Cinematic Platformers
 

I posted a small article on my blog. Find it here. Hope you like it.

mate, flashback was amazing, but waaaay, too hard. good blog, i finaly realized what games like abe and flashback are called now lol.

I played and beat Flashback on the genesis. I think Oddworld was harder.

Needs more Skullmonkeys, Earthworm Jim, Psychonauts, and a healthy dose of Viewtiful Joe wouldn't hurt.

Soon as I saw that first video, memories of my playing Heart of Darkness (my second playstation game of that genre, first being Abe's Exoddus...my first was actually Flashback...but I only played it for five minutes) came scramming back to me. I never did beat that game come to think of it. I'm not one for reading blogs but that was interesting :3

I wanted to talk about platformers that had a more serious story in the game. I love all the games you mentioned, but if I included those I would also have to include mario and that is not serious at all. I didn't include Heart of Darkness because of that, but after thinking about it is was kind of serious in its storytelling even though it looked cartoony.

Psychonauts had an amazing story!

Right up until the most cop-out ending since Monkey Island 2.

nah no way, flashback was much harder, oddworld might of been if you rescued all 300 (or 99). Its a good thing abe didnt come on megadrive, it wouldnt of been very good. ive seen a youtube video of oddysee on some german crapppy platform and it looks shit.

The Neverhood is about killing satan and awakening the old god. Both of your friends die (And, according to Doug Tennappel, the two you see at the end are just copies) and you can turn into Satan Himself.

Cinematic=/=Serious storyline. I suggest you watch something by Studio Ghibli.

Well we wont be able to play anything from Studio Ghibli until "The Another World" comes to the states. If it comes at all. But that wont be a platformer.

I agree with Kastere, Skullmonkeys and Psychonauts fit in this category as well (I haven't played the other two, so I can't comment). They're just like Oddworld is with a serious plot with a slightly cartoony look that off-sets it. I think its a very nice use dichotomy to send home the primary purpose of the plot. Psychonauts had a heavy emphasis on psychology where Oddworld had an emphasis on ethics and morality.

The Neverhood is darker than Skullmonkeys, in my opinion, but Skullmonkeys still has a fairly serious plot.
Of course, The Neverhood and Skullmonkeys rather terrify me so I might be bias.

Who even said the new Team Ico game is even a platformer? Anyways, the article is alright, but I think the Jak series deserves a mention.

Now to be fair, I never played Skullmonkeys or Neverhood. The real reason I wrote the post was because I loved Another World and so did certain game developers like Fumito Ueda (Ico). So I talked about games that developers sited Another World as influences. Tim Shafer never listed Another World as one of his influences so it didn't make the list.

Ah, well that makes sense, then. Although it would've been better if the article mentioned that, to avoid all these annoying "should'ves" ;)

Skullmonkeys and the Neverhood are pretty rare so its not terribly surprising you haven't played them. The Neverhood is a point-and-click puzzle/adventure game, so it wouldn't fit in the article -anyway-, but Skullmonkeys is a side-scrolling platformer.

Personally, with this list specifically, I would only include 2D side-scrolling platformers to avoid diving into the massive category of 3D platformers (so games like Psychonauts would be excluded, even if they're technically cinematic platformers). 2D platformers tend to be more easily framed for cinematic story-telling and rich backgrounds. Which isn't to say 3D ones don't but its generally told differently.

The games mentioned had a connection with the game Another World that is the only reason these games (Flashback, Oddworld, Ico) were talked about and others were not. The fact is there might not have been an Ico, Shadow of the Colossus or "Trico" without Another World. What influences did Skullmonkeys have on game developers? See where the post is coming from.

Skullmonkeys was part of the inspiration for the diffiulty in the Megaman Zero games.


Nah, I'm making that up. But Psychonauts deserves a 'special mention' anyway.

Would you count Super paper mario as one.
i just can't think of any.