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‘Just like us, he is no longer alone, Kiskill... But he is now accompanied by his madness.’
– Serge Le Tendre, Régis Loisel, La Quête de l'oiseau du temps, vol. 4, 1987.
In the second half of the 1980s, Infogrames began to produce a series of games with revolutionary ambitions. Eager to promote French creative excellence, the studio opted to adapt Franco-Belgian comic books with a distinctive accent on maturity, as well as writing original scripts. Their efforts to acquire licences brought them into the limelight in the 1990s, when they signed an exploitation deal with SEPP, which owned the rights to the Dupuis characters, and later with Casterman and the Hergé Foundation. In 1988, however, their two major adaptations were of Les Passagers du vent (1979) and La Quête de l'oiseau du temps (1987). The first belonged to the historical tradition of the French bande-dessinée and was an exceptional success with the public. The latter was part of the new fantasy movement developing in France, still connected to science fiction by its ecological concerns – similar themes can be found in Nathalie Henneberg's Les Dieux verts (1961), Jean-Pierre Andrevon's Les Hommes-machines contre Gandahar (1969) and Francis Berthelot's Khanaor (1983).
The aesthetic of French adventure games in the 1980s
La Quête de l'oiseau du temps unites the unique creativity of Jean Giraud and the expansive style of Jean-Claude Mézières, who taught Serge Le Tendre and Régis Loisel when they were students at the Faculté de Vincennes. Spread over four volumes, La Quête de l'oiseau du temps is an exercise in contemplation set in a fantasy world where all the characters are prisoners of their passions. The story follows the knight Bragon, who is called out of retirement by the sorceress-princess Mara, his former love. She asks him, through her daughter Pélisse, to collect some rare artefacts in order to prevent the resurrection of the cursed god Ramor. The adventure in the Seven Marches of Akbar is characterised by powerful changes in the colour palette. The pastoral tones of the beginning give way to the mournful greys of the Voiles d'Écume, before the heroes take the road of the Lèvres de Sable and their powerful ochres, which underline the intense corruption, and so forth until the end of the story.
Replicating the composition and colours of the original material is no easy task, and Infogrames has done its best. The Atari ST and Amiga versions have some nice tones and use wonderful pixel-art, but their slightly washed-out appearance fails to fully convey the strong contrasts of the bande-dessinée. On the other hand, the adaptation chooses to give the player complete freedom to explore the different regions without really justifying its mechanics. The title's problem is that it does not appeal to an audience accustomed to adventure games, nor to fans of the comics. Indeed, while La Quête de l'oiseau du temps is astonishing in that it avoids using a text parser in favour of pure mouse interaction, the game's progression is particularly cryptic within this particular interactive system. Within each location, the player will find it difficult to understand what to interact with and who to talk to. The game attempts to emulate the chaotic adventures of the original story, but struggles to convey the same complexity. For example, the confrontation with Shan-Thung is reduced to the absolute minimum, making some interactions impossible to deduce for anyone not already familiar with the story.
An inability to convey the melancholy of the original work
The game has made major changes to the story, making the plot less coherent and stripping the original work of its tragic weight. One of the successes of the bande-dessinée was to show how the ageing characters no longer fit into a world on the brink of collapse, and how they are scarred by a destructive melancholy. Bodias now serves only as an excuse to move the narrative forward, and is not developed in any meaningful way, preventing the player from understanding why his theatricality is a sign of deep malaise. In this respect, it is a complete misinterpretation to see the Mille Verts forest as majestic as ever, when it was completely ravaged by fire in the comics. The adaptation makes all the characters one-dimensional, refusing to show the tensions and doubts that permeate the story. One perhaps positive consequence of such an approach is undoubtedly the attenuation of the sexist eroticism that enveloped the bande-dessinée. Pélisse was always reduced to her feminine curves, and constantly scolded by Bragon; her silence in the game at least limits the impact of the male gaze.
While the nostalgic palette chosen by Infogrames appeals to an audience fascinated by the past, it is difficult not to see this adaptation of La Quête de l'oiseau du temps as an overly ambitious undertaking, mechanically, narratively and artistically. The free exploration is superfluous, as are the rations mechanic and random battles in the overworld. The original story is mishandled, and the revelation about the Time Bird becomes meaningless – not to mention the fact that the game completely alters the ending, leading to a very disappointing and misguided happy ending. Some of the backgrounds are taken directly from the comic book panels, but these are generally too few and lacking in panache. The title tries to hide its interface by allowing the player to interact directly with the boxes that open up on the screen, but the result is mostly clumsy, as it is often necessary to call up an abstract and inelegant menu between each action.
The great achievement of the bande-dessinée was to layer stories and arguments through a creative juxtaposition of panels. Some pages featured a magnificent large vertical box that set the tone and allowed the eye to move between all the details. In the final volumes, long red boxes cross the page like a cruel judgement, accentuated by a sinister colour. The adaptation of La Quête de l'oiseau du temps offers none of this. It is a pity, but there is something mystical about these design failings. In a way, for anyone who has read the original story, the game is a perfect illustration of its themes. Inadvertently, Infogrames has succeeded in highlighting the tragedy of passions that swell more than they really need to.
– Serge Le Tendre, Régis Loisel, La Quête de l'oiseau du temps, vol. 4, 1987.
In the second half of the 1980s, Infogrames began to produce a series of games with revolutionary ambitions. Eager to promote French creative excellence, the studio opted to adapt Franco-Belgian comic books with a distinctive accent on maturity, as well as writing original scripts. Their efforts to acquire licences brought them into the limelight in the 1990s, when they signed an exploitation deal with SEPP, which owned the rights to the Dupuis characters, and later with Casterman and the Hergé Foundation. In 1988, however, their two major adaptations were of Les Passagers du vent (1979) and La Quête de l'oiseau du temps (1987). The first belonged to the historical tradition of the French bande-dessinée and was an exceptional success with the public. The latter was part of the new fantasy movement developing in France, still connected to science fiction by its ecological concerns – similar themes can be found in Nathalie Henneberg's Les Dieux verts (1961), Jean-Pierre Andrevon's Les Hommes-machines contre Gandahar (1969) and Francis Berthelot's Khanaor (1983).
The aesthetic of French adventure games in the 1980s
La Quête de l'oiseau du temps unites the unique creativity of Jean Giraud and the expansive style of Jean-Claude Mézières, who taught Serge Le Tendre and Régis Loisel when they were students at the Faculté de Vincennes. Spread over four volumes, La Quête de l'oiseau du temps is an exercise in contemplation set in a fantasy world where all the characters are prisoners of their passions. The story follows the knight Bragon, who is called out of retirement by the sorceress-princess Mara, his former love. She asks him, through her daughter Pélisse, to collect some rare artefacts in order to prevent the resurrection of the cursed god Ramor. The adventure in the Seven Marches of Akbar is characterised by powerful changes in the colour palette. The pastoral tones of the beginning give way to the mournful greys of the Voiles d'Écume, before the heroes take the road of the Lèvres de Sable and their powerful ochres, which underline the intense corruption, and so forth until the end of the story.
Replicating the composition and colours of the original material is no easy task, and Infogrames has done its best. The Atari ST and Amiga versions have some nice tones and use wonderful pixel-art, but their slightly washed-out appearance fails to fully convey the strong contrasts of the bande-dessinée. On the other hand, the adaptation chooses to give the player complete freedom to explore the different regions without really justifying its mechanics. The title's problem is that it does not appeal to an audience accustomed to adventure games, nor to fans of the comics. Indeed, while La Quête de l'oiseau du temps is astonishing in that it avoids using a text parser in favour of pure mouse interaction, the game's progression is particularly cryptic within this particular interactive system. Within each location, the player will find it difficult to understand what to interact with and who to talk to. The game attempts to emulate the chaotic adventures of the original story, but struggles to convey the same complexity. For example, the confrontation with Shan-Thung is reduced to the absolute minimum, making some interactions impossible to deduce for anyone not already familiar with the story.
An inability to convey the melancholy of the original work
The game has made major changes to the story, making the plot less coherent and stripping the original work of its tragic weight. One of the successes of the bande-dessinée was to show how the ageing characters no longer fit into a world on the brink of collapse, and how they are scarred by a destructive melancholy. Bodias now serves only as an excuse to move the narrative forward, and is not developed in any meaningful way, preventing the player from understanding why his theatricality is a sign of deep malaise. In this respect, it is a complete misinterpretation to see the Mille Verts forest as majestic as ever, when it was completely ravaged by fire in the comics. The adaptation makes all the characters one-dimensional, refusing to show the tensions and doubts that permeate the story. One perhaps positive consequence of such an approach is undoubtedly the attenuation of the sexist eroticism that enveloped the bande-dessinée. Pélisse was always reduced to her feminine curves, and constantly scolded by Bragon; her silence in the game at least limits the impact of the male gaze.
While the nostalgic palette chosen by Infogrames appeals to an audience fascinated by the past, it is difficult not to see this adaptation of La Quête de l'oiseau du temps as an overly ambitious undertaking, mechanically, narratively and artistically. The free exploration is superfluous, as are the rations mechanic and random battles in the overworld. The original story is mishandled, and the revelation about the Time Bird becomes meaningless – not to mention the fact that the game completely alters the ending, leading to a very disappointing and misguided happy ending. Some of the backgrounds are taken directly from the comic book panels, but these are generally too few and lacking in panache. The title tries to hide its interface by allowing the player to interact directly with the boxes that open up on the screen, but the result is mostly clumsy, as it is often necessary to call up an abstract and inelegant menu between each action.
The great achievement of the bande-dessinée was to layer stories and arguments through a creative juxtaposition of panels. Some pages featured a magnificent large vertical box that set the tone and allowed the eye to move between all the details. In the final volumes, long red boxes cross the page like a cruel judgement, accentuated by a sinister colour. The adaptation of La Quête de l'oiseau du temps offers none of this. It is a pity, but there is something mystical about these design failings. In a way, for anyone who has read the original story, the game is a perfect illustration of its themes. Inadvertently, Infogrames has succeeded in highlighting the tragedy of passions that swell more than they really need to.
'The sky is sick, and the streets weep molten metal. And no one's sure how we got here.'
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (13th Jun. – 19th Jun., 2023).
By the end of the 1980s, with a comedy-driven formula, Sierra had reached the limits of AGI, its game engine designed to facilitate the creation of graphical adventures. To diversify its catalogue, Sierra commissioned a game from Evryware and gave them carte blanche to produce it. The collaboration between the two studios goes back to Championship Boxing (1983), which incorporated elements of strategy into its boxing matches, before Evryware went to Brøderbund with their series The Ancient Art of War (1984). Manhunter: New York (1988) was a first foray into the world of adventure games and a significant departure from Sierra's narrative habits. The game was particularly dark and intended for an adult audience, introducing very explicit violence. The latter may have indirectly influenced the studio, which became grittier in the 1990s with titles such as Phantasmagoria II: A Puzzle of Flesh (1996). More subtly, Manhunter's close-ups left their mark, appearing in Sierra's own titles as early as Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon (1989).
The Manhunter series recently inspired Ross Joseph Gardner and Aviv Salinas to create their psycho thriller Elsewhere in the Night. The player assumes the role of Lady Tick Tock as she investigates the disappearance and murder of Logan Cole, the latest in a series of gruesome killings. While EGA's colour palette and shot composition, with its disquieting urban frontality, are immediately reminiscent of Manhunter, there are several structural differences that call into question the relevance of such a tribute project. Firstly, Elsewhere in the Night reverses Manhunter's premise, pitting the detective directly against the city's legitimate authority: the title rejects the sterile apolitical nature of the original game to offer a brief critique of the police and capitalism, playing with an aesthetic reminiscent of cyberpunk. This is a laudable intention, but the discourse stands in stark contrast to the game's visual style and certain representational choices.
Because it is so concise, the title never really develops its subversive discourse, wandering awkwardly between criticism and rehashing the clichés of 1980s punk fiction and alternative comics. It is difficult to glean anything from the vulgarity of the various characters other than the simplistic vision of a decaying society. Similarly, the nudity of the antagonist and his sexual perversity echo the codes developed in the psycho thriller genre – which has often indulged in inappropriately depicting the disturbed psyches of criminals – but mostly feel very uncomfortable. Throughout the various interactions, Lady Tick Tock is constantly returned to her status as a woman, which she never really manages to transcend: the end of the game marks a shift in her personality towards a more amiable and sensitive attitude, reverting to a traditional vision of femininity.
Elsewhere in the Night is thus torn between retrograde influences and a deliberately more modern discourse, without managing to find an effective and ingenious synthesis. By never really subverting the visual codes of Manhunter, the title is forced to make major concessions in order to function. In particular, the game refuses to copy Manhunter's gratuitous violence through disturbing close-ups of corpses, despite the killer's gruesome modus operandi, lest it become obscenely voyeuristic. This is perhaps an admission of failure, especially when comparing Elsewhere in the Night to titles such as the Switch remake of Famicom Tantei Club: Kieta Kōkeisha (2021) or Paranormasight (2023). Both of these games manage to depict death explicitly, emphasising its tragic aspect and how it expresses the rupture of the social contract through a frightening sobriety.
Limited by its form, Elsewhere in the Night can only hint at anti-capitalist imagery, but remains largely empty. This is particularly unfortunate when compared to another project by Ross Joseph Gardner, Blood Nova (2022), which handled its references much more elegantly. Inspired by a more contemplative point-n-click tradition, such as Future Wars (1989), Loom (1990) and the works of Wadjet Eye Games, Blood Nova constructed a much more successful discourse on nostalgia and love, both through its dialogue and its wistful art direction. Though not unpleasant thanks to its accessible puzzle formula and notable for being free, Elsewhere in the Night struggles to properly mobilise Manhunter, whose historical relevance remains essentially technical. As such, Elsewhere in the Night features some charming locations, but remains a rather pointless exercise in reference.
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (13th Jun. – 19th Jun., 2023).
By the end of the 1980s, with a comedy-driven formula, Sierra had reached the limits of AGI, its game engine designed to facilitate the creation of graphical adventures. To diversify its catalogue, Sierra commissioned a game from Evryware and gave them carte blanche to produce it. The collaboration between the two studios goes back to Championship Boxing (1983), which incorporated elements of strategy into its boxing matches, before Evryware went to Brøderbund with their series The Ancient Art of War (1984). Manhunter: New York (1988) was a first foray into the world of adventure games and a significant departure from Sierra's narrative habits. The game was particularly dark and intended for an adult audience, introducing very explicit violence. The latter may have indirectly influenced the studio, which became grittier in the 1990s with titles such as Phantasmagoria II: A Puzzle of Flesh (1996). More subtly, Manhunter's close-ups left their mark, appearing in Sierra's own titles as early as Space Quest III: The Pirates of Pestulon (1989).
