I'm writing this a little after the release of Trials Rising, the continuation of the Trials series that sees players navigate extraordinary circuits on a quest to perfect the physics and then, if skilled enough, exploit the physics in search of faster and cleaner runs for bigger and better scores.
I thought 'ah, it seems there was a game like Trials way back in the year 2000, this should be interesting', only to find that the actual Trials series itself dates back to the year 2000. So what is this Elasto Mania then? A competitor that died out? Inspiration? Something altogether completely different? Just a neat little game worth playing?
Guess I'll download the demo and find out.
Fun Times
Elasto Mania is a wonderfully simple looking and sounding game. It's a passion project for its designer, clearly, and it's one that doesn't behave like the Trials series at all. The clue is in the title, for you and your bike are bouncier and stretchier than real-world physics would allow. This is going to be doubly challenging, surely...
You have five buttons to worry about. That sounds manageable until you see how they work in practice. Accelerating is an obvious one, but within milliseconds your front wheel will rise into the air and your centre of gravity will shift into a dangerous position.
To correct, you'll nudge left or right to rebalance, but this will often end up bouncing your bike up, which is a skill you ought to learn but a panic-inducing problem when you first do it.
You slam on the brakes, which take that description literally. Your rider lurches forward, the front wheel disappears into the body of the bike, you correct with another nudge in one direction or another and you're bouncing again.
Finally, on level ground, you learn that the space bar flips your paper thin rider around to face the other direction. Now you know how to control your bike, crack on with the levels.
You are generally tasked with safely reaching a flower somewhere in the level. The map will help you locate it, along with any apples you need to collect before the flower welcomes you across the finish line. Don't ask questions, nothing about this game makes sense.
The most obvious stage hazard is the spike trap, which will end your run if you touch one, but you can be caught out by the stage itself if your head ever strikes anything hard. Your arms and body can flail through objects with no problems, as can your bike, but your head and your wheels are your three hitboxes that will determine your success or failure.
Make it to the flower in one piece, by whatever means you can, and you'll complete the level. If you don't, restarts are incredibly quick, but checkpoints are nowhere to be found. This test of your patience starts... now!
Frustrations
You can see from my attempts that even the simple stuff can be tricky, should your bike decide to bounce or your wheels just not get the traction. It is a game about trial and error, in some respects, and finding the best routes through a stage might have you scratching your head until it clicks.
Final Word
When you're in the zone, Elasto Mania reminds me of all those old-school web games that made no sense but passed the time, and that you played long enough to get some level of competency with, but no real amount of skill. In time - often not a lot of time - you'd leave them be for the next flavour of the month, and they'll become little more than a memory, a case of "ah, yeah, I remember that. That was alright, wasn't it?"
Elasto Mania is alright. It's entertaining, it's frustrating, it's rewarding. It's a time filler and a surprise entry to the 1001 list. Another hidden gem. It got me wondering what it looks like when someone who knows the ins and outs of the physics engine gets to play with it.
Oh.
Good luck, folks.
Fun Facts
Everything about this, to me, screamed little homebrew game that got lost to history, but no. In 2014 it got an iOS release and has a sequel and active community of players challenging each other for the fastest times.
Elasto Mania, developed by Balázs Rózsa, first released in 2000.
Version played: Elasto Mania v1.11a, PC, 2000.