The idea behind the TouchArcade Game of the Week is that every Friday afternoon we post the one game that came out this week that we think is worth giving a special nod to. Now, before anyone goes over-thinking this, it doesn’t necessarily mean our Game of the Week pick is the highest scoring game in a review, the game with the best graphics, or really any other quantifiable “best” thing. Instead, it’s more just us picking out the single game out of the week’s releases that we think is the most noteworthy, surprising, interesting, or really any other hard to describe quality that makes it worth having if you were just going to pick up one.
These picks might be controversial, and that’s OK. If you disagree with what we’ve chosen, let’s try to use the comments of these articles to have conversations about what game is your game of the week and why.
Without further ado…
Peak’s Edge
We love developer Kenny Sun’s quirky sense of game design, and in fact his previous efforts Yankai’s Peak and Twinfold have both earned our Game of the Week recommendations in the past. It’s fitting then that his latest release, called Peak’s Edge, is also receiving that same honor today as it’s something of a mashup of those two game ideas. Yankai’s Peak had you moving a pyramid through a level made up of triangular grids and pushing moving other pyramids of various colors to their proper spots using a set of mechanics that was based around swiveling at anchor points at the tips of these pyramids. Twinfold was like a roguelike dungeon crawler but using the merging mechanics of Threes.
So when you blend elements of those two games together? That’s right. You get Peak’s Edge. It’s a single screen dungeon crawler like Twinfold and you play as a pyramid who moves about by flopping onto its four different sides on a triangular grid floor. There are other pyramids roaming about who are your enemies, and like many typical roguelikes movement and combat is turn-based, so you’ll move a space and then your enemies will move a space and so forth. Combat is as simple as just rolling into an enemy who is right up against you, but you can only absorb one hit on each side of your triangle so you’ll need to be crafty about which side you line up against an enemy so they don’t kill you with their attack.
There are also a whole bunch of different armor types you can collect by rolling onto the square where they’re placed. Whichever side lands on that armor square gets equipped with it, and because a pyramid has 4 sides you can have up to 4 different armors equipped at the same time. This also means you can only use an armor’s unique properties or abilities based on how you move and which side is either facing the floor or facing an enemy. In fact, I’d say more than anything else Peak’s Edge is about strategizing how you position yourself in each level. Sure, the first couple of floors you might be able to just roll around bashing into enemies and make a little progress. But before long you’re going to have to really think about and plan your movements carefully, as runs can end in the blink of the eye if you don’t.
That’s probably what I love most about Peak’s Edge, and really many of Kenny Sun’s titles. It’s like this little digital toy that you can chew on and contemplate as you progress your way deeper into the game, and it’s filled with tons of moments where you just plain feel like a genius for how you dealt with a certain situation. Or the polar opposite where you just feel like a jack ass for the poor choice you made that led to your death. Both types of moments are very satisfying! So if you’ve enjoyed any of Kenny Sun’s previous work or you’re just a fan of roguelikes and are interested in a very unique take on them, Peak’s Edge is very worth your time. It’s free with ads and IAP to remove them so there’s no reason not to give it a shot.
Source: https://toucharcade.com/2020/06/12/toucharcade-game-of-the-week-peaks-edge/