The Manhunter series recently inspired Ross Joseph Gardner and Aviv Salinas to create their psycho thriller Elsewhere in the Night. The player assumes the role of Lady Tick Tock as she investigates the disappearance and murder of Logan Cole, the latest in a series of gruesome killings. While EGA's colour palette and shot composition, with its disquieting urban frontality, are immediately reminiscent of Manhunter, there are several structural differences that call into question the relevance of such a tribute project. Firstly, Elsewhere in the Night reverses Manhunter's premise, pitting the detective directly against the city's legitimate authority: the title rejects the sterile apolitical nature of the original game to offer a brief critique of the police and capitalism, playing with an aesthetic reminiscent of cyberpunk. This is a laudable intention, but the discourse stands in stark contrast to the game's visual style and certain representational choices.
Because it is so concise, the title never really develops its subversive discourse, wandering awkwardly between criticism and rehashing the clichés of 1980s punk fiction and alternative comics. It is difficult to glean anything from the vulgarity of the various characters other than the simplistic vision of a decaying society. Similarly, the nudity of the antagonist and his sexual perversity echo the codes developed in the psycho thriller genre – which has often indulged in inappropriately depicting the disturbed psyches of criminals – but mostly feel very uncomfortable. Throughout the various interactions, Lady Tick Tock is constantly returned to her status as a woman, which she never really manages to transcend: the end of the game marks a shift in her personality towards a more amiable and sensitive attitude, reverting to a traditional vision of femininity.
Elsewhere in the Night is thus torn between retrograde influences and a deliberately more modern discourse, without managing to find an effective and ingenious synthesis. By never really subverting the visual codes of Manhunter, the title is forced to make major concessions in order to function. In particular, the game refuses to copy Manhunter's gratuitous violence through disturbing close-ups of corpses, despite the killer's gruesome modus operandi, lest it become obscenely voyeuristic. This is perhaps an admission of failure, especially when comparing Elsewhere in the Night to titles such as the Switch remake of Famicom Tantei Club: Kieta Kōkeisha (2021) or Paranormasight (2023). Both of these games manage to depict death explicitly, emphasising its tragic aspect and how it expresses the rupture of the social contract through a frightening sobriety.
Limited by its form, Elsewhere in the Night can only hint at anti-capitalist imagery, but remains largely empty. This is particularly unfortunate when compared to another project by Ross Joseph Gardner, Blood Nova (2022), which handled its references much more elegantly. Inspired by a more contemplative point-n-click tradition, such as Future Wars (1989), Loom (1990) and the works of Wadjet Eye Games, Blood Nova constructed a much more successful discourse on nostalgia and love, both through its dialogue and its wistful art direction. Though not unpleasant thanks to its accessible puzzle formula and notable for being free, Elsewhere in the Night struggles to properly mobilise Manhunter, whose historical relevance remains essentially technical. As such, Elsewhere in the Night features some charming locations, but remains a rather pointless exercise in reference.
2022
'Pinball predates civilization.'
Played with BertKnot.
The release of Evangelion: 3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time (2021) marked the de facto end of an era for Japanese animation. By recasting his franchise in a contemplative and optimistic light, Hideaki Anno emphasised the need to embrace life in all its complexity and to take care of ourselves. While fans remain divided over which version they prefer, with some favouring the ending of The End of Evangelion (1997), the change in tone has been recognised as Anno's new-found serenity. The 1997 film represented an excision of his otaku side through the flames of Purgatory, a bitter violence necessitated by the fans' deviation from the discourse developed in the anime. Thrice Upon a Time takes a much more contemplative approach, marking a genuine process of mourning and reconstruction. In particular, the film subtly weaves its characters into real-life scenes, highlighting their relationships with a wider society.
Rewriting and recontextualisation in Japanese pop-culture
This process of recontextualisation involves a dialogue between official production and fan production. Nicolle Lamerichs shows how the perception of characters is fluid and how fandom reclaims canonical characters to express themes beyond the author's control [1]. The figure of Shinji is particularly subject to these transformations, as he represents the otaku identity and the outcasts of Japanese society. By setting Shinji and the other characters in familiar settings – scenes similar to those in the anime and The End of the Evangelion, but also in everyday sceneries – Anno leaves it to the audience to completely reappropriate these characters, emphasising only their verisimilitude or, conversely, their artificiality. Such rewriting strategies are not uncommon in modern popular fiction, and the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise has demonstrated a surprising plasticity in recent years.
Through fan imagination, recent games, the Sonic Boom series (2014), and the Sonic the Hedgehog films (2020, 2022), the franchise has slowly shed the remnants of its kawaī aestheticism and taken on a more serious tone. The culmination was the release of Sonic Frontiers, the marketing cycle of which initially highlighted the shift in the series. The advent of the open world was supposed to renew the game formula, and the visual direction was meant to reflect a new gravitas for the hero, pondering the interpersonal relationships he has with his friends. For a game about renewal, the communication around Sonic Frontiers was relatively timid: the first gameplay footage was withheld for a long time, particularly the Cyberspace stages. This was probably due to the chaotic state of the title, which suffered from multiple development iterations and a serious lack of budget.
Meaningless references: a futile search for identity
The player assumes the role of Sonic and must explore the Starfall Islands to rescue his friends who have been trapped in a parallel dimension by Dr Eggman and his artificial intelligence, Sage. The adventure consists of exploring five islands filled with micro-objectives that allow the player to collect Chaos Emeralds and engage with the local Titan, who protects the barrier between the real world and reality. Sonic Frontiers borrows extensively from The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017), to the point where the original project was intended to be a much slower experience, with Sonic able to walk slowly and ride a horse [2]. The game makes no attempt to hide its direct inspiration, so much so that it directly recreates the Blood Moon scene and simply turns it into a Starfall one. The title rips off ideas from all the recent productions, turning them into a crucible with no identity. The general setting is that of Breath of the Wild, with a soundtrack that loosely copies the ethereal piano sound design, while the battles against the Titans are largely inspired by Shadow of the Colossus (2005), with the same sense of gradual scaling.
The combat system is inspired by recent character action games, with a rather surprising emphasis on combos; the density of the puzzles recalls the exploration of Genshin Impact (2020) and the many activities that dot organically the Teyvat map and blend with the environment; there are many borrowings from Neon Genesis Evangelion as well and, above all, Sonic's own games. But this compilation is particularly clumsy. At Gamescom 2022, fans could see that the level design of Cyberspace stages was lifted from previous entries in the series, including Sonic Adventure 2 (2001), Unleashed (2008) and Generation (2011). While Takashi Īzuka cited the corruption of the hero's memories as the reason for this decision [3], it was more likely a lack of resources and time. Two major problems underline the flawed nature of this approach. Firstly, while the layout of the levels is often taken from previous games, the graphics only vary between four environments: Green Hill, Chemical Plant, Sky Sanctuary and a new zone resembling Crisis City. The result is particularly dull and monotonous, with an overly detailed background and obnoxious visual filters designed to mimic computer corruption.
Inconsistent design between the various activities
More critically, the gameplay of Sonic Frontiers does not fit in with the old designs. The title opts for a jerky gameplay, with an Aim Attack that is only used for direction and never to gain speed, as Sonic is generally always faster when running unaided. This design dichotomy alters the relationship with the S rank: it seems alternately trivial and overly complicated. In reality, if the player chooses not to play according to the rules dictated by the old Sonic level design, and ignores the optimal and natural route in order to concentrate on Sonic's own movement, the S rank is relatively easy to achieve, although it feels meaningless due to the disconnect with the level. The same problem occurs in the overworld. The islands are particularly empty and visually abysmal, leaving the player to rush from objective to objective to solve uninspiring puzzles or complete ill-conceived mini-games. Gathering Kocos for Amy looks inordinately like the shepherd mini-game in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (2006), while the hacking mini-games are literally lifted from NieR: Automata (2017). The pinball, in which Sonic does not even act as the ball, is astonishing in its unusual mediocrity, as is the final boss in Hard Mode, a particularly poor and unwelcome shoot'em-up sequence.
For a game that emphasises freedom of exploration, Sonic Frontiers feels commanding. The progression from activity to activity is artificial, with the player's attention drawn to the nearest hideous metal structure. When it comes to action, Sonic's and the camera's movements are always fixed by the rails and the level design, which tries to convince the player that the game is still a platformer. It is particularly peculiar that Chaos Island contains so many 2.5D sequences, which are completely at odds with the open-world spirit of the title. With map exploration dependent on completing micro-objectives, exploration is generally linear or bloated with pointless roundabouts. Sonic's stats do little to shake the game out of its formulaic shackles, and any player who decides to spend a little time fishing to raise Sonic's attributes will find the experience ludicrous, as battles are over in an instant, as they are merely designated as health bars to be lowered during the vulnerability cycle. The game does a particularly poor job of communicating its gameplay intentions, and fights suffer from particularly long downtimes to justify the inclusion of chase sequences. The staging is often unreadable and the camera is frequently in awkward places, blocked by the metal limbs of enemies, if not spinning around to the point of causing serious dizziness. The perspective is also generally very poor, and diving attacks are always rather unpleasant to perform.
The art of false contemplation
Sonic Frontiers also suffers from poor performance, with serious clipping every few metres. Visually, the various islands are homogeneous, with no visual landmarks to give a clear idea of the world's geography. The fourth and fifth islands are, in fact, direct extensions of the first, further reducing the visual variety of the title. The game tries to impose a darker tone on its atmosphere, relying heavily on simple broken piano chords and a melody that repeats after three bars. Unable to find an identity, the game intersperses this pseudo-contemplation with unwarranted jazz melodies for its mini-games and heroic jingles when the player triumphs. The tone of the story follows this inconsistency: Sonic Frontiers multiplies references without purpose, justifying its existence by exploring the lore of the Ancients-Chao in a modulation on the themes of Final Fantasy XIV: Endwalker (2021) and The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (2000). The dialogues between Sonic and his companions are an opportunity to rehash themes already dealt with in previous games, under the guise of false maturity.
For Dr Eggman, Sonic Frontiers is an opportunity to discover fatherhood through crude cinematics and shallow, flawed writing. It comes as no surprise that Sonic Frontiers takes up the theme of parenthood transcending blood ties, a subject that has been well-explored in popular Japanese fiction since the 2010s, and has recently been exacerbated. However, this addition seems unjustified, given that Eggman is such a passive character. The game seems to be a collection of ideas with no coherence, whether in its game design, narrative or artistic direction. Taking elements that have worked in other cultural productions, the title indulges in a chaotic jumble, defending its own identity through a sort of recapitulation, a moment of reflection in the light of a new maturity.
This was Anno's project with Thrice Upon a Time, bringing an era to a close and ushering in a new one. All the characters of Evangelion were contextualised in a new world, both in the diegesis and in the context of film's production. It was a final attempt to respond to a troubled Japanese youth, battered by the uncertainty of the labour market and the breakdown of traditional interpersonal relationships: it is from this observation and a mature optimism that hope is born. Sonic Frontiers draws no lessons from the past and says nothing. It revels in its own status as a game of transition, with no intention of defining the future direction of the franchise; ironically, Sonic Superstars seems to disavow Frontiers' project by once again taking the golden nostalgia route already exploited by Sonic Mania (2017). This is unfortunate, as the idea of an open-world Sonic game is not necessarily meaningless, but it deserves better than feeble half-measures.
__________
[1] Nicolle Lamerichs, ‘The Emotional Realism of Anime: Rewriting Characters and Affective Reception in Evangelion 3.0+1.0: Thrice Upon a Time’, in Mechademia, vol. 15, no. 1, 2022, pp. 81-102.
[2] Yuzuke Takahashi, ‘［TGS2022］「ソニックフロンティア」制作者インタビュー。クラシック，モダンに続く第三世代ソニックに込められた思いとは’, on 4Gamer.net, 16th September 2022.
[3] Zackari Greif, ‘Sonic Team Leader Explains Sonic Frontiers' Use of Old Level Designs’, on gamerant.com, 30th August 2022, consulted on 16th June 2023.
Played with BertKnot.
The release of Evangelion: 3.0+1.0 Thrice Upon a Time (2021) marked the de facto end of an era for Japanese animation. By recasting his franchise in a contemplative and optimistic light, Hideaki Anno emphasised the need to embrace life in all its complexity and to take care of ourselves. While fans remain divided over which version they prefer, with some favouring the ending of The End of Evangelion (1997), the change in tone has been recognised as Anno's new-found serenity. The 1997 film represented an excision of his otaku side through the flames of Purgatory, a bitter violence necessitated by the fans' deviation from the discourse developed in the anime. Thrice Upon a Time takes a much more contemplative approach, marking a genuine process of mourning and reconstruction. In particular, the film subtly weaves its characters into real-life scenes, highlighting their relationships with a wider society.
Rewriting and recontextualisation in Japanese pop-culture
This process of recontextualisation involves a dialogue between official production and fan production. Nicolle Lamerichs shows how the perception of characters is fluid and how fandom reclaims canonical characters to express themes beyond the author's control [1]. The figure of Shinji is particularly subject to these transformations, as he represents the otaku identity and the outcasts of Japanese society. By setting Shinji and the other characters in familiar settings – scenes similar to those in the anime and The End of the Evangelion, but also in everyday sceneries – Anno leaves it to the audience to completely reappropriate these characters, emphasising only their verisimilitude or, conversely, their artificiality. Such rewriting strategies are not uncommon in modern popular fiction, and the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise has demonstrated a surprising plasticity in recent years.
Through fan imagination, recent games, the Sonic Boom series (2014), and the Sonic the Hedgehog films (2020, 2022), the franchise has slowly shed the remnants of its kawaī aestheticism and taken on a more serious tone. The culmination was the release of Sonic Frontiers, the marketing cycle of which initially highlighted the shift in the series. The advent of the open world was supposed to renew the game formula, and the visual direction was meant to reflect a new gravitas for the hero, pondering the interpersonal relationships he has with his friends. For a game about renewal, the communication around Sonic Frontiers was relatively timid: the first gameplay footage was withheld for a long time, particularly the Cyberspace stages. This was probably due to the chaotic state of the title, which suffered from multiple development iterations and a serious lack of budget.
Meaningless references: a futile search for identity
The player assumes the role of Sonic and must explore the Starfall Islands to rescue his friends who have been trapped in a parallel dimension by Dr Eggman and his artificial intelligence, Sage. The adventure consists of exploring five islands filled with micro-objectives that allow the player to collect Chaos Emeralds and engage with the local Titan, who protects the barrier between the real world and reality. Sonic Frontiers borrows extensively from The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017), to the point where the original project was intended to be a much slower experience, with Sonic able to walk slowly and ride a horse [2]. The game makes no attempt to hide its direct inspiration, so much so that it directly recreates the Blood Moon scene and simply turns it into a Starfall one. The title rips off ideas from all the recent productions, turning them into a crucible with no identity. The general setting is that of Breath of the Wild, with a soundtrack that loosely copies the ethereal piano sound design, while the battles against the Titans are largely inspired by Shadow of the Colossus (2005), with the same sense of gradual scaling.
