Placing the player in the role of sole survivor on an unknown planet rife with hostile life, Risk of Rain is a side-scrolling platformer that marries action with roguelike elements. Through the course of the game, the player traverses an endless gauntlet of randomly generated biomes, all the while facing off against an onslaught of procedurally generated enemies that get increasingly challenging as time passes. The player may don the mantle of one of several survivors to undertake this arduous journey, each possessing their own set of unique skills and abilities. Along the way, the player collects various items that aid in their endless struggle against the indigenous fauna, be that to bolster their own defenses or reach crazy levels of firepower. Death is permanent, however, and marks the end of the player’s run.

Webpage: http://riskofraingame.com/

Game Trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cia3haHicFU

Elemental Tetrad

Mechanics:

Each level in the game contains a teleporter placed at a random location on the map, which serves as the main goal for all the levels save the final stage. Procedurally generated enemies impede the player’s search for the teleporter, and upon death provide experience and an in-game currency used to unlock items. Each level increases the player’s strength, and items collected along the way confer passives bonuses, which stack on acquisition of duplicate items. The difficulty of the game scales with a timer, increasing each time after a set interval through 10 levels, whereby monsters have more health and damage. Upon death the game ends, however each run may unlock items or additional characters for future playthroughs through progress made, or sub-goals performed.

From Drizzle to HAHAHA difficulty. Feel the rain on your skin; no one else can feel it for you.

Story:

Risk of Rain features a loose story that chronicles the protagonist, a stranded survivor crash landed on a hostile planet, and their journey to find a way off the planet. Pieces of the story and background information about each enemy are revealed through monster logs that foes occasionally drop, and finishing the game ends with a cutscene that provides further insight into the motivations behind the selected character. These story elements serve mostly to complement the mechanics and aesthetics of the game more so than actually drive the player forward, and a lot of the story is left up to interpretation by the player, adding to the feeling of being stranded in an unknown and unforgiving locale.

Cause it’s just you against the world.

Aesthetics:

Featuring graphics reminiscent of retro 8-bit games, the pixelated two-dimensional aesthetic of the game together with the muted colour palette, ranging from the cool and dreary greys and blues to the outlandish but warm pinks and browns, bring a nostalgic yet appropriately foreign and alien-esque feel to the aesthetic of this dangerous planet. Sprites are simple but complemented by animations that breathe life into them, and the monster logs provide beautifully detailed art of each enemy encountered. The music of the game also heavily features a lot of synths that add to the mystique and nostalgia, every piece specifically tailored for each of the different biomes, starting relatively serene and ending in soaring crescendos reflective of the scaling difficulty of the game.

Nothing says “Mass Alien Genocide” quite like a warm sunset against cold steel.

Technology:

Originally conceived as a student project, Risk of Rain runs on GameMaker and as such some of the mechanics of the game and the graphics were tailored to conform to the limitations of the engine to prevent overloading and risk crashing the game, such as introducing tougher but fewer enemies on later difficulties to reduce the on-screen clutter.

I suppose one can’t have too many rockets.

The Art of Lenses

The Lens of Punishment:

Each playthrough of Risk of Rain ends when the player character dies, and all the items acquired, experience gained, and levels perish alongside them. The player is thus punished should they make severe enough mistakes that lead to their death, the most trying of challenges happening early in the game when the player is without the means to combat the ever increasing difficulty scale; However, should the player manage their time and items well, there is an exponential growth in character strength the longer they are able to survive, as item effects stack the more of each the player acquire and reward those who do avoid dying early. The thrill of cheating death and proceeding to the next level with a full stack of items intact is truly exhilarating.

Can’t deny that.

The Lens of Motivation:

Risk of Rain features a meta-game system, wherein every playthrough the player is able to unlock new items, modes and characters as they complete sub-objectives or achievements. These are available in all subsequent playthroughs after acquisition, and motivate the player to make several runs in order to reap all the rewards. These new characters and items enable the player to progress further in the game, by adding to the pool of items that may be procedurally generated or through providing a different set of skills and abilities to the player, supporting the motivation to survive as long as possible.

Someone’s been busy.

The Lens of Chance:

Many of the major elements in Risk of Rain are governed by chance, as both enemies and items are reliant on random generation. A player may only have access to less than stellar items whilst simultaneously facing off against tougher enemy archetypes at the start of the game, invoking a sense of hopelessness and lack of control, but because of the random nature of the game be elevated to heights of excitement at a whim when they chance upon a superior item. The player may also make risky plays, sticking with their collection of sub-optimal items if they happen to possess one or two of the rarer items. Do you continue your gauntlet with a ragamuffin collection of items, just because you hold on to one or two gems?

The Lens of Simplicity/Complexity:

Strewn throughout the levels are artifacts, which when acquired make fundamental changes to the game. These artifacts can vary the difficulty of the game, removing the random aspect of items, for example, allowing the player to choose what they want, or handicap the player by making enemies far stronger. There is an emergent complexity through the interaction of items, both between themselves and with artifacts. Certain items become far more valuable under the effect of some artifacts, and encourage the player to pursue these item configurations in order to find the most success in the playthrough.

Simple puzzles bar your way to the artifacts, sometimes requiring specific items to solve.