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[Valter]

I dunno, I didn't progress that far. It didn't interest me even a little bit.

[Kneecaps]

As other people have said, I enjoyed it until the game tried to explain itself.  I don't care how meta they were trying to go for.  Ruining a joke is not cool to me.  Not cool. 

[jimmythechang]

I am 100% behind this

If you're going to enjoy this hobby, you have to realize how ultimately you're just twiddling yo fingers

[Anthony Flack]

don't care how meta they were trying to go for.  Ruining a joke is not cool to me.  Not cool.

Fair call.

[Glaiel-Gamer]

nicely done, although the game would have meant nothing without the artistic statements. That's my biggest beef with it.

[Anthony Flack]

I dunno, when he did that bit with "I've reached a metaphor for life's obstacles; ah yes, the up arrow lifts my spirits - this game is ART!" - that was pretty funny on its own.

[Fuzz]

I dunno, when he did that bit with "I've reached a metaphor for life's obstacles; ah yes, the up arrow lifts my spirits - this game is ART!" - that was pretty funny on its own.

What segment of the actual game was that referring to? I couldn't find it. I also couldn't find the girl who tells you the metaphorical value of the hammer. Regardless, great game. I loved the self-referential consciously pretentious artist statements.

[Anthony Flack]

What segment of the actual game was that referring to? I couldn't find it. I also couldn't find the girl who tells you the metaphorical value of the hammer.

The metaphor for life's obstacles was a box you jumped over. The girl is a different-coloured box who says something like "hey cutie, here's the hammer".

[Mipe]

I closed the game after 5 minutes, hell, I don't think it should even be called a game. But then again my taste may differ from yours. 

[mirosurabu]

Just replayed it. Is there any *right* end? I found three artist statements.

Also, don't forget to press "G" when playing to get the awesome graphics upgrade.

Ah, crap.  :D Is it worth replaying again just to see this? Okay, I'll replay it.

[mirosurabu]

I closed the game after 5 minutes, hell, I don't think it should even be called a game. But then again my taste may differ from yours. 

It seems to be meta-artgame, not just your typical "art game".. It's intentionally like that, I guess. Just play it till the end if you want to know why is it like that.

[Curseman]

To everyone who doesn't understand what the others are talking about or getting out of this game (big spoiler):

After you get to the ending, and the guy at the computer mentions pressing 'i' to go into immersion mode, do it.  Then press 'm' to go to the main menu, and 's' to start the game over again.

[Anthony Flack]

Ah, crap. Is it worth replaying again just to see this? Okay, I'll replay it.

Heh, no it really isn't; it's funny because it's shitty.

[ExciteMike]

Oh jeez.  There should have been some clue that restarting it was different than what you just played... (or maybe I'm just slow)

I don't know, guys.  None of the "art games" I can think of came off heavy-handed like that.  (ones I can think of for the record: Flower, Passage, Gravitation, The Marriage, Braid?, Today I Die, Judith) Satire isn't very cool if the only example of what it's satirizing is itself. (or I'm being slow again) 

[team_q]

I don't know who he is trying to offend, I don't know of any attempts to add unnecessary depth to games that don't welcome it. He set himself up a nice straw man and beat the shit of out of it. This wasn't satire, it wasn't even good parody. I think he needs to put a whole hell of a lot more pretentiousness into the game at the end, if his mark was Indie Art game makers.

Other possibility, he is actually speaking out against the gaming press's gushing over anything new trying to make claims that don't actually hold water, but I think I projecting more what I wish he wrote about then anything.

[ChevyRay]

Haha, this is a neat idea

The whole artistic message is mostly what I thought was considered a "given" though like probably a passing thought I had myself 10 years ago when I first started playing video games. The fact that it's presented like some sort of important, eye-opening message that was supposed to be communicated to us through the game is just silly :D

Then again, I don't really represent the audience that the author is directing this at. I don't become immersed in games at all, and no game/book/movie I've seen yet has been able to take me out of the reality I'm in. Everything I see, play, and listen to, I do so as an audience, and never forgetting where I stand.

But the fact that being such a way should be considered "better" is just atrocious. What if this message really communicated itself to a gamer, and after that... s/he was no longer able to immerse him/herself in games or movies anymore, because s/he was always stricken with this reality of how idiotic s/he appeared to "everybody else". There's a certain kind of beauty to being able to lose yourself in something, and even not being a person who it happens to, I can see that. To just outright slander it is a bit over-conservative.

But if we didn't have super-conservatives, who would keep all our super-liberalists in line

[GregWS]

Haha, opposite end of the spectrum: I find immersion incredibly incredibly easy, too easy in fact.  Which is why I can't play games like Fallout 3 because they really get to me and freak me out way more than most people who have that "audience distance."  Other than just natural ease/challenge, I think immersion does have a significant choice factor, and if you don't choose to let yourself be immersed you just won't be (but yeah, even the ability to do this varies from person to person).

Actually, finding immersion as easy as I do is pretty awful with games at times, because I'm a very ethical/moral guy, and if I'm immersed in an experience trying to force me to do something wrong I just really want to shut the game off.  That's what happened with Shadow of the Colossus (which my brother had bought, so no loss for me): I could tell pretty quickly that killing them was a really really bad idea (which SPOILER: it sure is given it releases some super-evil demon/devil thing that consumes the player in a way), and I just couldn't enjoy the game and didn't play it (I ended up watching my brother play because I was curious about the game's story/hype, and it is an incredible game to watch).

[Captain_404]

Spoilers ahead. Highlight please.

Doesn't the game's main argument here a bit self defeating? The author is basically arguing that games cannot be art and cannot convey meaning in the same way that art does, and yet, his game carries a very forceful message.

I think this game is pretentious in and of itself, apart from its creator's statements. To me, it comes off more as an angry rant. As a way of saying to art games, "Ha! Look at how dumb you look!" rather than honest criticism.

Does it have valid points? Sure. Even the good art games are still a bit simplistic, I think everyone is still trying to get a feel for the medium, it's the experimentation and learning that happen before you can really do anything with a skill. Obviously, games have a long way to go before we make something truly astounding and fully deserving of both the terms "game" and "art." However, I don't think the author of this game has taken the time to truly understand the attempts that have been made thus far.

Perhaps this smacks of my own pretentiousness, I don't really care.


Interesting fact: Venetian oil painting was widely considered to be a silly passtime until around the time of Michelangelo.

[Fuzz]

I don't think this game is in reference to indie art games. I believe it's in reference to big budget AAA titles that gamers put unnecessary meaning into where there is none.

[team_q]

I don't think this game is in reference to indie art games. I believe it's in reference to big budget AAA titles that gamers put unnecessary meaning into where there is none.

I think I agree with this, and we are just being hypersensitive. I've seen discussions about games like Bioshock, Fable 2 and Fallout 3, that border on the deeper meanings about various gameplay elements. Honestly they all are just kill the shit out of almost everything, every other description might be trying to wring more out then what is there.