The combat system is inspired by recent character action games, with a rather surprising emphasis on combos; the density of the puzzles recalls the exploration of Genshin Impact (2020) and the many activities that dot organically the Teyvat map and blend with the environment; there are many borrowings from Neon Genesis Evangelion as well and, above all, Sonic's own games. But this compilation is particularly clumsy. At Gamescom 2022, fans could see that the level design of Cyberspace stages was lifted from previous entries in the series, including Sonic Adventure 2 (2001), Unleashed (2008) and Generation (2011). While Takashi Īzuka cited the corruption of the hero's memories as the reason for this decision [3], it was more likely a lack of resources and time. Two major problems underline the flawed nature of this approach. Firstly, while the layout of the levels is often taken from previous games, the graphics only vary between four environments: Green Hill, Chemical Plant, Sky Sanctuary and a new zone resembling Crisis City. The result is particularly dull and monotonous, with an overly detailed background and obnoxious visual filters designed to mimic computer corruption.
Inconsistent design between the various activities
More critically, the gameplay of Sonic Frontiers does not fit in with the old designs. The title opts for a jerky gameplay, with an Aim Attack that is only used for direction and never to gain speed, as Sonic is generally always faster when running unaided. This design dichotomy alters the relationship with the S rank: it seems alternately trivial and overly complicated. In reality, if the player chooses not to play according to the rules dictated by the old Sonic level design, and ignores the optimal and natural route in order to concentrate on Sonic's own movement, the S rank is relatively easy to achieve, although it feels meaningless due to the disconnect with the level. The same problem occurs in the overworld. The islands are particularly empty and visually abysmal, leaving the player to rush from objective to objective to solve uninspiring puzzles or complete ill-conceived mini-games. Gathering Kocos for Amy looks inordinately like the shepherd mini-game in The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess (2006), while the hacking mini-games are literally lifted from NieR: Automata (2017). The pinball, in which Sonic does not even act as the ball, is astonishing in its unusual mediocrity, as is the final boss in Hard Mode, a particularly poor and unwelcome shoot'em-up sequence.
For a game that emphasises freedom of exploration, Sonic Frontiers feels commanding. The progression from activity to activity is artificial, with the player's attention drawn to the nearest hideous metal structure. When it comes to action, Sonic's and the camera's movements are always fixed by the rails and the level design, which tries to convince the player that the game is still a platformer. It is particularly peculiar that Chaos Island contains so many 2.5D sequences, which are completely at odds with the open-world spirit of the title. With map exploration dependent on completing micro-objectives, exploration is generally linear or bloated with pointless roundabouts. Sonic's stats do little to shake the game out of its formulaic shackles, and any player who decides to spend a little time fishing to raise Sonic's attributes will find the experience ludicrous, as battles are over in an instant, as they are merely designated as health bars to be lowered during the vulnerability cycle. The game does a particularly poor job of communicating its gameplay intentions, and fights suffer from particularly long downtimes to justify the inclusion of chase sequences. The staging is often unreadable and the camera is frequently in awkward places, blocked by the metal limbs of enemies, if not spinning around to the point of causing serious dizziness. The perspective is also generally very poor, and diving attacks are always rather unpleasant to perform.
The art of false contemplation
Sonic Frontiers also suffers from poor performance, with serious clipping every few metres. Visually, the various islands are homogeneous, with no visual landmarks to give a clear idea of the world's geography. The fourth and fifth islands are, in fact, direct extensions of the first, further reducing the visual variety of the title. The game tries to impose a darker tone on its atmosphere, relying heavily on simple broken piano chords and a melody that repeats after three bars. Unable to find an identity, the game intersperses this pseudo-contemplation with unwarranted jazz melodies for its mini-games and heroic jingles when the player triumphs. The tone of the story follows this inconsistency: Sonic Frontiers multiplies references without purpose, justifying its existence by exploring the lore of the Ancients-Chao in a modulation on the themes of Final Fantasy XIV: Endwalker (2021) and The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask (2000). The dialogues between Sonic and his companions are an opportunity to rehash themes already dealt with in previous games, under the guise of false maturity.
For Dr Eggman, Sonic Frontiers is an opportunity to discover fatherhood through crude cinematics and shallow, flawed writing. It comes as no surprise that Sonic Frontiers takes up the theme of parenthood transcending blood ties, a subject that has been well-explored in popular Japanese fiction since the 2010s, and has recently been exacerbated. However, this addition seems unjustified, given that Eggman is such a passive character. The game seems to be a collection of ideas with no coherence, whether in its game design, narrative or artistic direction. Taking elements that have worked in other cultural productions, the title indulges in a chaotic jumble, defending its own identity through a sort of recapitulation, a moment of reflection in the light of a new maturity.
This was Anno's project with Thrice Upon a Time, bringing an era to a close and ushering in a new one. All the characters of Evangelion were contextualised in a new world, both in the diegesis and in the context of film's production. It was a final attempt to respond to a troubled Japanese youth, battered by the uncertainty of the labour market and the breakdown of traditional interpersonal relationships: it is from this observation and a mature optimism that hope is born. Sonic Frontiers draws no lessons from the past and says nothing. It revels in its own status as a game of transition, with no intention of defining the future direction of the franchise; ironically, Sonic Superstars seems to disavow Frontiers' project by once again taking the golden nostalgia route already exploited by Sonic Mania (2017). This is unfortunate, as the idea of an open-world Sonic game is not necessarily meaningless, but it deserves better than feeble half-measures.
__________
[1] Nicolle Lamerichs, ‘The Emotional Realism of Anime: Rewriting Characters and Affective Reception in Evangelion 3.0+1.0: Thrice Upon a Time’, in Mechademia, vol. 15, no. 1, 2022, pp. 81-102.
[2] Yuzuke Takahashi, ‘［TGS2022］「ソニックフロンティア」制作者インタビュー。クラシック，モダンに続く第三世代ソニックに込められた思いとは’, on 4Gamer.net, 16th September 2022.
[3] Zackari Greif, ‘Sonic Team Leader Explains Sonic Frontiers' Use of Old Level Designs’, on gamerant.com, 30th August 2022, consulted on 16th June 2023.
2022
‘This was the only earthly love of my life, and I could not, then or ever after, call that love by name.’
– Umberto Eco, Il nome della rosa, 1980.
Capturing the contours of a sixteenth-century society in the Holy Roman Empire is a difficult task. Central Europe was undergoing complex transitions as a result of demographic recovery, religious innovation and the administrative mosaic of Germanic territories. Recent historiography emphasises the interlocking and overlapping of forces that shaped regions and societies: it is difficult to generalise local observations to the rest of the Empire, but it is also unwise to paint the portrait of a village on the basis of generalities alone. For example, the forms of feudalism differed on either side of the Elbe. A theoretical simplification is to consider the regions south and west of the Elbe as being under the rule of Grundherrschaft [1]. This form of feudalism developed from the 14th century onwards with the decline of the traditional smaller lords and the demographic collapse caused by the Black Death. This situation allowed the surviving peasants to expand their farms and establish stronger hereditary rights over the land. Although still subject to the authority of their local lord, they had greater freedom of action.
History, fiction and myth: the Umbertian gaze
Towards the end of the fifteenth century, friction between the nobility and the peasantry increased as the former sought to assert their authority over land that seemed to have been de facto freed from serfdom. Another factor in the social crisis was undoubtedly the demographic upturn from 1470 onwards, which swelled the cohort of landless peasants, while small landowners were no longer able to take advantage of the economic opportunities of the previous century. In some southern regions of the Holy Roman Empire, agricultural production was no longer profitable, so it became mainly subsistence farming. These factors led to a widening gap between the peasants and the lords. The lords, sometimes nobility, sometimes clergy, were in latent conflict for other economic and political reasons.
It is difficult to summarise several thousand pages of social history in a few lines, so these few elements of context will suffice. Pentiment makes the bold choice of setting its action in this complex historical background, in a locality centred around the village of Tassing and Kiersau Abbey. The project explicitly borrows from Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose (1980). Although the historical context is different, the themes and structure are similar. Eco's readers will find themselves in familiar territory: Pentiment allows the player to assume the role of Andreas Maler, a Nuremberg artist commissioned by the Abbot of Kiersau to illustrate a Book of Hours as part of his certification as a master artist. During his stay in Tassing, Andreas gets to know the many members of the local society, until a murder takes place. For personal reasons, Andreas is thrust into the role of detective and must unravel the many secrets of the community.
Like The Name of the Rose, Pentiment multiplies points of view and semantic layers. The game is at once a general dissertation on the social history of the Holy Roman Empire, a detective story, a philosophical debate, a theological meditation and a discussion on the value of storytelling. It is through this literary device, borrowed from Eco, that the title manages to find a great deal of coherence in its storytelling [2]. The investigation – i.e. the criminal story – is interwoven with the socio-political narrative, so that the player is constantly confronted with both general and specific elements. Andreas Maler acts as a bridge between these two worlds. Firstly, because he finds himself at the crossroads of very different social universes: as a traveller, he is used to many cultures; as a young artist, he associates with the powerful without being fully part of their universe. Above all, he is a stranger to Tassing, and his gaze is that of a witness whose interest in local politics, however altruistic, is rather weak. In other words, his view is certainly subjective, but it is all-encompassing. These characteristics are very similar to those of William of Baskerville, who had a complex theological background.
Depicting the Middle Ages through the new social studies
In terms of narrative economy, such a protagonist captures the player's attention in a number of ways. For classically trained historians, Andreas provides access to the ancient and medieval literary world; for mystery fans, his role as a detective is crucial. The choice of Andreas' background means that, in addition to the interactive gameplay typical of CRPGs, players can personalise their experience around the themes that interest them most. As a Latinist, I was pleasantly surprised to see Pentiment commanding a very solid Latin, and to read the classical locutions quoted by Andreas. The title has a rare encyclopaedic quality, in tune with recent scholarly developments. There remain a few very minor approximations, such as certain onomastic choices (Else Mülleryn should rather be spelt Müllerin) and Kiersau's remarkable and exagerated interregionalism. On the latter point, the choice was certainly motivated by Umberto Eco's vision of a universalist abbey and a political response to Kingdom Come: Delivrance (2018): the figure of the Ethiopian priest Sebhat seems a rather explicit foil to Daniel Vávra's ultra-conservative claims about the absence of people of colour in fifteenth-century Bohemia.
Pentiment always uses its encyclopaedic knowledge wisely to illustrate medieval mentalities. Arrogantly imparting knowledge is the best way to undermine the friendship and support of the game's various characters. The game constantly seeks to highlight the limits of Andreas' knowledge and the subjectivity of the concept of truth. As such, Pentiment seeks to portray the situation of women in the Middle Ages with real nuance. The game's fictional micro-history project features women who are involved in their village's economy and are pillars of the community. Discussions with the Benedictine nuns also provide an opportunity to explore women in religion, and Pentiment clearly illustrates the prejudices of the time, as well as Andreas' very masculine perspective. In contrast to the Christian tradition, which leaves no place for women in its traditional hierarchy – women's religious offices generally disappeared in the central Middle Ages, which is exactly the situation described for Kiersau Abbey – and restricts them to religious life or marriage, Pentiment constantly emphasises their agency and the ways in which they can circumvent the restrictions. Amalie illustrates the extreme spiritual experiences that women can voluntarily inflict on themselves through her retreat and mystical visions. Illuminata embodies a mastery of the literary classics, while the other sisters stand out for their practical knowledge and integration into Tassing society.
To write, to read and to die in the universal library
Like Umberto Eco's library, that of Kiersau Abbey is intended to be universal. It seeks to circumscribe all known knowledge through the possession of rare volumes, be they erudite treatises or chivalric romances. Writing and rewriting are at the heart of Pentiment's project. The narrative is subjective and subject to numerous corrections: when the dialogue is presented, mistakes punctuate the text and are corrected in front of the player. Similarly, the choice of script depends on the impression the speaker makes on Andreas. He presents the discourse of the educated clergy in a Gothic style, while the villagers have a much less polished script. Above all, it is noteworthy that Andreas changes his representation according to the information he receives. For example, when he learns that the shepherd is actually an avid reader of Latin books, he updates the script used in the dialogue. These elements are linked to a concern for memory, and Pentiment sets out to question what deserves to be left to posterity, rejecting the idea of a monolithic history. The truth is in a constant state of flux and varies from different perspectives: it is this insight that guides Andreas' investigation into the various murders. The game is less about finding the culprit than about writing Tassing's story. The game forces the player to accuse one of the suspects for each murder, but it is remarkable that all the solutions seem unsatisfactory. Pentiment is not about solving murders, but about understanding how Tassing society reacts to events that upset its internal balance.
Pentiment borrows its idea of humour from The Name of the Rose [3]: laughter is used to subvert the order of the world, because it reveals – through sarcasm or astonishment – the way in which the world turns. The comic scenes in the game anchor the narrative in a plausible reality, not just a cold, theoretical illustration of 16th-century Tassing. Pentiment's dialogue system is not so much a mechanic that supports 'choices' leading to different endings, but rather a sincere exploration of the world. Comedy is necessary because it is an instrument of freedom and truth, which all the characters seek in one way or another: to laugh is to break free from social bonds, hence Saint Grobian's irreverence. Conversely, silence allows the player to conform to the social mould, to maintain the status quo. Such a position is sometimes necessary to make progress in an investigation without alienating potential allies. The great strength of Pentiment is that it strikes the right balance between laughter, speech and silence. The characters, including Andreas, have to take a stand, and the question is how to do it.
There are no straightforward answers, and the game is never preachy or pretentious. The complexity of the world, of social relations and social transformations explain the hesitations. Uncertainty is part of the truth: Pentiment shines through its unique artistic direction, borrowed from manuscripts and engravings. In a stroke of genius, the game moves drawn characters on fixed backgrounds. There's something magical about seeing sketches move in this way, evoking a kind of collage. The practice of cutting out and reusing figures and backgrounds is well documented in the production of medieval manuscripts, underlining the plasticity of art in the representation of history [4]. In a fifteen-hour adventure, Pentiment creates such a vast universe. I find it difficult to write more, given the extraordinary richness so elegantly condensed into a game, from religious issues to economic innovations. In this respect, it is worth mentioning the welcome presence of an indicative bibliography in the game's credits. Umberto Eco concludes The Name of the Rose with a variation on a line by Bernard of Cluny: 'Stat rosa pristina nomine, nomina nuda tenemus', he writes. The original rose lives on in its name, we keep the names naked. To Bernard of Cluny's 'ubi sunt...?', Eco adds the persistence of memory. The memory of people who existed centuries ago should persist even more; Pentiment is a sublime fresco in their honour, coming as close as possible to the historical truth without ever being able to fully circumscribe it: 'Since I tell to its end my story, then joyful shall be my days.' [5]
___________
[1] Joachim Whaley, 'Economic Landscapes, Communities, and their Grievances', in Germany and the Holy Roman Empire, vol. 1, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2012, pp. 122-142.
[2] José-Marie Cortès, 'Itinéraires interprétatifs dans Le Nom de la Rose', in Synergies Inde, no. 2, 2007, pp. 289-306.
