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[Melly]

It's an interesting thing to think about. Maybe we should all start doing the most depressing endings possible and giggle as our player writhe on their seats and redo the game a hundred times trying to find that elusive good ending.

That would be awesome.

[Ivan]

Settle down

[Melly]

I'm being serious. o.o

[Anthony Flack]

It *is* interesting, that.

You give people agency, and so if it all turns out badly, they assume they've made a mistake. A movie with an unhappy ending is understood, because how could it be any different? But with a game... well, we have been so conditioned that player death==whoops, try again.

I don't think it's a good idea to have people off hunting for things that aren't there, and if people assume that the ending is just a fail state part-way to the real conclusion, they will be left confused and frustrated, and feeling like the game is broken.

But at the same time, you can't just pop up a message going "Hey everybody, that's it, there's no secret ending, kthxbai" without spoiling the moment...

So, how to convey to people that they've reached the real ending if it's an unhappy ending, and you want it to be minimalist and anti-climactic? I agree, it's tricky.

I want to know what the fish were up to. I mean, they WANTED you to do all that stuff. They set you up.

[Scypher]

I do wish that the green pod looked more like something that gave me any clue as to its utility.

You see it in close-up on the title screen. It has "CPU" written on it and some symbols that indicate "water" => "death"

Oh, I know, and I recognized that it was the same object; but you can't expect a player on their first playthrough to remember this minor detail that flashes by and equate that to taking the green pod to the dirt patch.

I just think that game puzzles summarized as "take this thing to some place and you figure it out" are game tasks that should be avoided when possible. Which isn't to say that such a puzzle couldn't lend to the game's sense of exploration and discovery - in some games it can do wonders. I didn't think it helped Fathom, though.

But, hey, tiny details. It didn't hurt my opinion of Fathom much.

[NathanielEdwards]

It *is* interesting, that.

You give people agency, and so if it all turns out badly, they assume they've made a mistake. A movie with an unhappy ending is understood, because how could it be any different? But with a game... well, we have been so conditioned that player death==whoops, try again.

I don't think it's a good idea to have people off hunting for things that aren't there, and if people assume that the ending is just a fail state part-way to the real conclusion, they will be left confused and frustrated, and feeling like the game is broken.

But at the same time, you can't just pop up a message going "Hey everybody, that's it, there's no secret ending, kthxbai" without spoiling the moment...

So, how to convey to people that they've reached the real ending if it's an unhappy ending, and you want it to be minimalist and anti-climactic? I agree, it's tricky.

I want to know what the fish were up to. I mean, they WANTED you to do all that stuff. They set you up.

^^^Totally Right About Everything^^^

On a different note, I will also say that I stumbled into every development after the run 'n' gun bit. I think the underwater part had to be confusing and even a bit irritating for the right pace. Pacing is always an issue in games, in this case because you could theoretically stumble onto the seed and soil, then straight onto the passage at the bottom without having to explore, and then you'd finish the game after about five minutes and it would fail completely.

So, the jaggy blocks and dark underwater area is at least partially necessary to make sure it takes the player time to discover what they need to, though it also alienates a lot of people. How many game design paradoxes must this game expose?

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

finally played it. i got past the boss, then the space level, then the secret boss, but can't figure out how to kill it with my bolt-gun (those things you collect do come in useful! wish i had collected more!) i didn't see the water level everyone else was talking about though.

[Anthony Flack]

You guys are amassing loads of bad video game karma by doing that, you know.

It WILL come back and bite you later. The next time you spend four hours looking for a secret exit that doesn't exist, or 100% completion that doesn't reward you with anything, remember this thread, and think "yeah, I deserved that".

[ஒழுக்கின்மை (Paul Eres)]

but if (as i interpret it and as a few others have interpreted it) the point of the game is to make fun of people who only want fun/gameplay over all else in games and look down on games trying to be anything greater than that, then it'd just make the game more powerful for people when they finally realize how pavlovian they're acting

[team_q]

I really enjoyed this, somehow I paced the water part out really well, I found pretty much all the fish, and got to the end, I thought it was fantastic.


As a gamer who hates finding everything and only wants to complete the story, this game fits well.


BUG: When the 3rd to last owl fell on me, it warped backwards 2 spaces.

[Glaiel-Gamer]

but if (as i interpret it and as a few others have interpreted it) the point of the game is to make fun of people who only want fun/gameplay over all else in games and look down on games trying to be anything greater than that, then it'd just make the game more powerful for people when they finally realize how pavlovian they're acting

Ya but there's no rule that says that greater meaning HAS to be less fun

I don't necessarily think that on a large scale the game was that bad or anything. It certainly elicits a response from the player, mainly disappointment and "wtf". I think the majority of the complaints come from minor design oriented things such as underwater movement and a seemingly arbitrary sequence of events needed to get to the ending.

Also, there's a few things which seemed sorta incomplete. If you die in the first part, it just restarts the game, so it seems like death is meaningless unless you die in a very specific way, which doesn't entirely make sense if "water=death" like the game hints at.

I think the game sorta falls in a weird area that's not really well thought our and meaningful art game, and not really the fun art game type either.

