Friction

Friction is a 1995 puzzle-action game developed by Azurelore Korrigan under the A-J Games label & released as shareware on BBS servers before being put on compilation CD-ROMs years later. The game was made using mh:awesomegames:RSD Game-Maker, which had its last release(version 3.0) a year ago.

Plot
Hank was roaring down a dark country road when his car broke down. At that instant, the clouds decided to let loose their burden of rain.

The blackness was of pitch, but in the glare of his headlights Hank was able to see a house about a block away. Having not much of a choice, he trotted over, hoping for assistance.

After pounding the door until his knuckles were raw, recieving no answer, Hank started back to his car. Once he turned around, however, he heard the door open behind him. Hank spun around on his heel to stand face to face with a small robed figure. He jumped back in surprise, but the figure did nothing.

"Uh... He-Hello?"

No reply.

"My car broke down about a block back in that direction." He gestured. "Can I use your phone?"

Again, no reply.

"I mean, I -- I need some help, here."

The figure pointed at him. Suddenly Hank felt strange. His head started spinning and he collapsed.

When he awoke, Hank found himself in the middle of a field, with nothing anywhere in sight except for large structures, somewhat resembling the climbing sets in a playground. Hank knew not what else to do, so he grabbed a rope and began to climb. Maybe somewhere up here is the way out of this hellish place. There has to be a way out.

... Hasn't there?

Why It Doesn't Understand Friction

 * 1) The title of the game, while fitting, is just one simple word, making it hard to look up the game at all. Other games like Pro Racer also suffer this issue, although only for their North American releases.
 * 2) The gameplay is mostly uneventful, mainly due to not that many mechanics to actually spice up the game to make it enjoyable: you just walk left & right as well as climb up or slide down. Other times it can be frustrating, such as with the poles. The gray poles make you move downward while the gold poles make you move upward. While they can sometimes be used to your advantage & are helpful in certain levels, they can be very annoying most of the time.
 * 3) * Level 1 in particular has it so that in order to get the key, you have to actually press down on the gold pole so that you'll have enough time to get the key to unlock the door, otherwise you'll be stuck where the door is unless you press ESC or load a previous state.
 * 4) * There are some sections where gray & gold poles are put right next to each other, which can lead to several moments of frustration & struggling to go through the game's physics.
 * 5) * The 2 main enemies you'll encounter in the game, the nose spiders & the snakes, can also be a bit annoying as well in some areas.
 * 6) * The key & spring mechanics aren't cleverly used in the levels they are in & are mostly just basic additions to the gameplay formula.
 * 7) The controls, while fine, are kind of stiff in comparison to other games made using the engine, due to the left/right movement presses going by 1 block compared to the up/down movement presses being more floppily in action. This can result in you missing a platform if you hold it for even a tiny bit too long, most of the time to your death.
 * 8) * Sometimes, when you want to just fall down to get to another part of the level easier, the climbing up mechanic won't work & instead you'll just fall to your death.
 * 9) * Sometimes, even when you're only pressing the directional buttons once for every action, your character will still get misaligned due to bad level design here & there.
 * 10) Speaking of which, the level design is rather hit-and-miss. Some of the levels are notably either very generic, or poorly designed.
 * 11) * Level 1's design flaw is already talked about in WIDUF#2.
 * 12) * When you're going down after getting the gray key at the top right of level 3 on the gray pole, you'll be going too fast to predict where you'll end up, therefore meaning you are likely to end up either dying from the snake, dying from the nose spider if going to the right some more, or go to the left some more, miss the horizontal ropes & die from the water.
 * 13) * There are many parts of level 4 where you can easily die due to the spikes being put in many places where they really shouldn't be put due to the level starting off with you having to go down a gray pole due to the nose spider preventing you from going through most of the safe rope. Despite this, it is easy to collect the bonus items that will either give you points or an extra life in the case of the A-J doll.
 * 14) * Level 7 includes a part where you could barely avoid the fire on a lower horizontal rope by going up just far enough to not get hit by it alongside avoiding the snake that goes on the vertical rope, though this is only for an extra life meaning that you'll have to backtrack afterwards, which is easier said than done.
 * 15) * Level 9 involves backtracking that can be stupidly hard because of how some objects are placed & the lightning, which you'll have to wait for in order to progress does not help things at all other than to waste your time.
 * 16) * Level 10, for whatever reason, has a misplaced green mouse in the corner where you can't reach it due to said corner being blocked by a log. Not only that, but there are 3 floating nose spiders near the end of the level for no reason other than to pad the game out & lead to more unfair deaths.
 * 17) * Level 12 has the same lightning problem as level 9.
 * 18) The physics are rather wonky, sometimes due to the engine itself, mainly the gravitational pulls either being too slow to get to another part of the stage or too fast for the player to react to what's coming ahead.
 * 19) The collision detection can also be very wonky, with the spikes somehow having a bigger hitbox than how they look in the surface, with even the tiniest of contact with them leading to instant death. A combination of that & the physics will be a nightmare, & unfortunately that does happen from time to time.
 * 20) * Additionally, level 12 has blocks that if you were to stand beneath them, would put you right below them to the ground where you can't escape.
 * 21) The ending is just a bland advertisement for 20 additional levels you could've purchased for $40 that never got produced, alongside some really bad music taken from a BBS server.

Redeeming Qualities

 * 1) Some levels aren't that bad. For example, level 5 has an interesting mechanics where you can either just go up the gold pole easy peasy, or risk getting all the items with all the lightning attacking you every few moments, therefore actually making that stuff a neat challenge compared to the later levels.
 * 2) * Level 11 is a nice breather level that isn't much to worry about, therefore can be seen as a way to relax while preparing yourself for the rest of the game.
 * 3) * Level 13 is a decent grand finale, showcasing all of the gimmicks from the previous levels combined into a challenging ascend to the top.
 * 4) The music selection is nicely put together, with none of the tracks being truly bad aside from the ending theme.
 * 5) It is a clever experimental game in how it uses physics to make a whole game out of it, even if it wasn't the best.

Videos
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