[3] Michel Perrin, 'Problématique du rire dans Le Nom de la Rose d'Umberto Eco (1980) : de la Bible au XXe siècle', in Bulletin de l'Association Guillaume Budé, no. 58, 1999, pp. 463-477.
[4] Anna Dlabacová, ‘Medieval Photoshop’, on leidenmedievalistsblog.nl, 18th February 2022, consulted on 13th June 2023.
[5] Wolfram von Eschenback, Parzival, II, XVI, l. 676 (trans. Jessie L. Weston), c. 1210.
– Umberto Eco, Il nome della rosa, 1980.
Capturing the contours of a sixteenth-century society in the Holy Roman Empire is a difficult task. Central Europe was undergoing complex transitions as a result of demographic recovery, religious innovation and the administrative mosaic of Germanic territories. Recent historiography emphasises the interlocking and overlapping of forces that shaped regions and societies: it is difficult to generalise local observations to the rest of the Empire, but it is also unwise to paint the portrait of a village on the basis of generalities alone. For example, the forms of feudalism differed on either side of the Elbe. A theoretical simplification is to consider the regions south and west of the Elbe as being under the rule of Grundherrschaft [1]. This form of feudalism developed from the 14th century onwards with the decline of the traditional smaller lords and the demographic collapse caused by the Black Death. This situation allowed the surviving peasants to expand their farms and establish stronger hereditary rights over the land. Although still subject to the authority of their local lord, they had greater freedom of action.
History, fiction and myth: the Umbertian gaze
Towards the end of the fifteenth century, friction between the nobility and the peasantry increased as the former sought to assert their authority over land that seemed to have been de facto freed from serfdom. Another factor in the social crisis was undoubtedly the demographic upturn from 1470 onwards, which swelled the cohort of landless peasants, while small landowners were no longer able to take advantage of the economic opportunities of the previous century. In some southern regions of the Holy Roman Empire, agricultural production was no longer profitable, so it became mainly subsistence farming. These factors led to a widening gap between the peasants and the lords. The lords, sometimes nobility, sometimes clergy, were in latent conflict for other economic and political reasons.
It is difficult to summarise several thousand pages of social history in a few lines, so these few elements of context will suffice. Pentiment makes the bold choice of setting its action in this complex historical background, in a locality centred around the village of Tassing and Kiersau Abbey. The project explicitly borrows from Umberto Eco's The Name of the Rose (1980). Although the historical context is different, the themes and structure are similar. Eco's readers will find themselves in familiar territory: Pentiment allows the player to assume the role of Andreas Maler, a Nuremberg artist commissioned by the Abbot of Kiersau to illustrate a Book of Hours as part of his certification as a master artist. During his stay in Tassing, Andreas gets to know the many members of the local society, until a murder takes place. For personal reasons, Andreas is thrust into the role of detective and must unravel the many secrets of the community.
Like The Name of the Rose, Pentiment multiplies points of view and semantic layers. The game is at once a general dissertation on the social history of the Holy Roman Empire, a detective story, a philosophical debate, a theological meditation and a discussion on the value of storytelling. It is through this literary device, borrowed from Eco, that the title manages to find a great deal of coherence in its storytelling [2]. The investigation – i.e. the criminal story – is interwoven with the socio-political narrative, so that the player is constantly confronted with both general and specific elements. Andreas Maler acts as a bridge between these two worlds. Firstly, because he finds himself at the crossroads of very different social universes: as a traveller, he is used to many cultures; as a young artist, he associates with the powerful without being fully part of their universe. Above all, he is a stranger to Tassing, and his gaze is that of a witness whose interest in local politics, however altruistic, is rather weak. In other words, his view is certainly subjective, but it is all-encompassing. These characteristics are very similar to those of William of Baskerville, who had a complex theological background.
Depicting the Middle Ages through the new social studies
In terms of narrative economy, such a protagonist captures the player's attention in a number of ways. For classically trained historians, Andreas provides access to the ancient and medieval literary world; for mystery fans, his role as a detective is crucial. The choice of Andreas' background means that, in addition to the interactive gameplay typical of CRPGs, players can personalise their experience around the themes that interest them most. As a Latinist, I was pleasantly surprised to see Pentiment commanding a very solid Latin, and to read the classical locutions quoted by Andreas. The title has a rare encyclopaedic quality, in tune with recent scholarly developments. There remain a few very minor approximations, such as certain onomastic choices (Else Mülleryn should rather be spelt Müllerin) and Kiersau's remarkable and exagerated interregionalism. On the latter point, the choice was certainly motivated by Umberto Eco's vision of a universalist abbey and a political response to Kingdom Come: Delivrance (2018): the figure of the Ethiopian priest Sebhat seems a rather explicit foil to Daniel Vávra's ultra-conservative claims about the absence of people of colour in fifteenth-century Bohemia.
Pentiment always uses its encyclopaedic knowledge wisely to illustrate medieval mentalities. Arrogantly imparting knowledge is the best way to undermine the friendship and support of the game's various characters. The game constantly seeks to highlight the limits of Andreas' knowledge and the subjectivity of the concept of truth. As such, Pentiment seeks to portray the situation of women in the Middle Ages with real nuance. The game's fictional micro-history project features women who are involved in their village's economy and are pillars of the community. Discussions with the Benedictine nuns also provide an opportunity to explore women in religion, and Pentiment clearly illustrates the prejudices of the time, as well as Andreas' very masculine perspective. In contrast to the Christian tradition, which leaves no place for women in its traditional hierarchy – women's religious offices generally disappeared in the central Middle Ages, which is exactly the situation described for Kiersau Abbey – and restricts them to religious life or marriage, Pentiment constantly emphasises their agency and the ways in which they can circumvent the restrictions. Amalie illustrates the extreme spiritual experiences that women can voluntarily inflict on themselves through her retreat and mystical visions. Illuminata embodies a mastery of the literary classics, while the other sisters stand out for their practical knowledge and integration into Tassing society.
To write, to read and to die in the universal library
Like Umberto Eco's library, that of Kiersau Abbey is intended to be universal. It seeks to circumscribe all known knowledge through the possession of rare volumes, be they erudite treatises or chivalric romances. Writing and rewriting are at the heart of Pentiment's project. The narrative is subjective and subject to numerous corrections: when the dialogue is presented, mistakes punctuate the text and are corrected in front of the player. Similarly, the choice of script depends on the impression the speaker makes on Andreas. He presents the discourse of the educated clergy in a Gothic style, while the villagers have a much less polished script. Above all, it is noteworthy that Andreas changes his representation according to the information he receives. For example, when he learns that the shepherd is actually an avid reader of Latin books, he updates the script used in the dialogue. These elements are linked to a concern for memory, and Pentiment sets out to question what deserves to be left to posterity, rejecting the idea of a monolithic history. The truth is in a constant state of flux and varies from different perspectives: it is this insight that guides Andreas' investigation into the various murders. The game is less about finding the culprit than about writing Tassing's story. The game forces the player to accuse one of the suspects for each murder, but it is remarkable that all the solutions seem unsatisfactory. Pentiment is not about solving murders, but about understanding how Tassing society reacts to events that upset its internal balance.
Pentiment borrows its idea of humour from The Name of the Rose [3]: laughter is used to subvert the order of the world, because it reveals – through sarcasm or astonishment – the way in which the world turns. The comic scenes in the game anchor the narrative in a plausible reality, not just a cold, theoretical illustration of 16th-century Tassing. Pentiment's dialogue system is not so much a mechanic that supports 'choices' leading to different endings, but rather a sincere exploration of the world. Comedy is necessary because it is an instrument of freedom and truth, which all the characters seek in one way or another: to laugh is to break free from social bonds, hence Saint Grobian's irreverence. Conversely, silence allows the player to conform to the social mould, to maintain the status quo. Such a position is sometimes necessary to make progress in an investigation without alienating potential allies. The great strength of Pentiment is that it strikes the right balance between laughter, speech and silence. The characters, including Andreas, have to take a stand, and the question is how to do it.
There are no straightforward answers, and the game is never preachy or pretentious. The complexity of the world, of social relations and social transformations explain the hesitations. Uncertainty is part of the truth: Pentiment shines through its unique artistic direction, borrowed from manuscripts and engravings. In a stroke of genius, the game moves drawn characters on fixed backgrounds. There's something magical about seeing sketches move in this way, evoking a kind of collage. The practice of cutting out and reusing figures and backgrounds is well documented in the production of medieval manuscripts, underlining the plasticity of art in the representation of history [4]. In a fifteen-hour adventure, Pentiment creates such a vast universe. I find it difficult to write more, given the extraordinary richness so elegantly condensed into a game, from religious issues to economic innovations. In this respect, it is worth mentioning the welcome presence of an indicative bibliography in the game's credits. Umberto Eco concludes The Name of the Rose with a variation on a line by Bernard of Cluny: 'Stat rosa pristina nomine, nomina nuda tenemus', he writes. The original rose lives on in its name, we keep the names naked. To Bernard of Cluny's 'ubi sunt...?', Eco adds the persistence of memory. The memory of people who existed centuries ago should persist even more; Pentiment is a sublime fresco in their honour, coming as close as possible to the historical truth without ever being able to fully circumscribe it: 'Since I tell to its end my story, then joyful shall be my days.' [5]
___________
[1] Joachim Whaley, 'Economic Landscapes, Communities, and their Grievances', in Germany and the Holy Roman Empire, vol. 1, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2012, pp. 122-142.
[2] José-Marie Cortès, 'Itinéraires interprétatifs dans Le Nom de la Rose', in Synergies Inde, no. 2, 2007, pp. 289-306.
[3] Michel Perrin, 'Problématique du rire dans Le Nom de la Rose d'Umberto Eco (1980) : de la Bible au XXe siècle', in Bulletin de l'Association Guillaume Budé, no. 58, 1999, pp. 463-477.
[4] Anna Dlabacová, ‘Medieval Photoshop’, on leidenmedievalistsblog.nl, 18th February 2022, consulted on 13th June 2023.
[5] Wolfram von Eschenback, Parzival, II, XVI, l. 676 (trans. Jessie L. Weston), c. 1210.
1988
Nintendo's early explorations of the NES Zapper took two different forms. While Duck Hunt (1984) is the best-known example of a fixed shooter, Gumshoe (1986) offered a dynamic side-scrolling formula in a rather absurd platformer concept. All the major Japanese developers tried to use the Zapper in one of their games, with little success. Gotcha! The Sport! (1987) by Sanritsu Denki and LJN had very poor ergonomics, while the NES port of Taito's Operation Wolf (1989) gutted the arcade title. Around the same time, Sunsoft released Freedom Force, which was designed specifically for the NES. With its automatic horizontal scrolling, the game was reminiscent of Hogan's Alley (1984), but differed in that it spawned enemies continuously, not just during still scenes. The player takes on the role of Rad Rex, an anti-terrorist operative tasked with rescuing hostages from a plane hijacked by a group of anarchists.
The title's difficulty is particularly harsh, requiring almost impossible levels of reaction, especially given the poor accuracy of the Zapper. Enemies start firing a few tenths of a second after coming out of hiding, draining the player's health bar in a matter of moments. The main problem lies in the way the game dispenses ammunition and recharges the player's health bar. Instead of placing the items on the actual shooting area, like all other games that use the Zapper, Freedom Force makes them appear in the lower right-hand corner of the screen, away from the action. Because their timer is so short, the player is forced to keep a constant eye on this part of the screen and be prepared to make a long motion to shoot for the refills. This makes it difficult to focus on the enemies and adjust one's aim. Most of the time, the player is not quick enough to get the bonuses or loses the recovered health immediately after a deadly salvo from enemies that have appeared in the meantime. The player can also swap weapons by shooting the corresponding bonus, but the effects are insignificant. The only exception is the grenade launcher, which decimates everyone on the screen – enemies and innocent civilians alike – and proves to be an exceptional downgrade.
Despite the brevity of the experience – just five stages, each lasting just a few dozen seconds – Freedom Force is remarkably unfair and unpleasant, never helped by the disconcerting and completely out-of-place Hangman word-game interludes. Perhaps most notable is the presence of on-screen blood, though it never approaches the gore of Narc (1988) – whose censorship focused more on drug references – or Hokuto no Ken (1986). More generally, Freedom Force is riddled with design ideas that exacerbate the NES Zapper's already wayward handling. The result is a forgettable experience bathed in an obnoxious depiction of ultra-virile masculinity.
The title's difficulty is particularly harsh, requiring almost impossible levels of reaction, especially given the poor accuracy of the Zapper. Enemies start firing a few tenths of a second after coming out of hiding, draining the player's health bar in a matter of moments. The main problem lies in the way the game dispenses ammunition and recharges the player's health bar. Instead of placing the items on the actual shooting area, like all other games that use the Zapper, Freedom Force makes them appear in the lower right-hand corner of the screen, away from the action. Because their timer is so short, the player is forced to keep a constant eye on this part of the screen and be prepared to make a long motion to shoot for the refills. This makes it difficult to focus on the enemies and adjust one's aim. Most of the time, the player is not quick enough to get the bonuses or loses the recovered health immediately after a deadly salvo from enemies that have appeared in the meantime. The player can also swap weapons by shooting the corresponding bonus, but the effects are insignificant. The only exception is the grenade launcher, which decimates everyone on the screen – enemies and innocent civilians alike – and proves to be an exceptional downgrade.
Despite the brevity of the experience – just five stages, each lasting just a few dozen seconds – Freedom Force is remarkably unfair and unpleasant, never helped by the disconcerting and completely out-of-place Hangman word-game interludes. Perhaps most notable is the presence of on-screen blood, though it never approaches the gore of Narc (1988) – whose censorship focused more on drug references – or Hokuto no Ken (1986). More generally, Freedom Force is riddled with design ideas that exacerbate the NES Zapper's already wayward handling. The result is a forgettable experience bathed in an obnoxious depiction of ultra-virile masculinity.
1999
'I work and
work, yet my life gets no easier
I stare at my hands.'
– Takuboku Ishikawa (1886-1912).
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (6th Jun. – 12th Jun., 2023).
In the post-war years, the myth of work as a vehicle for social success was shaped by Japan's exceptional economic recovery. Getting a job came with the promise that it would last a lifetime, without the worker having to endure another job search. The construction of this social myth was intensified from the autumn of 1960, when Prime Minister Hayato Ikeda unveiled his Income Doubling Plan (Shotoku Baizō Keikaku), which aimed to stimulate the economy through a spectrum of liberal and social measures. The plan was largely successful, with Japan's GDP growing at double-digit rates: by diverting public attention from foreign affairs to economic issues, Ikeda had succeeded in grounding confidence in the government in GDP performance. This very favourable situation enabled Japan to gain a high international standing and stabilise its domestic situation. The downside of such a system, however, is that it is particularly susceptible to losing the support of the general public should the economic situation swing the other way.
