Engage the Imagination, Round Two

Entirely coincidentally, not long after posting my previous entry longing for an opportunity to make use of my imagination once again when playing games, PlayStation Plus heeded my cry and delivered me a lovely little morsel of gaming pleasure.

Thomas Was Alone (or, Christopher was Depressed as Mrs Howell insists on calling it, much to my amusement), takes the very essence of games - the humble square - and weaves a short but perfectly timed story that portrays a group of newly created Artificial Intelligences as they try and make sense of the world around them.

The minimalistic imagery throughout the game forces the player to flesh the world out in their own minds. The black and grey world suggests sprawling oceans, deep chasms and caves and high mountains, but this suggestion is all that is required. Much like Defender, we need only be given a basic representation and our minds can do the rest of the work for us.

It is the characterisation, and the interplay between what are ultimately just different geometric shapes, that are the most poignant example of minimalistic representation in games. The individual characters each have very notable personalities - they have complexes about their weight, they demonstrate paranoia, neuroses and jealousy. I found myself on more than one occasion getting more than a little annoyed with John's arrogance...

Look at John. All tall and yellow. Pah.

All of these character traits are portrayed through no more than shape, and some masterfully delivered voice acting. This voice acting, admittedly, could be viewed as the game still essentially dictating to the player what they should make of the characters in the game. However, because it is delivered entirely in the form of internal monologue, and never as direct communication between characters, it promotes a feeling of awkward tension throughout the story. The player knows what the characters think and feel. They are burdened with the issues, anxieties and worries of multiple characters, and through this, are able to infer far more meaning on in-game actions than the game explicitly demonstrates. The high, floaty jumping of John is punctuated (in my mind at least) with a smug grin and air of superiority over the other characters that makes him a fundamentally irritating individual. The discovery by Claire that she can float on water, making her indispensable to the other characters, is an amusing moment, that evolves into something much more powerful as her insecurities about her size become more apparent. 

This game has, by a long way, offered more memorable characters than any others I have played recently - and all of this is achieved through clever use of minimal assets. Being able to sum up the game with a name and an adjective, regardless of their combination, says a lot about the purity of the content. Thomas was Alone. Christopher was Depressed. John was Tall. Claire was Insecure. Laura was Bouncy. All are accurate, and get the point of the game, and the essence of the characters, across immediately.

I'll end here for today. Peter is late...

Engage the Imagination - The Rest is Elementary

The reason I continued to play games after being given a SNES for my 9th birthday (cheers Dad, look what you did to me!), was because I could immediately, at the touch of a button (more, the clunk of a power switch back then really) be taken into a multitude of other worlds. Literally hundreds upon of hundreds of different environments, different cultures, different laws of physics and different perspectives on life, at my fingertips. 

Receiving a new game was like Christmas, regardless of the time of year, and having to wait entire days at school just to get back and play it was torturous. I remember many times dreaming in different game worlds, and finding myself wondering what living in them would be like. A child's imagination is, of course, an incredibly active thing at the best of times, and games were not by any means the only thing that enabled that imagination to run riot - a good book was just as effective.

I often find myself engaged in some sort of discussion revolving around the topic of "games were better in the old days" (bearing in mind, I myself am only 25, and the old days to me simply mean when a can of Coke was 40p). Usually, people say that they only seem better now, because of the nostalgia factor - looking back on your first gaming experiences is always going to be an emotional process. However, I think there is something quite tangible, and hugely important that is missing from nearly all games in the modern day. It is something that, ironically, is only likely to get worse as technology improves. The ability of games to engage the imagination.

Defender on the Atari 2600. Mmmm. Blocky.

Defender pictured above on the Atari 2600 portrays a highly advanced fighter jet patrolling the skies of a sprawling metropolis, gallantly risking all to send invaders to a fiery, explosive death on the ground below. Honestly, it does. We don't need to be shown it does, our imagination is able to take the very basic visual information available and mentally convert it into an action-packed scenario that James Cameron himself would be proud of. The same goes for just about any game from the earliest years of the industry. The very lack of graphical power possessed by hardware at the time meant imaginations were needed to piece together the world into something thrilling, something engaging, and importantly, something personal, to each individual player.

