The Xenophis, a Vulcan exploratory vessel, has incidentally found the mythical sector of Firia where the planets, only reachable through warp tunnels, are told to be made of staggering ice and liquid fire. As a precautionary act, the Xenophis crew are attempting to launch interstellar probes, significantly altered to exist within the Firia atmosphere, in order to learn more of this magnificent piece of the galaxy.

However, evidence shows that the former inhabitants do not like outsiders.

You are the probe, and your mission is to maneuver your way to the other end of the warp tunnel. You are equipped with two shields, one to protect you from icy drones, and another from fiery ones. However, only one shield can be active at a time.

WARNING: Be quick; your nerves will be tested.

Screenshots

Downloads

  • Windows XP, Vista, and 7

    Installer (.exe, 36MB) - Includes all the files and libraries required for running the game
  • Mac OS X Snow Leopard

    Bundle (.dmg, 59MB)
  • Ubuntu, Debian, and potentially other Linux distributions

    Archive with precompiled dynamic libraries (.tar.bz2, 36MB) - Recommended
    Ubuntu/Debian package (.deb)
    Source build - see installation manual

Help

If you're having trouble installing the game, click here for installation instructions & help.

If you still have any enquiries, or would like to report a bug, you may reach me at:

If you have feedback on how to improve the game or any suggestion, please use the feedback service by clicking the button on the left.

Live Capture

Gameplay

In theory, playing the game is very simple: when a drone is approaching you, you must activate the correct shield before it hits you. Failing to do that, you will lose a percentage of your shield's stability. Primarily, there are two kinds of drones you will face:

  1. Chasing drones: you can not escape these
  2. Duette drones: a pair of drones, one of fire and one of ice. You must move and collide with one of them, while regarding, of course, your shield.

There are 4 game modes each zone could be in, each mode has different objectives, suggested difficulty, and possibly a way of playing. Briefly:

  1. Arcade: this is the "normal" mode; your objective is to reach the last portal with your shields intact
  2. Survival: virtually, you can't beat this mode, every time you enter a portal, the game will get harder and you can see how long you will last!
  3. Dodgy: only one of your shields is active and flipping is not possible, you will be faced with Duette drones and you must dodge to stay alive and reach the last portal
  4. Nervebreak: the rules of the game change; the drones have adapted to your shields and you must collide with every drone using the opposite shield. In other words, face fire drones with your ice shield, and ice drones with your fire shield

At the time of the release, there are 6 zones to choose from. Once you engage a zone, you will be briefed with your objective and how to play. Good luck!

Development

Vertigo is an open-source and completely free game licensed under the GPL. You may view and get the source code at its GitHub repository https://github.com/amireh/Vertigo

The engine allows for creating your own custom zones. At the moment you can only do that by scripting. I will post a guide, or better yet create an editor, later, and until then you can view an example sheet in VERITGO_ROOT/resources/zones/example.vzs. The file is heavily commented.

Credits

  • Ten by twenty for their Akashi font, I've used it throughout all the overlays in the game, this website, and other off-resources
  • zy0rg for his fascinating galaxy drawing which I used for the intro scene and the actual sky
  • Job de Boer, from the NHL university in the Netherlands, for sound art
  • Slappy, for his cool Graphical Installer for NSIS

Finally, I'd like to thank Ogre3D and Bullet Physics, and the whole open-source/free-software community for making any of this possible for us indie developers, cheers.