The freeter and the myth of self-discovery
The collapse of the economic bubble in the 1990s led to a reconfiguration of the labour market. Unemployment soared, and companies could no longer sustain the myth of a permanent career: in effect, they sought to retain their best and brightest while relying on a young, unskilled workforce to serve as temporary expedients. These part-timers are known as freeters, and they are the subject of a rather subtle definition in Japanese capitalist theory: on the one hand, they are presented as individuals marginalised by the labour market, but on the other, part-time work is described as an opportunity to discover more personal passions and to refocus on something other than the professional world. In other words, part-time work frees people from the constraints and boredom of a lifelong career. This ideological illusion enabled the Japanese government and corporations to justify their harsh socio-economic policies with the support of the cultural production of the time.
The drama Shomuni (1998), adapted from the manga of the same name, was a big surprise for Japanese television, dominating the ratings in a very unexpected way. The drama focuses on the female employees of the Shomu ni division of the Manpan Corporation. The least efficient women are sent to this department to do the most menial tasks, as the company hopes that they will leave on their own to avoid paying financial compensation. Unfortunately, the women of Shomu ni are content with their positions and use their free time to indulge their passions. Unconsciously, Shomuni presents unskilled work as a vector of emancipation for those who are able to take advantage of the opportunities it offers.
Gamifying labour: capitalism's hidden prison
Beyond dramas that 'focused on cool young people imbued with a sense of freedom and personal agency searching for happiness' [1], video games also play a role in shaping this idealised image of low-skilled work. While Shenmue (1999) highlighted the mind-numbing repetitiveness of work, Power Shovel glamorises the construction industry. The player is given control of a power shovel to perform decontextualised tasks such as moving sand, digging holes or demolishing buildings. The task is not an easy one, as the controls are rather unintuitive and the timers extremely tight. The player is urged by the angry voice of the taskmaster to learn the controls as quickly as possible. The goal is not so much to have a detailed understanding of the various manoeuvres, but rather to memorise fixed sequences so as to repeat the same movements as quickly as possible without having to think. The game's tutorial fully embraces this alienation, as the player is invited to follow a shadow worker whose inputs are slowly and mindlessly displayed on the screen.
There is something terribly oppressive about Power Shovel, which manages to reproduce the alienation of manual labour while wrapping it in a modern fantasy. In the arcade mode, the most tasteless tasks are interspersed with more playful challenges, such as serving soup with the shovel, catching turtles, or reducing a luxury car to rubble. These cathartic challenges help to make the job fun, with the protagonist's paycheck treated as a scorecard. The yelling of the taskmaster, even if it carries the weight of hierarchical domination, is rather amusing in the context of the game. Power Shovel oozes ideological cynicism, and the title never really hides from it. While the tone mimics that of a Japanese game show – Ichirō Nagai's voice lends itself well to this – the game proudly displays the colours of the Komatsu company, which distributed many copies of the game to its employees.
Job insecurity and the fiction of happiness
The player gradually finds their bearings and adapts to the rigid controls. Unsurprisingly, the first-person view allows for much better control of the machine, and is undoubtedly the best perspective for working efficiently and beating the most difficult timers, thus fully assimilating the player to the worker. The 'Licence King' mode, which tests the player's skills, feels like a compulsory passage. The reward is, ominously, the promise of a job, which only adds to the capitalist malice. The bright colours and the Taito mascot are further subterfuges that mask the harshness of the workplace behind the prospect of amusement, as long as one is willing to put in the effort to succeed. The same themes can be found in the drama Furītā, ie o kau (2010), in which a young man, disillusioned with the traditional office job, turns to part-time work in order to break free from social expectations – namely to get married, start a family and become a homeowner. He also finds love while working in the construction industry.
Christopher Perkins argued that the success of Furītā, ie o kau was indicative of a new shift in the representation of the freeter in the late 2000s. He wrote: 'rather than illuminating and exploring a number of important social and economic challenges currently facing Japanese society, the series is content to tell a story of personal development that falls into sentimentality: maintaining the image of family as the locus of welfare provision and rendering risk a moral challenge to be overcome by resilient individuals, rather than a complex of structural challenges to be addressed by the state' [2]. Power Shovel was already a manifestation of this reality. The title is quite enjoyable to play once the initial difficulty barrier has been overcome. But therein lies its problem. Despite the game's promises, the player never becomes the 'King of Komatsu'. Instead, they always play the role of a slave worker being berated by the taskmaster: that is the secret magic of capitalism.
__________
[1] Christopher Perkins, 'Part-timer, buy a house. Middle-class precarity, sentimentality and learning the meaning of work', in Kristina Iwata-Weickgenannt, Roman Rosenbaum (ed.), Visions of Precarity in Japanese Popular Culture and Literature, Routledge, London, 2015, p. 69.
[2] Ibid., p. 80.
work, yet my life gets no easier
I stare at my hands.'
– Takuboku Ishikawa (1886-1912).
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (6th Jun. – 12th Jun., 2023).
In the post-war years, the myth of work as a vehicle for social success was shaped by Japan's exceptional economic recovery. Getting a job came with the promise that it would last a lifetime, without the worker having to endure another job search. The construction of this social myth was intensified from the autumn of 1960, when Prime Minister Hayato Ikeda unveiled his Income Doubling Plan (Shotoku Baizō Keikaku), which aimed to stimulate the economy through a spectrum of liberal and social measures. The plan was largely successful, with Japan's GDP growing at double-digit rates: by diverting public attention from foreign affairs to economic issues, Ikeda had succeeded in grounding confidence in the government in GDP performance. This very favourable situation enabled Japan to gain a high international standing and stabilise its domestic situation. The downside of such a system, however, is that it is particularly susceptible to losing the support of the general public should the economic situation swing the other way.
The freeter and the myth of self-discovery
The collapse of the economic bubble in the 1990s led to a reconfiguration of the labour market. Unemployment soared, and companies could no longer sustain the myth of a permanent career: in effect, they sought to retain their best and brightest while relying on a young, unskilled workforce to serve as temporary expedients. These part-timers are known as freeters, and they are the subject of a rather subtle definition in Japanese capitalist theory: on the one hand, they are presented as individuals marginalised by the labour market, but on the other, part-time work is described as an opportunity to discover more personal passions and to refocus on something other than the professional world. In other words, part-time work frees people from the constraints and boredom of a lifelong career. This ideological illusion enabled the Japanese government and corporations to justify their harsh socio-economic policies with the support of the cultural production of the time.
The drama Shomuni (1998), adapted from the manga of the same name, was a big surprise for Japanese television, dominating the ratings in a very unexpected way. The drama focuses on the female employees of the Shomu ni division of the Manpan Corporation. The least efficient women are sent to this department to do the most menial tasks, as the company hopes that they will leave on their own to avoid paying financial compensation. Unfortunately, the women of Shomu ni are content with their positions and use their free time to indulge their passions. Unconsciously, Shomuni presents unskilled work as a vector of emancipation for those who are able to take advantage of the opportunities it offers.
Gamifying labour: capitalism's hidden prison
Beyond dramas that 'focused on cool young people imbued with a sense of freedom and personal agency searching for happiness' [1], video games also play a role in shaping this idealised image of low-skilled work. While Shenmue (1999) highlighted the mind-numbing repetitiveness of work, Power Shovel glamorises the construction industry. The player is given control of a power shovel to perform decontextualised tasks such as moving sand, digging holes or demolishing buildings. The task is not an easy one, as the controls are rather unintuitive and the timers extremely tight. The player is urged by the angry voice of the taskmaster to learn the controls as quickly as possible. The goal is not so much to have a detailed understanding of the various manoeuvres, but rather to memorise fixed sequences so as to repeat the same movements as quickly as possible without having to think. The game's tutorial fully embraces this alienation, as the player is invited to follow a shadow worker whose inputs are slowly and mindlessly displayed on the screen.
There is something terribly oppressive about Power Shovel, which manages to reproduce the alienation of manual labour while wrapping it in a modern fantasy. In the arcade mode, the most tasteless tasks are interspersed with more playful challenges, such as serving soup with the shovel, catching turtles, or reducing a luxury car to rubble. These cathartic challenges help to make the job fun, with the protagonist's paycheck treated as a scorecard. The yelling of the taskmaster, even if it carries the weight of hierarchical domination, is rather amusing in the context of the game. Power Shovel oozes ideological cynicism, and the title never really hides from it. While the tone mimics that of a Japanese game show – Ichirō Nagai's voice lends itself well to this – the game proudly displays the colours of the Komatsu company, which distributed many copies of the game to its employees.
Job insecurity and the fiction of happiness
The player gradually finds their bearings and adapts to the rigid controls. Unsurprisingly, the first-person view allows for much better control of the machine, and is undoubtedly the best perspective for working efficiently and beating the most difficult timers, thus fully assimilating the player to the worker. The 'Licence King' mode, which tests the player's skills, feels like a compulsory passage. The reward is, ominously, the promise of a job, which only adds to the capitalist malice. The bright colours and the Taito mascot are further subterfuges that mask the harshness of the workplace behind the prospect of amusement, as long as one is willing to put in the effort to succeed. The same themes can be found in the drama Furītā, ie o kau (2010), in which a young man, disillusioned with the traditional office job, turns to part-time work in order to break free from social expectations – namely to get married, start a family and become a homeowner. He also finds love while working in the construction industry.
Christopher Perkins argued that the success of Furītā, ie o kau was indicative of a new shift in the representation of the freeter in the late 2000s. He wrote: 'rather than illuminating and exploring a number of important social and economic challenges currently facing Japanese society, the series is content to tell a story of personal development that falls into sentimentality: maintaining the image of family as the locus of welfare provision and rendering risk a moral challenge to be overcome by resilient individuals, rather than a complex of structural challenges to be addressed by the state' [2]. Power Shovel was already a manifestation of this reality. The title is quite enjoyable to play once the initial difficulty barrier has been overcome. But therein lies its problem. Despite the game's promises, the player never becomes the 'King of Komatsu'. Instead, they always play the role of a slave worker being berated by the taskmaster: that is the secret magic of capitalism.
__________
[1] Christopher Perkins, 'Part-timer, buy a house. Middle-class precarity, sentimentality and learning the meaning of work', in Kristina Iwata-Weickgenannt, Roman Rosenbaum (ed.), Visions of Precarity in Japanese Popular Culture and Literature, Routledge, London, 2015, p. 69.
[2] Ibid., p. 80.
1996
‘The critical point of withdrawal is not the early phase of acute sickness, but the final step free from the medium of junk....’
– William S. Burroughs, Naked Lunch, 1959.
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (30th May – 5th Jun., 2023).
Subverting Myst (1993) is an exercise in simplicity. Despite its legendary status, the Miller brothers' title was filled with a certain modesty compared to the mainstream production of the time. Its abstract narrative and minimalist interactions lent themselves to the contemplation of an island whose contours were easy to grasp. This approach was facilitated by Sunsoft, who asked the Millers to produce a more mature title than their earlier children's games, such as Cosmic Osmo and the Worlds Beyond the Mackerel (1989) and Spelunx and the Caves of Mr Seudo (1991). A parody of such a classic title makes sense, as it turns the original concept of Myst on its head, capturing a universe whose interpretation was left up to the player. Parroty Interactive teamed up with Peter Bergman, a member of Firesign Theatre, to take on this challenge.
The radio comedy troupe Firesign Theatre is an institution of American absurdist production. Critical of presidencies from Nixon to Reagan, whose election came as a hammer blow to the group, Firesign Theatre has always placed its productions within a complex political spectrum, seeking to be clear-eyed witnesses to events in the modern United States. In Waiting for the Electrician or Someone Like Him (1968), the group criticised the hippie counterculture's fascination with indigenous people, comparing it to historical American colonialism and equating it with a form of white supremacy. The Firesign Theatre was never really a counterculture – at least the group repeatedly refused to be called one – but it did seek to contribute to public debate, rather than sinking into a social pessimism that could not be heard by the general public. Indeed, David McCarthy contrasts their method, 'firmly anchored in the present [and] from a position inside history' [1], with that of Daphne Oram.
Firesign Theatre's approach was also highly referential, playing with the radio medium to create a poetic contrast between the old-fashioned quality of the recording and the modern content of their albums. The sound is sometimes deliberately drowned in white noise, sometimes in discordant filters. The intonation is at times inspired by evangelical prosody, at others by television culture. This network of references creates a unique depth and holds the listener's attention with stylistically and aurally unexpected passages. As a direct parody of Myst, one might expect the same techniques to be found in P.Y.S.T.: to a certain extent, they are. However, the title sinks into a certain complacency and fails to create a structure as chiseled as Firesign Theatre's audio productions.
Myst's gameplay was particularly contemplative and uncluttered, with simple, open decors. P.Y.S.T., with its deliberately grimy art direction, is drowned out by excessive detail, and the few interactions that do take place leave the player largely passive. Because the various audio recordings are only played after clicking on the appropriate element on the screen, the game is often immersed in an unproductive silence: the complex layers of sound and fluid narrative of Firesign Theatre are a long way off. While the title retains a critical spirit, attacks on the punk counterculture and the USSR take precedence over those on rampant capitalism and television. Watching the various TV mini-sketches in the Garden becomes a chore, as does the horoscope parody in the Planetarium, which has been repurposed as a gruesome doctor's office. The humour in P.Y.S.T. is generally heavy-handed, dated and borderline offensive.
The undoubtedly disappointing aspect of the title is how far it is from being a no-budget amateur production. On the contrary, the behind-the-scenes parody shows very well equipped studios and a large crew. John Goodman even plays King Mattruss. While the irreverence of P.Y.S.T. may not be a problem, the dissonance between gameplay and world-building is underwhelming. While Firesign Theatre's productions have always been chaotic, this game parody simply lacks coherence and purpose. By contrast, Zork: Grand Inquisitor (1997), a return to a humorous formula after the very serious Zork Nemesis (1996), was far more competent in its writing and made far better use of its prestigious cast and radiophonic tradition, delivering a genuine point-n-click experience.
__________
[1] David McCarthy, ‘“Attitudes Toward History” and the Radiophonic Compositions of Daphne Oram and the Firesign Theatre’, in Jarmila Mildorf, Pim Verhulst (ed.), Radio Art and Music: Culture, Aesthetics, Politics, Rowman & Littlefield, 2020, p. 81.
– William S. Burroughs, Naked Lunch, 1959.
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (30th May – 5th Jun., 2023).
Subverting Myst (1993) is an exercise in simplicity. Despite its legendary status, the Miller brothers' title was filled with a certain modesty compared to the mainstream production of the time. Its abstract narrative and minimalist interactions lent themselves to the contemplation of an island whose contours were easy to grasp. This approach was facilitated by Sunsoft, who asked the Millers to produce a more mature title than their earlier children's games, such as Cosmic Osmo and the Worlds Beyond the Mackerel (1989) and Spelunx and the Caves of Mr Seudo (1991). A parody of such a classic title makes sense, as it turns the original concept of Myst on its head, capturing a universe whose interpretation was left up to the player. Parroty Interactive teamed up with Peter Bergman, a member of Firesign Theatre, to take on this challenge.
