IncrediBots
Developer: Grubby Games
Nomination: Technical Excellence
Platform: Web Browser (Flash)
Website
Description: An engine for building and animating two dimensional robots, teaching them to do tricks, and making movies.

Adam’s Thoughts:
IncrediBots will mostly appeal to armchair engineers. It’s a do-anything/build-anything sandbox with a handful of goals and a free play mode. The tools provided are fairly kludgey to use (it can take hours to make a machine that does exactly what you want), but it’s in the service of making those tools incredibly powerful. If a problem can be solved with torque or simple linear force, you can do it in IncrediBots.

The game has been out for a while, so even cooler than the building tools is the fact that IncrediBots lets you save and share machines you’ve built. This means that even if you don’t have the time or intrest to build something yourself, you can always see the clever work of others. Players have built Rube Goldberg machines, movie vignettes, and even simple games with the integrated tools. It’s like sharing a sandbox with other kids, but they can’t knock over your castle.

Katie’s Thoughts:
For anyone who grew up loving their Tinker toys and Erector sets, IncrediBots will feel like a wonderful throwback to his childhood. Like these toys, Incredibots provides a powerful if time-consuming engine for building machines and watching physics work. And unlike the classic toys, this game can be played at a desk when you’re supposed to be working.

The large collection of shared machines demonstrates the diversity of things that can be achieved with the tools provided by this game, Rube Goldberg machines being a favorite. For both kids and adults that don’t have the time or the space to build a big project made of wood and metal, Incredibots provides an option that lets you create within the computer, and save it for later without taking up the entire garage.

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Tags:   GDC · IGF · Technical ExcellenceNo Comments

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