obviously very interruptive to the gameplay. The sound also usually disappears at this point (btw, the soundtrack is great), but after you finish the level, if you focus on another window and then focus back on the game's, fullscreen and sound will usually be restored. This may just be a glitch with my setup (but access to the source might've allowed improvement ;) )
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	Great Game posted by richardj @ 58.109.38.106 on Sep 5 2008 11:01 AM
Good usage of graphics, gameplay and sound. Very interesting twist on an old game. The only bad bits are motion sickness on the rotating boards and the difficulty is a bit high.
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	Atomic Worm posted by AMDmi3 @ 213.180.219.121 on Sep 4 2008 7:19 PM
As usual, why not release source if the game is distributed free of charge?
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Re: Atomic Worm posted by Wolven @ 81.191.158.80 on Sep 4 2008 8:57 PM I don't think the author of the game is very in to the "Linux world" so he might not even have thought about releasing the source. Here's a quote from the website: [...] "I don’t know much about Linux except that it’s a great free alternative to Windows." [...] There is a contact form and a feedback form on the authors website though, so perhaps he'll consider releasing the source, or give you an answer to why he's not willing to do so if you ask him nicely and explain why you think releasing the source is a good idea.   [Reply]

	Great casual game posted by Judebert @ 65.82.17.121 on Sep 4 2008 4:08 PM
After some consideration, this seems like no big thing: the standard snake game has limited movement, too; it's just that it's always a grid. But by providing different shapes, Atomic Worm rejuvenates the entire genre! To compensate for the reduced choice and the need to think ahead, Atomic Worm allows you to reduce your tail by matching items. Of course, this leads to combos and additional powers and challenges. I find the poetry a little distracting. The flexing boards make me a little motion sick. The controls are a little touchy: I occasionally found my worm going the wrong way and messing up my combos, or heading back into his own tail. (I'd like a way to "lock" a path once it's selected, so I can move my mouse or make choices farther in advance.) The game could also use debugging output and detail settings to help out older computers. If it were Open Source, I could figure out the debugging on my own. At least I don't have to port it, since the author made Windows and Linux versions. The music is perfect: motivating but non-intrusive. The graphics are very good, the idea is fantastic, and the implementation is excellent.
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	Doesn't run for me posted by Judebert @ 65.82.17.121 on Sep 3 2008 11:31 PM
Looks like an interesting idea. Although the installer ran on my RHEL box, running bin/AtomicWorm produces no output whatsoever (either on the screen or in the console). I'll try again on Debian, just because it looks interesting.
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Re: Doesn't run for me posted by W.P. van Paassen @ 85.223.48.131 on Sep 4 2008 6:37 AM   The game needs hardware acceleration otherwise it won't run. What kind of video card do you have and what drivers are you using? Cheers WP   [Reply]   Re: Doesn't run for me posted by Judebert @ 65.82.17.121 on Sep 4 2008 3:58 PM It's an nvidia card, and glxgears goes like crazy. And xorg.conf is using the nvidia driver, not nv. On my Debian system, there's a much less powerful nForce chipset. That runs the game fine, although it takes up a lot of CPU starting the menu and switching levels.   [Reply]   Re: Doesn't run for me posted by W.P. van Paassen @ 85.223.48.131 on Sep 4 2008 6:01 PM   Thanks for the feedback. What version of RHEL are you running?   [Reply]   Re: Doesn't run for me posted by Judebert @ 65.82.17.121 on Sep 9 2008 4:46 PM Red Hat Enterprise Linux WS release 4 (Nahant Update 4 Beta) with gcc 3.4.6 and kernel 2.6.9-39. Rather than debug in the comments, let's take it into email. Or better yet, set up a bugtracker and I'll post there.   [Reply]

	Nice twist on worm/snake posted by Wolven @ 81.191.158.80 on Sep 3 2008 9:12 AM
Quite a nice twist on an old classic game. For a first impression I rate it 4 out of 5 since I find the controller a bit hard to use. I wish the "direction ring" was a bit larger, so I could focus more on the board around the worm and not so much on the worm it self. Also the second stage is a bit hard compared to the first one. I wish the progression was a bit gentler. There's no source available, but the binary installer and the game worked just fine on my Slackware 12.1 install. Defiantly a game worth downloading. I'm looking forwards to see the other game by Charlie Dog Games (Go Ollie) being ported to Linux.
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