The radio comedy troupe Firesign Theatre is an institution of American absurdist production. Critical of presidencies from Nixon to Reagan, whose election came as a hammer blow to the group, Firesign Theatre has always placed its productions within a complex political spectrum, seeking to be clear-eyed witnesses to events in the modern United States. In Waiting for the Electrician or Someone Like Him (1968), the group criticised the hippie counterculture's fascination with indigenous people, comparing it to historical American colonialism and equating it with a form of white supremacy. The Firesign Theatre was never really a counterculture – at least the group repeatedly refused to be called one – but it did seek to contribute to public debate, rather than sinking into a social pessimism that could not be heard by the general public. Indeed, David McCarthy contrasts their method, 'firmly anchored in the present [and] from a position inside history' [1], with that of Daphne Oram.
Firesign Theatre's approach was also highly referential, playing with the radio medium to create a poetic contrast between the old-fashioned quality of the recording and the modern content of their albums. The sound is sometimes deliberately drowned in white noise, sometimes in discordant filters. The intonation is at times inspired by evangelical prosody, at others by television culture. This network of references creates a unique depth and holds the listener's attention with stylistically and aurally unexpected passages. As a direct parody of Myst, one might expect the same techniques to be found in P.Y.S.T.: to a certain extent, they are. However, the title sinks into a certain complacency and fails to create a structure as chiseled as Firesign Theatre's audio productions.
Myst's gameplay was particularly contemplative and uncluttered, with simple, open decors. P.Y.S.T., with its deliberately grimy art direction, is drowned out by excessive detail, and the few interactions that do take place leave the player largely passive. Because the various audio recordings are only played after clicking on the appropriate element on the screen, the game is often immersed in an unproductive silence: the complex layers of sound and fluid narrative of Firesign Theatre are a long way off. While the title retains a critical spirit, attacks on the punk counterculture and the USSR take precedence over those on rampant capitalism and television. Watching the various TV mini-sketches in the Garden becomes a chore, as does the horoscope parody in the Planetarium, which has been repurposed as a gruesome doctor's office. The humour in P.Y.S.T. is generally heavy-handed, dated and borderline offensive.
The undoubtedly disappointing aspect of the title is how far it is from being a no-budget amateur production. On the contrary, the behind-the-scenes parody shows very well equipped studios and a large crew. John Goodman even plays King Mattruss. While the irreverence of P.Y.S.T. may not be a problem, the dissonance between gameplay and world-building is underwhelming. While Firesign Theatre's productions have always been chaotic, this game parody simply lacks coherence and purpose. By contrast, Zork: Grand Inquisitor (1997), a return to a humorous formula after the very serious Zork Nemesis (1996), was far more competent in its writing and made far better use of its prestigious cast and radiophonic tradition, delivering a genuine point-n-click experience.
__________
[1] David McCarthy, ‘“Attitudes Toward History” and the Radiophonic Compositions of Daphne Oram and the Firesign Theatre’, in Jarmila Mildorf, Pim Verhulst (ed.), Radio Art and Music: Culture, Aesthetics, Politics, Rowman & Littlefield, 2020, p. 81.
2018
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (23rd May – 29th May, 2023).
sylvie's many games are fascinating meditations on game design, relying on the poetic contrast between a sweet atmosphere and devious level design, while Hubol's titles are more absurd, whimsical and garish, as in Craz'd! (2009). Their productions must be understood through an aesthetic of subversion, playing with traditional codes and the player's expectations. For example, cat planet (2009), a more concise project by sylvie, subverted the idea of a single action button, but remained relatively superficial in its exploration of game design. JIGGLY ZONE revisits this initial idea, but takes the opposite approach. The player controls a Jigglypuff and must collect fragments of medallions scattered across seven different worlds. Initially, Jiggly can only make a single jump, but the title gradually tries to push the player to their limits by offering a series of technical obstacles. The placement of platforms and spikes requires careful movement, making full use of the jump palette. The first objective, implied by the various Jigglies that populate this strange world, is to obtain a power-up in the Golden City. This allows the player to make successive jumps of decreasing height.
JIGGLY ZONE immediately takes advantage of this new resource by introducing more challenging aerial platforming, with multiple spikes dotting the screen. Despite the roughness of some sections, sylvie's philosophy is not to alienate the player: by pressing the down button, a checkpoint can be placed on Jiggly's position. This acts as a de facto savestate, breaking up the progression into easily digestible micro-sections. Much like Celeste (2018), the title allows players to familiarise themselves with Jiggly's powers at their own pace, but rewards their proactive – albeit often optional – use, as well as exiting the boundaries of the levels. In the first few minutes, each screen may seem chaotic and labyrinthine, but the acquisition of power-ups recontextualises them, as the player is able to get through a previously major ordeal in no time. JIGGLY ZONE manages to alter the pace and mode of exploration to avoid becoming unpleasantly monotonous. The lack of a map, which players will have to draw themselves in order to find their way through the world, is perhaps unfortunate. It is frustrating to get lost in a series of visually similar screens near the end, trying to find chests that were inaccessible at the start of the game.
There's something fascinating about the way the world of JIGGLY ZONE is constructed. The pixel art assets contrast nicely with the crepe paper backgrounds. The NPCs' dialogue is disjointed, and the player is treated like a pariah. Nowhere are they welcome, and all the characters are either sarcastic, contemptuous or defiant. Each group protects its treasures, but Jiggly simply ignores their warnings and complaints. The Golden City has suffered an apocalypse, the nature of which eludes the player. All that remains are the ruins of gilded buildings, their blocks engraved with a dollar sign. Was it the avarice of the inhabitants or that of the looters that brought the city to its knees? No answer is given, except that Jiggly grabs the last remaining treasure.
The various NPCs seem to be mere reflections of themselves, their remarks devoid of any rationality. As the title progresses, this feeling deepens, their words distorted and their sentences pierced by an eerie silence, like the hull of a ship cracked by the sea. This is of little interest to Jiggly. Conversation with the locals was a welcome reward when progression was slow and cautious. But with increasing power, the presence of other life forms becomes obsolete, anecdotal. In the final minutes, the player collects the last medallion shards without remorse. And then there is only silence.
sylvie's many games are fascinating meditations on game design, relying on the poetic contrast between a sweet atmosphere and devious level design, while Hubol's titles are more absurd, whimsical and garish, as in Craz'd! (2009). Their productions must be understood through an aesthetic of subversion, playing with traditional codes and the player's expectations. For example, cat planet (2009), a more concise project by sylvie, subverted the idea of a single action button, but remained relatively superficial in its exploration of game design. JIGGLY ZONE revisits this initial idea, but takes the opposite approach. The player controls a Jigglypuff and must collect fragments of medallions scattered across seven different worlds. Initially, Jiggly can only make a single jump, but the title gradually tries to push the player to their limits by offering a series of technical obstacles. The placement of platforms and spikes requires careful movement, making full use of the jump palette. The first objective, implied by the various Jigglies that populate this strange world, is to obtain a power-up in the Golden City. This allows the player to make successive jumps of decreasing height.
JIGGLY ZONE immediately takes advantage of this new resource by introducing more challenging aerial platforming, with multiple spikes dotting the screen. Despite the roughness of some sections, sylvie's philosophy is not to alienate the player: by pressing the down button, a checkpoint can be placed on Jiggly's position. This acts as a de facto savestate, breaking up the progression into easily digestible micro-sections. Much like Celeste (2018), the title allows players to familiarise themselves with Jiggly's powers at their own pace, but rewards their proactive – albeit often optional – use, as well as exiting the boundaries of the levels. In the first few minutes, each screen may seem chaotic and labyrinthine, but the acquisition of power-ups recontextualises them, as the player is able to get through a previously major ordeal in no time. JIGGLY ZONE manages to alter the pace and mode of exploration to avoid becoming unpleasantly monotonous. The lack of a map, which players will have to draw themselves in order to find their way through the world, is perhaps unfortunate. It is frustrating to get lost in a series of visually similar screens near the end, trying to find chests that were inaccessible at the start of the game.
There's something fascinating about the way the world of JIGGLY ZONE is constructed. The pixel art assets contrast nicely with the crepe paper backgrounds. The NPCs' dialogue is disjointed, and the player is treated like a pariah. Nowhere are they welcome, and all the characters are either sarcastic, contemptuous or defiant. Each group protects its treasures, but Jiggly simply ignores their warnings and complaints. The Golden City has suffered an apocalypse, the nature of which eludes the player. All that remains are the ruins of gilded buildings, their blocks engraved with a dollar sign. Was it the avarice of the inhabitants or that of the looters that brought the city to its knees? No answer is given, except that Jiggly grabs the last remaining treasure.
The various NPCs seem to be mere reflections of themselves, their remarks devoid of any rationality. As the title progresses, this feeling deepens, their words distorted and their sentences pierced by an eerie silence, like the hull of a ship cracked by the sea. This is of little interest to Jiggly. Conversation with the locals was a welcome reward when progression was slow and cautious. But with increasing power, the presence of other life forms becomes obsolete, anecdotal. In the final minutes, the player collects the last medallion shards without remorse. And then there is only silence.
'I understand people used to make lamps using ionized gases: neon, argon, mercury, and so forth. Walking down into quicksilver gully is exactly like walking into the glow of one of those old lamps.'
– John H. Varley, Retrograde Summer, 1975.
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (16th May – 22th May, 2023).
In John Varley's Retrograde Summer (1975), the narrator goes with her clonal sister Jubilant to a grotto filled with liquid mercury. An industrial waste, this mercury is the by-product of fusion operations, crudely dumped into nature without any environmental precautions. During the summer, the mercury evaporates, forming rainbow-ionised clouds, but some of it condenses in the underground caverns, forming pools of liquid mercury. It is a popular spot for children, many of whom play on its surface, as it is impossible to sink deep into it. For Jubilant, it is a contemplative discovery. 'She watched the drops fall from the roof and splash without a ripple into the isolated pools on the floor of the cave,' comments the narrator [1]. Mercury has a mystical aura, often depicted in science fiction, but also in modernist decoration with the lava lamps of the late 1960s.
A recreational contemplation of mercury and wooden labyrinths
A similar tranquil atmosphere can be found in Archer Maclean's Mercury, whose introductory cutscenes evoke unexplored science fiction frontiers, from Arctic glaciers to electron atmospheres. Archer Maclean, a jack-of-all-trades known for experimenting with a wide variety of game concepts – from International Karate (1986) to his snooker games – has revisited an old industry idea. Controlling a ball in three-dimensional space is a simple premise that lends itself to many variations, as evidenced by the many titles inspired by Marble Madness (1984) and Super Monkey Ball (2001). But just like Tama: Adventurous Ball in Giddy Labyrinth (1994) or 3D Marble Flip! (2003), Mercury is primarily inspired by wooden labyrinth puzzles where the ball is moved by the tilt of the toy. Unexpectedly, the development team decided to implement liquid mechanics for the ball after developing a new physics engine.
This approach gave shape to Mercury, which then took full advantage of it. Mercury's very high density, low viscosity and strong metallic bonding allow for unexpected movements. Titles that only allow the player to control incompressible balls often adopt a very linear level design; creativity comes mainly from the verticality, which allows the ball to fall in a variety of ways and take shortcuts. Mercury is much more fluid; the first level introduces the movement mechanics and shows the player how the liquid interacts with the slopes. However, the title also implies that only a fraction of the mercury needs to touch the finish line to complete the level: a creative player will realise that it is possible to send the molten mass against the corner of the raised platform and let inertia cut off some of the mercury, which can be sent directly to the end of the level. Splitting the liquid or flattening it against the walls are viable strategies for progressing through the game, sometimes circumventing puzzles in seemingly unexpected ways.
Physical creativity of objectives
With this free-form philosophy, Mercury offers three different types of objectives. 'Races' involve reaching the end of the level as quickly as possible, regardless of the amount of mercury conserved; 'Percentage' missions emphasise precision and force the player to conserve as much liquid as possible; 'Tasks' often require a lot of round-tripping and manipulation to activate switches of different colours. Indeed, the ball of mercury – and all its subdivisions, if there are any – can take on a particular colour, and it is possible to mix them up. For example, a mass of red mercury touching another mass of blue colour will form a purple unit. The title uses this mechanic to create puzzles that sometimes require the player to control multiple masses of mercury simultaneously, forcing the player to carefully divide their attention. One of the most complex instances is Orbit Bonus 3, where the platforms have holes in many areas, so navigating the maze with one mercury ball pushes the other dangerously close to the void. In general, Mercury multiplies creative ideas, either by focusing on gravity or friction.
The player is therefore encouraged to think about their movements beforehand in order to protect their mercury. It is often necessary to use barriers to temporarily block one clump and allow the others to progress through the level, either to reach a switch or to get closer to the first to make a fusion. This is both the strength and the weakness of the title. On the one hand, the levels are relatively accessible and completing the title does not require an impossible effort. If the timer is quite strict, there is always a relatively easy solution. Backed by an ethereal soundtrack, Mercury emulates well the contemplation that Varley expressed in Retrograde Summer, with mercury seen as a very malleable toy with unique physics. At the same time, the title takes the liberty of ramping up the difficulty quite considerably as the player tries to beat the high scores. It requires a great deal of creativity and flawless execution to make dangerous jumps or cut a few corners without losing material: Xero Bonus expects an absurd mastery of aerial movements and of the platform's movement cycle. This design plasticity is particularly pleasant for those who enjoy the exercise of surpassing themselves.
Some problems and artificial difficulties
On the other hand, some levels require prior understanding to identify the solution process. Helios Percentage 1 is particularly dense and the camera makes it difficult to analyse the level, with criss-crossing pipes and switches on different floors. The introductory view always uses a camera that rotates at a rather unpleasant speed, and it is not practical to use this opening shot to dissect the various elements of a level. The title thus enforces a blind exploration that seems at odds with the puzzle design itself. In order to achieve high scores, this makes the search for the method sluggish and frustrating – as if the inspection time was counted when solving a Rubik's Cube. Overall, while it is relatively intuitive to grasp the controls for moving the mercury around, managing the camera requires considerably more effort.
Nevertheless, Mercury remains an atypical proposition for 2000s video games, favouring unique design ideas. Maclean considers the title to be his greatest achievement, interpreting it as an exception within an industry dominated by graphical performance and the homogenisation of AAA: ‘the constant raising of the production values bar doesn’t help anybody in the long run, it’ll just mean fewer developers and therefore fewer ideas, as well as fewer publishers willing to risk ever rising development budgets on new genres when instead they can stick with lower risk known-formulas’ [2]. It is remarkable how this '[lateral thinking] about development' is reflected in Mercury's gameplay itself, which is able to offer the player something new and unique.
__________
[1] John H. Varley, Retrograde Summer, in The Persistence of Vision, The Dial Press, New York, 1978.
[2] Archer Maclean, ‘Archer Maclean talks Mercury’, on Eurogamer, 8th May 2005, consulted on 20th May 2023.
– John H. Varley, Retrograde Summer, 1975.
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (16th May – 22th May, 2023).
