Hothead Games have released the first episode of Penny Arcade Adventures: On the Rain Slick Precipice of Darkness - an action title based on the popular web-comic of the same (but less exhaustingly subtitled) name. As is generally the way with these newfangled episodic games, the (unlockable by purchase) game client also acts as a playable demo, one which you can download for trial locally from AusGamers in Windows, Linux and Mac flavours.

Internet connected Xbox 360 can also find the demo and purchasable full episode now available from the Xbox Live Arcade.

Cross platform for the epic win.

will laugh if its s***.

If you buy the game, do you have a license for any platform, or just the platform you bought it for?

My guess would be that windows/linux/mac would be unified while the x360 would most definitely not be. Might want to look into it properly before buying if you're concerned though.

Yeah, well if the PC/Linux/Mac one is all the one thing, I'll definitely buy it, just to support that sort of business model. I love that they've made it multi-platform from the get-go.

Think I'll be buying the first episode just to support them - The stuff I've seen of it sound like it's a bit of a laugh.. Beyond that, then just depends on how good it turns out I guess.

Massive props for the fact it's available for Windows, Mac, Linux & XBLA. If only more developers gave this sort of love (But I'm guessing it might be due to the platform the game runs in, but who knows).

lulz no ps3.

i am keen on this though, been reading PA for years.

They develop under torque so they can easily port it across all the platforms it supports. So PS3 and Wii versions would be kicking around except they have poor online delivery systems.

It's a great game but I can't imagine enjoying it too much unless you're into the comic. The battle system is like Final Fantasy 7's with Mario RPG-esque timing challenges.

lulz no ps3.

I don't think the Torque engine supports PS3.

I enjoy reading Penny-Arcade, although I find their recent stuff to be less amusing then previous years.

I should find the funnies in the game, so I'll have a looksy at the Demo.

whats this about torque?

last edited by Mr Hardware at 18:18:41 22/May/08

Wow, that demo was incredibly short.

Uh, what are you guys smoking? There already are Torque engine games on the PS3. Rocketman (capcom) is a PSN release which is based on torque engine with full mp support.

More info about rocketman..

http://au.ps3.ign.com/articles/818/818216p1.html

i played the demo of this last night on XBLA, the art is pretty awesome, and the whole thing stays very close to the PA comic humour. So if you are into PA you will definately get a kick out of this.

As for the gameplay, its pretty stock standard jrpg stuff, except for the fight mechanic. You run around doing fetch quests and doing things like kill X amount of angry trashcans. The fight mechanic is a bit different to your usual turnbased JRPG stuff. Its not quite turnbased, its timebased or something. Each action is timed (Item, Attack, Special move), after you do a move the timer is reset and you have to wait for the time to refill. So you can pretty much do any move at any time as long as you're meter is full. Kudos to them for having a bash at doing something different with it but i don't think it has been properly executed just yet.

its pretty stock standard jrpg stuff

There goes any chance of me enjoying it then

JRPG? I'd say it's more like a point and click adventure game with turn-based battles, and even the battles are more like Paper Mario than Final Fantasy.

I'm definitely buying this game when I get home tonight. It's f***ing awesome, I got a good laugh when I talked to the first person I saw, and all they said was "HOLY f***ING s***, DID YOU SEE THAT GIANT f***ING ROBOT?!"

I also loved how you use an orange in battle to distract the Fruit f***ers, and they say stuff to each other like "Oh man, you've gotta let me in on that." Brilliant.

so wet, you're not enjoying lost odyessey then ?

I forgot to mention that i bought PA last night.

i think you can get past any probs you have with the gameplay if you are into the comedy and the story.

and midda i relayed that exact part of the game to a mate at work!