This individual nature of the play experience is what some may mistake for 'nostalgia'. It is something that is far, far harder to come across in today's games. You're told exactly who you are. You're told what you're doing. You're told why you're doing it. You're told when to move, when to stop, when to jump, shoot, duck, run... there is little room left for the imagination to be unleashed. Even games like Spec Ops: The Line which inserts some very challenging and powerful plot twists, still ultimately tells you what you should think, even if you have some choices in the matter.

This is why games that are purposely abstracted from reality (games that some label as 'Art Games' nowadays), such as Limbo, in my opinion are so much more memorable. They're still more explicit in their visual representation of their worlds than the likes of Defender, but they leave a lot more up to the imagination, which allows a much greater individuality to shine through and impact the play experience.

The 'indie' games sector has seen a massive rise in popularity over this previous generation, and the games produced in the sector often hark back to the 'good ol' days of gaming' (40p Coke era again). Admittedly, part of the reason here is budget - 16/32bit style graphics are substantially cheaper after all. But, many indie developers are in the privileged position of being able to make the type of games that they grew up on, and want to continue to play. It's a gap that isn't really filled through any other part of the industry.

Now, this isn't to say that the likes of Blizzard, Activision and EA should suddenly drop everything, and start making the likes of Super Metroid or Super Punch Out! again. Photorealism in games has its place for sure. But take a step back from your accurately modelled carbon-fibre weave, the lovingly crafted physics of Dead or Alive (>_>) or the slightly more accurate 'wet clothing shader' on Lara, and think. Do players need to see this level of realism? Or, would they rather engage their imaginations a little bit more, and delve into a more engaging, if less high-resolution, world of wonder and intrigue?

With imagination working away, realism and accuracy becomes secondary, the graphics that represent the world become simply a means to an end. Alone in the Dark looks thoroughly comical by today's standards, but is regarded as one of the high points of horror gaming for its dark, tense atmosphere and engaging world. This is a world fully represented with fewer polygons than Master Chief's head. 

Re-engage the mind, and re-engage that childish imagination. This is a world we could certainly use a little cognitive break from from time to time.

Have you seen the price of a can of Coke?

Weddings, Pigs and Houses

My last post was a shockingly long time ago. Bad Pete. 

Lots has been going on though. I haven't been sitting around twiddling my thumbs (as much as I would love some time to do just that) - no no, instead I've been really a rather busy little piggy.

Firstly, the wedding that has been in the planning for the best part of 2 years finally happened on December the 23rd - a truly amazing day (due in no small part to my wife's meticulous, almost scary level of precision and planning) and one that will be remembered forever. Oh, and the fact that Katie surprised me with a little vehicular present in the morning...

Phwoar!

Yes, a shiny Aston Martin DB9 (with a mere 400 miles on the clock no less) to drive me to the venue. It was felt necessary to go a bit Gangnam Style on it, to truly appreciate it's splendour. It also put us into a bit of James Bond mood, so we had to, of course, have a few photos along those lines...

Our attempt at being suave and sophisticated... Shut up.

After a wonderful ceremony in the picturesque country house, and having more cameras pointed at us than I think we will ever experience again, I managed to deliver a reasonably eloquent speech. This surprised me I have to say. Especially as I'd rewritten the entire thing 48 hours previously. Maybe standing up in front of rooms full of students is finally paying off, who knows...

Just after signing the register, during the closest thing we'll likely get to being paparazzi-fied...

Cutting the delicious cake, kindly made by our close friend Kelzky

I'll post a few more photos once we get the professional shots back from the photographers too.

So, after that, and our honeymoon in Lapland (during which I drove a Husky Dog Team - badly - a SnowMobile - slightly better - and Cross Country skied - primarily on my backside) it is finally time to get back to working on this little game. Being a husband, I need to bring home the bacon now see.

Completion is so close, one can almost taste the salty, smoked finish. However, we still have a little way to go, so no confirmed release date yet (Sorry everyone on Frictional's forums, but just so I don't get misquoted or anything! I know you're all eager for information...). But boy is it looking (and sounding) good - Our audio designer has been back on project for a few weeks, not to mention the excellent stuff that has been going on from the rest of the team too. It's going to be a hectic month.

Hectic too, because for some reason, after the huge stress of wedding planning, we thought it would be a logical idea to move house in the next month. So, in a few weeks we'll be off to the lovely little village of Wallington. Phew. Finally, then, I may be able to return to some semblance of a routine.

But, I won't speak too soon... Who knows what may be just around the corner. Oh, and of course, at some point, there's the small matter of a PhD thesis that needs to be written...

Dum de dum.