In John Varley's Retrograde Summer (1975), the narrator goes with her clonal sister Jubilant to a grotto filled with liquid mercury. An industrial waste, this mercury is the by-product of fusion operations, crudely dumped into nature without any environmental precautions. During the summer, the mercury evaporates, forming rainbow-ionised clouds, but some of it condenses in the underground caverns, forming pools of liquid mercury. It is a popular spot for children, many of whom play on its surface, as it is impossible to sink deep into it. For Jubilant, it is a contemplative discovery. 'She watched the drops fall from the roof and splash without a ripple into the isolated pools on the floor of the cave,' comments the narrator [1]. Mercury has a mystical aura, often depicted in science fiction, but also in modernist decoration with the lava lamps of the late 1960s.
A recreational contemplation of mercury and wooden labyrinths
A similar tranquil atmosphere can be found in Archer Maclean's Mercury, whose introductory cutscenes evoke unexplored science fiction frontiers, from Arctic glaciers to electron atmospheres. Archer Maclean, a jack-of-all-trades known for experimenting with a wide variety of game concepts – from International Karate (1986) to his snooker games – has revisited an old industry idea. Controlling a ball in three-dimensional space is a simple premise that lends itself to many variations, as evidenced by the many titles inspired by Marble Madness (1984) and Super Monkey Ball (2001). But just like Tama: Adventurous Ball in Giddy Labyrinth (1994) or 3D Marble Flip! (2003), Mercury is primarily inspired by wooden labyrinth puzzles where the ball is moved by the tilt of the toy. Unexpectedly, the development team decided to implement liquid mechanics for the ball after developing a new physics engine.
This approach gave shape to Mercury, which then took full advantage of it. Mercury's very high density, low viscosity and strong metallic bonding allow for unexpected movements. Titles that only allow the player to control incompressible balls often adopt a very linear level design; creativity comes mainly from the verticality, which allows the ball to fall in a variety of ways and take shortcuts. Mercury is much more fluid; the first level introduces the movement mechanics and shows the player how the liquid interacts with the slopes. However, the title also implies that only a fraction of the mercury needs to touch the finish line to complete the level: a creative player will realise that it is possible to send the molten mass against the corner of the raised platform and let inertia cut off some of the mercury, which can be sent directly to the end of the level. Splitting the liquid or flattening it against the walls are viable strategies for progressing through the game, sometimes circumventing puzzles in seemingly unexpected ways.
Physical creativity of objectives
With this free-form philosophy, Mercury offers three different types of objectives. 'Races' involve reaching the end of the level as quickly as possible, regardless of the amount of mercury conserved; 'Percentage' missions emphasise precision and force the player to conserve as much liquid as possible; 'Tasks' often require a lot of round-tripping and manipulation to activate switches of different colours. Indeed, the ball of mercury – and all its subdivisions, if there are any – can take on a particular colour, and it is possible to mix them up. For example, a mass of red mercury touching another mass of blue colour will form a purple unit. The title uses this mechanic to create puzzles that sometimes require the player to control multiple masses of mercury simultaneously, forcing the player to carefully divide their attention. One of the most complex instances is Orbit Bonus 3, where the platforms have holes in many areas, so navigating the maze with one mercury ball pushes the other dangerously close to the void. In general, Mercury multiplies creative ideas, either by focusing on gravity or friction.
The player is therefore encouraged to think about their movements beforehand in order to protect their mercury. It is often necessary to use barriers to temporarily block one clump and allow the others to progress through the level, either to reach a switch or to get closer to the first to make a fusion. This is both the strength and the weakness of the title. On the one hand, the levels are relatively accessible and completing the title does not require an impossible effort. If the timer is quite strict, there is always a relatively easy solution. Backed by an ethereal soundtrack, Mercury emulates well the contemplation that Varley expressed in Retrograde Summer, with mercury seen as a very malleable toy with unique physics. At the same time, the title takes the liberty of ramping up the difficulty quite considerably as the player tries to beat the high scores. It requires a great deal of creativity and flawless execution to make dangerous jumps or cut a few corners without losing material: Xero Bonus expects an absurd mastery of aerial movements and of the platform's movement cycle. This design plasticity is particularly pleasant for those who enjoy the exercise of surpassing themselves.
Some problems and artificial difficulties
On the other hand, some levels require prior understanding to identify the solution process. Helios Percentage 1 is particularly dense and the camera makes it difficult to analyse the level, with criss-crossing pipes and switches on different floors. The introductory view always uses a camera that rotates at a rather unpleasant speed, and it is not practical to use this opening shot to dissect the various elements of a level. The title thus enforces a blind exploration that seems at odds with the puzzle design itself. In order to achieve high scores, this makes the search for the method sluggish and frustrating – as if the inspection time was counted when solving a Rubik's Cube. Overall, while it is relatively intuitive to grasp the controls for moving the mercury around, managing the camera requires considerably more effort.
Nevertheless, Mercury remains an atypical proposition for 2000s video games, favouring unique design ideas. Maclean considers the title to be his greatest achievement, interpreting it as an exception within an industry dominated by graphical performance and the homogenisation of AAA: ‘the constant raising of the production values bar doesn’t help anybody in the long run, it’ll just mean fewer developers and therefore fewer ideas, as well as fewer publishers willing to risk ever rising development budgets on new genres when instead they can stick with lower risk known-formulas’ [2]. It is remarkable how this '[lateral thinking] about development' is reflected in Mercury's gameplay itself, which is able to offer the player something new and unique.
__________
[1] John H. Varley, Retrograde Summer, in The Persistence of Vision, The Dial Press, New York, 1978.
[2] Archer Maclean, ‘Archer Maclean talks Mercury’, on Eurogamer, 8th May 2005, consulted on 20th May 2023.
2020
'The first bird I searched for was the nightjar, which used to nest in the valley. Its song is like the sound of a stream of wine spilling from a height into a deep and booming cask. It is an odorous sound, with a bouquet that rises to the quiet sky.'
– John A. Baker, The Peregrine, 1967.
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (9th May – 15th May, 2023).
The publication of The Peregrine (1967) by John A. Baker marked a significant shift in naturalist literature; although it had always been committed to finding a style that combined expertise and poetry, ever since Gilbert White's Natural History of Selborne (1788), John A. Baker's influence can be felt in the restored autonomy given to nature. The environment exerts its own fascination on man, as if in a reversal of the naive notion of human domination over its natural space. In describing the saltings of Essex, Baker records an obsessive journey into birdwatching, a kind of one-sided love affair driven by the comings and goings of peregrine falcons: there is something deeply serious and melodramatic about his writing, reflecting a communion between the author and his environment. This subjective approach has become a source of inspiration for contemporary writers – most notably Mark Cocker's Crow Country (2007), David G. Haskell's The Forest Unseen (2012) and Helen Macdonald's H Is for Hawk (2016) – and regularly attracts criticism from some zoologists, who feel deceived that these books are primarily poetic works rather than ornithological manuals.
Birdwatching today, between naturalism and personal poetry
Baker's approach stemmed from a change in birdwatching methods after World War II. Spurred on by Max Nicholson and his manual The Art of Bird-Watching (1932), British birdwatching adopted a more scientific method, favouring observation in the field rather than skeletons in museums. This new methodology was supported by the rise of ecological science, the study of the interactions between living things and their environment, but also by the collaboration between academic societies and local amateur associations. In the 1960s, the decline of bird populations due to chemical pollution prompted British local authorities to take action and reinvent a tradition of birdwatching, giving it a patriotic or local colour [1]: demands for environmental protection often led in the United Kingdom to calls for a return to a lost age and the withdrawal of mankind from fragile natural areas.
The strength of The Peregrine lies in its ability to evoke powerful emotions through birdwatching. Baker combined this new-found concern for environmental conservation with a sublime and poetic sense of wonder. Such a spirit can certainly be found in the recent revival of birdwatching in the wake of the ecological emergency. [2] The Bird Museum crystallises this new attitude to ecological conservation. The concept of exhibiting representations of birds highlights the subjective nature of the relationship between humans and the natural environment. The variety of artistic styles is surprising, ranging from abstract charcoal drawings to ethereal watercolours, shimmering pop art or more detailed naturalistic sketches. Some pieces are the work of amateurs, while others are astonishing in their technique. The Bird Museum reflects the complex relationship of the different artists with birds and nature, without comparing them to each other, thanks to the random generation of the gallery.
Nature observation in the Internet age
There is something almost majestic and tragic about this museum. Instead of real birds, it is their representations that the player can observe. Is this a reversal of the master and the beast, as in The Peregrine, where the birds are the ones observing the humans trapped in a aviary-museum? Or is it something more tragic, such as the disappearance of bird species whose only visible trace is the artistic inspiration they provide to humans? The interpretation is left open, but The Bird Museum is primarily concerned with highlighting animals that are ubiquitous in our environment but generally ignored. The various artworks pay tribute to ordinary species such as the rock dove. The more absurd productions, especially the sculptures, underline the plasticity of the avian kingdom, which, without reaching the fantastic contortions of the statues, comprises several thousand species.
The Bird Museum reinvents nature by suggesting an almost symbiotic contemplation, immersing the player in an enchanting diversity. The experience is certainly not perfect, as the random generation of the instance still produces duplicates. Perhaps most importantly, the edge-distorting filter interferes with the experience, preventing the player from using their peripheral vision to appreciate the gallery as a whole. The Bird Museum seems to be conceived as a linear observation of the different artworks, rejecting the idea of a more complex and transversal museography. The layout of the rooms does not allow for organic circulation, and it is often necessary to cross multiple times the large central hall to access the other wings of the gallery. Nevertheless, The Bird Museum is an atypical project that manages to arouse genuine curiosity by integrating contemplative strolling, concern for the environment and collective artistic creation. It is only a pity that the title did not have full confidence in its concept and decided to negatively and unnecessarily alter the artistic productions through various filters.
__________
[1] Sean J. Nixon, ‘Vanishing Peregrines: J. A. Baker, Environmental Crisis and Bird-Centred Cultures of Nature, 1954-73’, in Rural History, vol. 28, no. 2, pp. 205-226.
[2] The global lockdown following the COVID-19 pandemic was also an important factor, as it encouraged introspection, while the decline in human activity allowed animal species to repopulate places they had traditionally avoided. However, the production of The Bird Museum predates these events.
– John A. Baker, The Peregrine, 1967.
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (9th May – 15th May, 2023).
The publication of The Peregrine (1967) by John A. Baker marked a significant shift in naturalist literature; although it had always been committed to finding a style that combined expertise and poetry, ever since Gilbert White's Natural History of Selborne (1788), John A. Baker's influence can be felt in the restored autonomy given to nature. The environment exerts its own fascination on man, as if in a reversal of the naive notion of human domination over its natural space. In describing the saltings of Essex, Baker records an obsessive journey into birdwatching, a kind of one-sided love affair driven by the comings and goings of peregrine falcons: there is something deeply serious and melodramatic about his writing, reflecting a communion between the author and his environment. This subjective approach has become a source of inspiration for contemporary writers – most notably Mark Cocker's Crow Country (2007), David G. Haskell's The Forest Unseen (2012) and Helen Macdonald's H Is for Hawk (2016) – and regularly attracts criticism from some zoologists, who feel deceived that these books are primarily poetic works rather than ornithological manuals.
Birdwatching today, between naturalism and personal poetry
Baker's approach stemmed from a change in birdwatching methods after World War II. Spurred on by Max Nicholson and his manual The Art of Bird-Watching (1932), British birdwatching adopted a more scientific method, favouring observation in the field rather than skeletons in museums. This new methodology was supported by the rise of ecological science, the study of the interactions between living things and their environment, but also by the collaboration between academic societies and local amateur associations. In the 1960s, the decline of bird populations due to chemical pollution prompted British local authorities to take action and reinvent a tradition of birdwatching, giving it a patriotic or local colour [1]: demands for environmental protection often led in the United Kingdom to calls for a return to a lost age and the withdrawal of mankind from fragile natural areas.
The strength of The Peregrine lies in its ability to evoke powerful emotions through birdwatching. Baker combined this new-found concern for environmental conservation with a sublime and poetic sense of wonder. Such a spirit can certainly be found in the recent revival of birdwatching in the wake of the ecological emergency. [2] The Bird Museum crystallises this new attitude to ecological conservation. The concept of exhibiting representations of birds highlights the subjective nature of the relationship between humans and the natural environment. The variety of artistic styles is surprising, ranging from abstract charcoal drawings to ethereal watercolours, shimmering pop art or more detailed naturalistic sketches. Some pieces are the work of amateurs, while others are astonishing in their technique. The Bird Museum reflects the complex relationship of the different artists with birds and nature, without comparing them to each other, thanks to the random generation of the gallery.
Nature observation in the Internet age
There is something almost majestic and tragic about this museum. Instead of real birds, it is their representations that the player can observe. Is this a reversal of the master and the beast, as in The Peregrine, where the birds are the ones observing the humans trapped in a aviary-museum? Or is it something more tragic, such as the disappearance of bird species whose only visible trace is the artistic inspiration they provide to humans? The interpretation is left open, but The Bird Museum is primarily concerned with highlighting animals that are ubiquitous in our environment but generally ignored. The various artworks pay tribute to ordinary species such as the rock dove. The more absurd productions, especially the sculptures, underline the plasticity of the avian kingdom, which, without reaching the fantastic contortions of the statues, comprises several thousand species.
The Bird Museum reinvents nature by suggesting an almost symbiotic contemplation, immersing the player in an enchanting diversity. The experience is certainly not perfect, as the random generation of the instance still produces duplicates. Perhaps most importantly, the edge-distorting filter interferes with the experience, preventing the player from using their peripheral vision to appreciate the gallery as a whole. The Bird Museum seems to be conceived as a linear observation of the different artworks, rejecting the idea of a more complex and transversal museography. The layout of the rooms does not allow for organic circulation, and it is often necessary to cross multiple times the large central hall to access the other wings of the gallery. Nevertheless, The Bird Museum is an atypical project that manages to arouse genuine curiosity by integrating contemplative strolling, concern for the environment and collective artistic creation. It is only a pity that the title did not have full confidence in its concept and decided to negatively and unnecessarily alter the artistic productions through various filters.
__________
[1] Sean J. Nixon, ‘Vanishing Peregrines: J. A. Baker, Environmental Crisis and Bird-Centred Cultures of Nature, 1954-73’, in Rural History, vol. 28, no. 2, pp. 205-226.
[2] The global lockdown following the COVID-19 pandemic was also an important factor, as it encouraged introspection, while the decline in human activity allowed animal species to repopulate places they had traditionally avoided. However, the production of The Bird Museum predates these events.
2008
‘Sometimes a god comes. He brings a new way to do a thing or a new thing to be done. A new kind of singing, or a new kind of death. He brings this across the bridge between the dream-time and the world-time.’
– Ursula K. Le Guin, The Word for World Is Forest, 1972.
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (2nd May – 8th May, 2023).
