Northway Games

Factsheet

Developed by:
Northway Games
Based in Vancouver, B.C. Canada
Radial Games
Based in Vancouver & Santa Monica CA

Release date:
April 5 2016

Platforms:
HTC Vive on Steam
Oculus Touch on the Oculus Store
Playstation VR
Microsoft VR

Regular Price:
USD $19.99

Description

Developed by Northway Games in collaboration with Radial Games. The new Fantastic Contraption has been designed from the ground up to be a room-scale VR game. Imagine walking around a grassy island floating in the sky, building a machine the size of a horse with your own hands, then watching it roll out into the world.

The game uses simple tools: spinning wheels and two types of rods, a bit like the classic wooden Tinkertoys come to life. On each level you have to get a ball to a goal area, but there's never a "right" answer. Working cars, tanks, catapults, conveyor belts, walking creatures or minimalist structures that use only gravity. These contraptions are life sized, right there in front of you, beside and behind you. Every level is infinitely replayable - this is a VR experience you and your friends will play for hours.

History

Fantastic Contraption was originally a building game made way back in 2008. Millions of people played it obsessively and saved over 12 million contraptions. For years we loved the idea of a three dimensional Fantastic Contraption but just couldn't figure out how it would work. Then we tried the Vive.

We started work on Contraption in July 2015. It's been a wild, wild ride.

Features

Build huge contraptions with your own two hands
Room-scale VR with hand support
Surreal and beautiful immersive landscape
Challenging puzzles with infinite solutions
Full 3D audio by Gordon McGladdery

Videos

Launch Trailer (Vive) - YouTube

Gameplay Footage - YouTube

Alpha Teaser - YouTube

Images

download all screenshots as .zip (42MB)

Logo & Keyart

download logo files (including alternates) as .zip (32MB)

Awards & Recognition

"Game Developers Choice Awards" Finalist, Best VR/AR Game, 2017
"Proto Award" Winner, Best Interaction Design, 2016
"Independent Games Festival (IGF)" Finalist, Nuovo Award, 2016
"Unity Awards" Finalist, Best VR Game, 2016
"Sense of Wonder Night (SOWN / TGS)" Winner, Best Tech, 2016
"Vision VR/AR" Finalist, Best VR Experience, 2016

Selected Articles

"Impressively intuitive and whimsical as fuck."
- Nathan Grayson, Kotaku
"Fantastic Contraption is a great puzzle game that keeps you thinking about building new machines long after the headset is off."
- Ian Hamilton, UploadVR
"The game is an absolute blast."
- Jason Evangelho, Forbes
"Fantastic Contraption might leapfrog past other titles to become the upcoming Vive’s first true, must-have game."
- Sam Machkovech, Ars Technica
"Fantastic Contraption works the way you'd expect it to if it somehow existed in the real world, and the result is an imaginative game that rewards creativity. I can't wait to play more."
- Ben Kuchera, Polygon
"It’s a simple premise, but excellently executed in how natural it feels to be in an environment where you can build whatever you can think of with these pipes and wheels."
- Kent Bye, Voices of VR (podcast)
"A 3D VR workshop that puts one in mind of a toddler’s playroom version of Tony Stark’s lab from the Iron Man films."
- Bryant Francis, Gamasutra
"It blew me away (and I'm not being paid to say that!)."
- Northernlion, Youtube

Additional Links

Official mixed-reality Twitch stream
Watch the archives and check the schedule twitch.tv.

Rock Paper Shotgun Interview
Why A Cat Is 100 Times Better rockpapershotgun.com.

Gamasutra Interview
About our team and the game's concept gamasutra.com.

Intel Mixed Reality article
Fantastic Contraption Pioneers Mixed-Reality Virtual Reality Game Trailers software.intel.com.

About Northway Games

Boilerplate
Northway Games is Sarah and Colin Northway, partners in life and in indie games. We alternate taking the lead on games and collaborate with different artists on every project. We spent years traveling full time while making games in 25 different countries, and are now semi-stationary in Vancouver, Canada.

More information
More information on Northway Games, our logo & relevant media are available here.