Narbacular Drop

Game Description

Help the Princess Escape Her Mysterious Dungeon

The helpless princess, No-Knees, is only helpless due to a rather unique affliction - she is forever cursed to walk the earth. In other words, she can't jump, which is rather unlike most characters in a 3D game. She has been kidnapped by a foul demon beast and finds herself locked away in his mountain lair. Luckily for her, the mountain is a sentient being and hates the demon beast's guts.

He offers to help the princess escape by giving her the power of portalisation: the ability to conjure up two dimensionally-linked portals on any rocky surface within the mountain. Use her new found ability to help the princess make her way past monsters, rushing boulders, and solve plenty of puzzles as she makes her escape.

Intriguing Puzzler

The gameplay might sound a bit familiar to some gamers, as it should since the group of students who made this game for their senior game design project were quickly picked up by Valve to create their popular game, Portal. In essence, you move No-Knees around the various levels and use the left and right mouse button to create two portals, one orange and one blue, to transport the princess around.

Basically anything movable, like enemies, blocks, the princess, are able to enter one portal and emerge from the other. For instance, this can be used to move blocks to a hard to reach switch to open a door or you can use the portals to leapfrog down a corridor as huge boulders roll down it. You have to be careful because if you die at any point you have to start the entire level over again.

Interesting Play Options

While the original game can seem a bit on the short side, there is a rather healthy mod community adding more and more levels with the game's map editor. Given this added replay factor and the unique gameplay, the fact that it is absolutely free makes this title hard to pass up.

What makes this game even more exciting is the variety of ways in which any level can be completed. In fact, many of the fan base have put out speed runs that contain techniques the creators admit they didn't know existed. The free form nature of the game design allows a very open ended approach to navigating the levels and are great for flexing a little creative muscle.

So if you are a fan of Portal or are just looking for an ingenious puzzling experience, download Narbacular Drop and get your fill of portal-jumping fun!

Player Reviews