Like roher's stuff isn't fun, but it's well thought out so if you enjoy that kind of stuff and figuring out meaning then it has value to it. Likewise, Braid has some artistic meaning, but underneath a fun puzzle with some fun mechanics. It's enjoyable, but not everything seems to have meaning attached to it.

Fathom is between them in that it seems like the type of game where the enjoyment comes out of figuring out its meaning, but there's too many holes involved to give it more than a skin-deep theme.

It's just taking advantage of the law of vagueness. If you make a game that SEEMS artistic, the fans will fill in the meaning for you.

[Ixis]

I agree with Glaiel and a few others. There's no intrinsic value in a game that isn't fun, or rather: games (be they art, for fun, or otherwise) are generally made to either communicate something or to be entertaining, Fathom doesn't do either all too well, unfortunately.

If we are to accept the idea that art games do not have to be fun, then we must believe that they have to convey some sort of meaning. I could go down to the Chicago Museum of Modern art, and while seeing the work of Seurat isn't "Team Fortress 2 FUN!!" there is the fascination in the way your mind interprets pointillism.

A case could be made to say Fathom's intrinsic value isn't in conveying meaning, or being fun, instead it's existence fueled by the workings of a finely put together engine with finely put together pixels, but the very nature of how the game plays out seems to contradict it.

Instead I'm personally comfortable saying it's just some kind of cool post-modern flailing that I have to trick my friends and family into trying out.

[Edmund]

its hard to dance the line between meaningful and fun. im unsure if the the abstract thinkers inability to design a fun game (see passage/grave yard), or the concrete thinkers inability to put out of the box/emotional thinking into a seemingly formulaic design(see mostly everything else).

its obvious that it can be done though, we have ICO, Shadow and Braid as proof of this but its not an easy thing to jump into and something that i think takes a lot of experience to do well.

Though i feel the same way as most of you about this game, i do respect the fact that adam is trying to move out of his comfort zone and try something new. it took balls to release this kind of game and high fives all around for taking the risk.

Good or bad, doing this game gives adam perspective as an artist. he knows what he can improved upon if he decides to make another game in this vein and he also knows what aspects worked. its very hard for an artist to come out of the gates with this great piece of art.. i mean shit even though john blows 1st published game was Braid, he had been working in game design for over 10 years and knew what he was doing.

so yes what im saying is regardless of what anyone says, fathom is a good game for you as an artist and shows growth and your willingness to push your self, and to me i think thats honestly more important then the game itself.

keep it up

-Edmundface
 

[Glaiel-Gamer]

Ya I guess this is just a demo for their flixel framework for flash.

I don't mean to undermine adam's efforts or anything, but I don't really get what they could put into a flash game framework that isn't already in flash besides a few minor things

[Anthony Flack]

If this game was supposed to be Adam's magnum opus, I'd have serious reservations. But taken as a provocative little sketch, it's fine.

[Myron]

Having played through Fathom several times now, I am certain that this was not meant to be a magnum opus. Adam says from the beginning that is a 10 day job, and I highly doubt he would pin his hopes and dreams for his legacy on 10 days of labor.

That said, I feel that this is still an amazing work (especially considering the time constraint).  The narrative is less like a full blown story, and more like a poem, and I think that is an interesting way to deliver a game.

If the game had been like the intro... just level after level of platformer action I am sure it would be awesome, but we wouldn't all be thinking right now. Thinking about what makes our own personal experience with a game satisfying.

I think perhaps some of  the hostility about this game might come from the fact that it is impossible to have a truly happy ending. I think that the necessity to have happy endings tends to make things palatable, but can dilute and ruin otherwise provocative creative works. 

This is what I imagine interactive poetry to be like.  Not everyone likes poetry.  That is fine, but I am sure that the world is better for having poets.

[Farbs]

I think the contrast between the two gameplay areas and their effect on the player is pretty interesting. If you started in the water zone I think this game would have seen a much more positive reaction. The platformy bit is so slick and promises so much that it's disappointing to leave, and even more disappointing to not return.

It's like you promised to take us to Disneyland, pulled over to grab a burger on the way, then turned the car around and drove us home. Burgers are nice and all, but you said we were going to Disneyland!

Interesting.

[John Nesky]

Alright, so the thing that bothers me the most, which I don't understand, is the pit right at the start of the platformer level. It's totally reasonable for someone to accidentally fall in this pit, in fact I think someone earlier in the thread said that they did. But someone who falls in that pit ends up having a different experience from someone who made it all the way to the boss before falling. And I think it's likely that people who don't get to see the boss won't try it again. They will come away with a totally different impression, simply because they randomly fell into a pit by chance.

Given that water and death are supposed to be vaguely the same thing here, instead of restarting the first level after falling into the pit, I think you should just get rid of the pit entirely and not let the player actually die before reaching the boss. That way the player's experience will depend less on randomness.

[AdamAtomic]

That way the player's experience will depend less on randomness.

Exactly!!

[John Nesky]

So the randomness is intentional then?

If this was a game that encouraged replaying, (I feel it doesn't, despite the people who look for alternate endings) then having randomness would make sense to me. People would have the opportunity to see both outcomes and might learn that there is a random element.

But I feel this is more like a movie, where half the people see one movie and half the people see a different movie, and they don't realize that they are missing something and learn about it unless they happen to compare notes.