Try A Thing: Jazztronauts
What happens when you mix urban exploration, Katamari Damacy, Animal Crossing, and Half-Life?
Nothing, those things are nothing alike, what are you doing.
What happens when you try to mix them anyway and add in a few hefty bong rips? Then you get Jazztronauts. A new game mode for Garry's Mod (aka 'that wonky Valve physics box/thing that people used to make shitty youtube videos before Source Filmmaker existed'), Jazztronauts charmed me somewhere around March when I first saw TieTuesday streaming an early alpha and I'd been waiting with bated breath for its proper release.
It's really quite simple: while running through the eighty millionth map full of Extruded Half-Life Creepypasta Shit, you run across a crew of interdimensional cat burglars, pun intended. One of them bumblefucks their magical loot-stealing wand into a sewer and right down into your waiting hands, and you proceed to go mad with power and STEAL THE WORLD. Then they, impressed with your chutzpah, recruit you to steal the world for them.
The gameplay is very, very, rote, in a good way: You go up to a video screen in your home base and surf randomly through a selection of Steam Workshop maps for Garry's Mod. You load it into reality, and then hop on your interdimensional vaporwave trolley to jump into the map. Once you're there, you proceed to steal everything that isn't nailed down (and, with certain upgrades, most things that are), while specifically keeping an eye out for mode-generated shiny, humming, candylike mcguffin Shards. When you're done dicking around, you summon the bus out of whatever wall (or floor, or locker, or skybox, or toilet) you choose and it bursts through reality Kool-Aid Man style to bring you back to home base. Back home, you head to a magical chute and pull a lever, prompting it to blarf all of the trash you picked up all over the place, which gives you money for upgrades. Pick level, loot level, dump trash, repeat.
It's zen and incredibly relaxing (except when it's not relaxing because you warped into a jumpscare level because people are dicks) (and also when it's not relaxing because it's hilarious due to someone clipping through the world and finding out that the Combine base you were in has been wallpapered by pictures of Snoop Dogg) (and finally also when it's not relaxing because how the fuck do you get that shard like five miles up in the air suspended on a telephone pole without dying violently). It's worth noting that even though it's been publically released, it's still very much an Early Mod Release Work In Progress: text needs proofreading, there's plenty of bugs, and there have been times trying to run it with
xyzzysqrl that the thing just flat-out crashed.
But it's still a chance for you to wander through pretty much any map on Steam's workshop and see what people did. And steal it. There's a lot of interesting stuff there and a lot of mediocre garbage and you can explore it all. And technically, it's all free - assuming you have Garry's Mod, of course. That'll cost you $NUMBER.
I'm gonna be playing this for quite some time, even if I've technically played through the "main story" once already.
EDIT: Also, it's worth noting for those with issues regarding such things, that the Jazztronauts-specific content features heavy casual talk of drug use as well as occasional contemplation about the sentience of NPCs and trippy, potentially epilepsy-triggering visuals.
Also, the Steam Workshop content is a steaming pile and features jumpscares, definitely epilepsy-triggering visuals, and very loud noises, along with flatgrass. so much flatgrass.
Crossposted from Dreamwidth. Original at https://swordianmaster.dreamwidth.org/114584.html
Nothing, those things are nothing alike, what are you doing.
What happens when you try to mix them anyway and add in a few hefty bong rips? Then you get Jazztronauts. A new game mode for Garry's Mod (aka 'that wonky Valve physics box/thing that people used to make shitty youtube videos before Source Filmmaker existed'), Jazztronauts charmed me somewhere around March when I first saw TieTuesday streaming an early alpha and I'd been waiting with bated breath for its proper release.
It's really quite simple: while running through the eighty millionth map full of Extruded Half-Life Creepypasta Shit, you run across a crew of interdimensional cat burglars, pun intended. One of them bumblefucks their magical loot-stealing wand into a sewer and right down into your waiting hands, and you proceed to go mad with power and STEAL THE WORLD. Then they, impressed with your chutzpah, recruit you to steal the world for them.
The gameplay is very, very, rote, in a good way: You go up to a video screen in your home base and surf randomly through a selection of Steam Workshop maps for Garry's Mod. You load it into reality, and then hop on your interdimensional vaporwave trolley to jump into the map. Once you're there, you proceed to steal everything that isn't nailed down (and, with certain upgrades, most things that are), while specifically keeping an eye out for mode-generated shiny, humming, candylike mcguffin Shards. When you're done dicking around, you summon the bus out of whatever wall (or floor, or locker, or skybox, or toilet) you choose and it bursts through reality Kool-Aid Man style to bring you back to home base. Back home, you head to a magical chute and pull a lever, prompting it to blarf all of the trash you picked up all over the place, which gives you money for upgrades. Pick level, loot level, dump trash, repeat.
It's zen and incredibly relaxing (except when it's not relaxing because you warped into a jumpscare level because people are dicks) (and also when it's not relaxing because it's hilarious due to someone clipping through the world and finding out that the Combine base you were in has been wallpapered by pictures of Snoop Dogg) (and finally also when it's not relaxing because how the fuck do you get that shard like five miles up in the air suspended on a telephone pole without dying violently). It's worth noting that even though it's been publically released, it's still very much an Early Mod Release Work In Progress: text needs proofreading, there's plenty of bugs, and there have been times trying to run it with
xyzzysqrl that the thing just flat-out crashed.
But it's still a chance for you to wander through pretty much any map on Steam's workshop and see what people did. And steal it. There's a lot of interesting stuff there and a lot of mediocre garbage and you can explore it all. And technically, it's all free - assuming you have Garry's Mod, of course. That'll cost you $NUMBER.
I'm gonna be playing this for quite some time, even if I've technically played through the "main story" once already.
EDIT: Also, it's worth noting for those with issues regarding such things, that the Jazztronauts-specific content features heavy casual talk of drug use as well as occasional contemplation about the sentience of NPCs and trippy, potentially epilepsy-triggering visuals.
Also, the Steam Workshop content is a steaming pile and features jumpscares, definitely epilepsy-triggering visuals, and very loud noises, along with flatgrass. so much flatgrass.
Crossposted from Dreamwidth. Original at https://swordianmaster.dreamwidth.org/114584.html