As early as Herbert G. Wells, science fiction was accompanied by a latent pessimism. In The War of the Worlds (1897), the author repeatedly compares Martians and Earthlings, pointing out that the cruelty of the former during their invasion is fundamentally similar to that of the latter. Humans are quite capable of illegitimate violence based on racial criteria, and capitalism is well suited to the exploitation of wildlife. These parallels are reflected in the lexicon used by the narrator: 'I crept out like a rat' (p. 249), 'we're eatable ants' (p. 255) [1]. In contrast to the image of a blissful and ideal humanity under attack from warring alien civilisations, this pessimism about humanity has spawned an entire artistic and cultural tradition that finds visible connections with post-Marxist militant anxieties. In The Word for World is Forest (1972), Ursula K. Le Guin explores the dire consequences of the Anthropocene and humanity's violent exploitation of exoplanets to satisfy its desire for expansion. As for space operas, the first novels of Stephen Baxter's Xeelee Sequence (1991-2018) explored with unusual evocative intensity the triangular war between humanity, the Xeelee and the Photino Birds, and its consequences throughout the universe.
Pessimism in modern science fiction
While The Word for World is Forest offered glimpses of hope for a rebuilding of society on a more egalitarian basis and with greater respect for the environment, Le Guin's later works are marked by a heightened gloom, rejecting the march of progress as inextricably linked to violence and oppression. Perhaps because the focus is on a smaller scale, The Dispossessed (1974), The Eye of the Heron (1978) and Always Coming Home (1985) are much harsher about the effects of modernity, leading to the alienation of the individual, the reproduction of exploitative systems and the disappearance of a privileged relationship with the environment. Nevertheless, Le Guin's work, even when shrouded in heavy pessimism, still leaves room for discussion of the ontology of evil and the solutions, however impractical, for creating a better world. In a way, she has inherited the thinking of Ernst Bloch. The Weimar German philosopher, a follower and objector of Marx, sought to resolve the contradictions of social emancipation through the concepts of utopia and hope; for him, it was less important to resolve the questions than to imagine possibilities that would allow society to move from theory to praxis.
This long artistic tradition is expressed in Iji, which also features a triangular conflict following the double invasion of the Tasen and the Kamato, who have ravaged the surface of the Earth. The player assumes the role of Iji, who was visiting the D.C.M.F.P.R. Research Facility where her father worked. During the invasion, she falls into a coma and is subjected to scientific experiments by the survivors of the attack, giving her the ability to use Tasen technology. When she wakes up, most of the humans are dead and she must find a way to escape and stop the invasion, with the distant help of her brother Dan. Iji must travel through ten levels to find a solution to the problem and understand the issues surrounding the alien invasions. From the outset, the title appears to be a variation on the Metroidvania concept. This impression is relatively inaccurate: Daniel Remar originally conceived Iji as a fairly linear platformer, and despite the versatility of the gameplay, this initial structure remains. The graphic style is reminiscent of Another World (1991), with its flat colour animations. While Eric Chahi's game used rotoscoping, Remar opted for 3D modelling in Blender before rendering the final product in flat colours. The result is a visually charming title that subverts the similarity of all the enemies.
Freedom of action in a non-modular level design
Iji offers a modular progression, not so much in its level design, but in the different approaches available to the player. While it is possible to traverse the levels in a blunt manner, backed by massive firepower, the player can also opt for a more subtle approach thanks to Iji's non-lethal weapons and hacking skills. Thematically, the pacifist route is the most interesting, if less immediately entertaining, given that, as of patch 1.3, it is possible to complete the game without killing any enemies. This alters the dialogue and progression, making Iji a real curiosity for its time. In practice, choosing a pacifist approach proves to be rather odd, as it often seems disconnected from the rest of the game's mechanics. Both alien factions prioritise fighting each other, and Iji is a footnote in their conflict; progression mostly boils down to jumping around to dodge incoming fire and finding a place to take cover. The title's generosity in refilling resources makes sense in the context of an aggressive run, but it almost trivialises a pacifist playthrough.
To compensate for the multiple approaches, bosses are less DPS races and more encounters where the player has to find the weakness and the method to triumph – often involving the environment. Such artificiality is not a problem until the final boss, which takes the opposite approach and becomes a battle of endurance, challenging the player's decision-making and reflexes, especially if they did not upgrade the firepower of Iji. The Assassins do not quite inspire the fear expected of them either: they present a slight challenge, but they never chase the player out of a given area: the easiest method is to keep going and ignore them altogether. In some respects, Iji has not quite figured out a unifying concept in its progression, and it somewhat suffers from the latitude given to the player. Nevertheless, the title is enjoyable and the levels, although linear, end before repetitiveness sets in.
What is at stake when violence is used?
Iji is particularly expansive in its world-building; from the opening, the game seeks to highlight the anguish of the protagonist, contrasted with the apparent inhumanity of her brother. Crucially, the title scatters a large number of notes throughout the various levels, both conveying information about the weapons and detailing the motivations and perspectives of the two alien factions. Iji is ambitious, but the gamble is not entirely successful. The logs are too numerous and disrupt the progression more than necessary, occasionally drowning key elements in a flood of secondary information. By contrast, the best sequences are the pacifist interactions between Iji and the aliens, which feel more natural and elegant. Walking through a Tasen base without hearing a single gunshot is a striking counterpoint to the explosions that usually accompany alien skirmishes.
LunaEndlessWitch has accurately identified the narrative shortcomings of the title, pointing out a general lack of contrast that diminishes the symbolic significance of a pacifist approach. From the start, this option is implied by the game and presented as the only one that allows Iji to maintain her humanistic integrity. Yet no situation ever pushes her over the edge, forcing her to compromise – or even question – her ideals. In the Xeelee Sequence, Baxter presents each faction's acts of violence without elliptical detours, but the various actors invoke their necessity in the name of survival and progress. In particular, humanity manages to justify its xenophobic wars of aggression by arguing that they are carried out in self-defence. Such an approach does not work in Iji, since the protagonist has nothing to lose beyond her still pure ideals; not surprisingly, she declares that she is willing to lose her life in the name of her values, because she is not committing anything for which she is accountable. Despite the hollow and superficial tones of the Kamato's populist rhetoric, she can only counter with sanctimonious sermons, lacking the necessary perspective to radically confront this xenophobic philosophy.
Iji appears as a historical curiosity, representative of a free creation in the field of video games. Driven by the vision of Daniel Remar, the title is of colossal proportions. Remar explains his working method on his website, and there is a real unbridled passion in his act of creation. Offering an experience that promotes replayability, Iji feels organic and ambitious in its plot, but it does not quite manage to create an elegantly crafted experience that pushes its protagonist into a corner and forces her to make difficult choices. Interestingly, Remar seems to have quickly realised Iji's limitations, pointing out that his other, more humble titles are probably better designed [2], thus demonstrating a true love of the medium.
__________
[1] Herbert G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, Heinemann, London, 1898.
[2] Daniel Remar, « Интервью с создателем Iji, гейм-дизайнером Дэниэлем Ремаром (Daniel Remar) », on old-games.ru, 22th April 2015, consulted on 4th May 2023.
– Ursula K. Le Guin, The Word for World Is Forest, 1972.
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (2nd May – 8th May, 2023).
As early as Herbert G. Wells, science fiction was accompanied by a latent pessimism. In The War of the Worlds (1897), the author repeatedly compares Martians and Earthlings, pointing out that the cruelty of the former during their invasion is fundamentally similar to that of the latter. Humans are quite capable of illegitimate violence based on racial criteria, and capitalism is well suited to the exploitation of wildlife. These parallels are reflected in the lexicon used by the narrator: 'I crept out like a rat' (p. 249), 'we're eatable ants' (p. 255) [1]. In contrast to the image of a blissful and ideal humanity under attack from warring alien civilisations, this pessimism about humanity has spawned an entire artistic and cultural tradition that finds visible connections with post-Marxist militant anxieties. In The Word for World is Forest (1972), Ursula K. Le Guin explores the dire consequences of the Anthropocene and humanity's violent exploitation of exoplanets to satisfy its desire for expansion. As for space operas, the first novels of Stephen Baxter's Xeelee Sequence (1991-2018) explored with unusual evocative intensity the triangular war between humanity, the Xeelee and the Photino Birds, and its consequences throughout the universe.
Pessimism in modern science fiction
While The Word for World is Forest offered glimpses of hope for a rebuilding of society on a more egalitarian basis and with greater respect for the environment, Le Guin's later works are marked by a heightened gloom, rejecting the march of progress as inextricably linked to violence and oppression. Perhaps because the focus is on a smaller scale, The Dispossessed (1974), The Eye of the Heron (1978) and Always Coming Home (1985) are much harsher about the effects of modernity, leading to the alienation of the individual, the reproduction of exploitative systems and the disappearance of a privileged relationship with the environment. Nevertheless, Le Guin's work, even when shrouded in heavy pessimism, still leaves room for discussion of the ontology of evil and the solutions, however impractical, for creating a better world. In a way, she has inherited the thinking of Ernst Bloch. The Weimar German philosopher, a follower and objector of Marx, sought to resolve the contradictions of social emancipation through the concepts of utopia and hope; for him, it was less important to resolve the questions than to imagine possibilities that would allow society to move from theory to praxis.
This long artistic tradition is expressed in Iji, which also features a triangular conflict following the double invasion of the Tasen and the Kamato, who have ravaged the surface of the Earth. The player assumes the role of Iji, who was visiting the D.C.M.F.P.R. Research Facility where her father worked. During the invasion, she falls into a coma and is subjected to scientific experiments by the survivors of the attack, giving her the ability to use Tasen technology. When she wakes up, most of the humans are dead and she must find a way to escape and stop the invasion, with the distant help of her brother Dan. Iji must travel through ten levels to find a solution to the problem and understand the issues surrounding the alien invasions. From the outset, the title appears to be a variation on the Metroidvania concept. This impression is relatively inaccurate: Daniel Remar originally conceived Iji as a fairly linear platformer, and despite the versatility of the gameplay, this initial structure remains. The graphic style is reminiscent of Another World (1991), with its flat colour animations. While Eric Chahi's game used rotoscoping, Remar opted for 3D modelling in Blender before rendering the final product in flat colours. The result is a visually charming title that subverts the similarity of all the enemies.
Freedom of action in a non-modular level design
Iji offers a modular progression, not so much in its level design, but in the different approaches available to the player. While it is possible to traverse the levels in a blunt manner, backed by massive firepower, the player can also opt for a more subtle approach thanks to Iji's non-lethal weapons and hacking skills. Thematically, the pacifist route is the most interesting, if less immediately entertaining, given that, as of patch 1.3, it is possible to complete the game without killing any enemies. This alters the dialogue and progression, making Iji a real curiosity for its time. In practice, choosing a pacifist approach proves to be rather odd, as it often seems disconnected from the rest of the game's mechanics. Both alien factions prioritise fighting each other, and Iji is a footnote in their conflict; progression mostly boils down to jumping around to dodge incoming fire and finding a place to take cover. The title's generosity in refilling resources makes sense in the context of an aggressive run, but it almost trivialises a pacifist playthrough.
To compensate for the multiple approaches, bosses are less DPS races and more encounters where the player has to find the weakness and the method to triumph – often involving the environment. Such artificiality is not a problem until the final boss, which takes the opposite approach and becomes a battle of endurance, challenging the player's decision-making and reflexes, especially if they did not upgrade the firepower of Iji. The Assassins do not quite inspire the fear expected of them either: they present a slight challenge, but they never chase the player out of a given area: the easiest method is to keep going and ignore them altogether. In some respects, Iji has not quite figured out a unifying concept in its progression, and it somewhat suffers from the latitude given to the player. Nevertheless, the title is enjoyable and the levels, although linear, end before repetitiveness sets in.
What is at stake when violence is used?
Iji is particularly expansive in its world-building; from the opening, the game seeks to highlight the anguish of the protagonist, contrasted with the apparent inhumanity of her brother. Crucially, the title scatters a large number of notes throughout the various levels, both conveying information about the weapons and detailing the motivations and perspectives of the two alien factions. Iji is ambitious, but the gamble is not entirely successful. The logs are too numerous and disrupt the progression more than necessary, occasionally drowning key elements in a flood of secondary information. By contrast, the best sequences are the pacifist interactions between Iji and the aliens, which feel more natural and elegant. Walking through a Tasen base without hearing a single gunshot is a striking counterpoint to the explosions that usually accompany alien skirmishes.
LunaEndlessWitch has accurately identified the narrative shortcomings of the title, pointing out a general lack of contrast that diminishes the symbolic significance of a pacifist approach. From the start, this option is implied by the game and presented as the only one that allows Iji to maintain her humanistic integrity. Yet no situation ever pushes her over the edge, forcing her to compromise – or even question – her ideals. In the Xeelee Sequence, Baxter presents each faction's acts of violence without elliptical detours, but the various actors invoke their necessity in the name of survival and progress. In particular, humanity manages to justify its xenophobic wars of aggression by arguing that they are carried out in self-defence. Such an approach does not work in Iji, since the protagonist has nothing to lose beyond her still pure ideals; not surprisingly, she declares that she is willing to lose her life in the name of her values, because she is not committing anything for which she is accountable. Despite the hollow and superficial tones of the Kamato's populist rhetoric, she can only counter with sanctimonious sermons, lacking the necessary perspective to radically confront this xenophobic philosophy.
Iji appears as a historical curiosity, representative of a free creation in the field of video games. Driven by the vision of Daniel Remar, the title is of colossal proportions. Remar explains his working method on his website, and there is a real unbridled passion in his act of creation. Offering an experience that promotes replayability, Iji feels organic and ambitious in its plot, but it does not quite manage to create an elegantly crafted experience that pushes its protagonist into a corner and forces her to make difficult choices. Interestingly, Remar seems to have quickly realised Iji's limitations, pointing out that his other, more humble titles are probably better designed [2], thus demonstrating a true love of the medium.
__________
[1] Herbert G. Wells, The War of the Worlds, Heinemann, London, 1898.
[2] Daniel Remar, « Интервью с создателем Iji, гейм-дизайнером Дэниэлем Ремаром (Daniel Remar) », on old-games.ru, 22th April 2015, consulted on 4th May 2023.
1996
Played during the Backloggd’s Game of the Week (25th Apr. – 1st May, 2023).
In 1991, Bethesda released a very literal adaptation of Where's Waldo (1991) for the NES, which is remembered for its structural mediocrity. Finding Waldo on the horribly pixelated screens was obnoxious, and the game never really captured the spirit of the books. The Great Waldo Search (1992) on the SNES attempted to rectify the problem with much more detailed backgrounds and a slightly impressionistic art style, but proved to be particularly trivial and failed to justify a video game adaptation. In the same year, SEGA released its own version for arcade machines, with a more frantic formula and an emphasis on player competition. While the goal is still to find Waldo, the stages are now more dynamic and players have to deal with a very tight timer.
Interestingly, the title focuses on the player's reflexes and the element of luck. In the stationary scenes, finding Waldo is mostly a matter of speed, while the fast-moving scenes force players to spot a few pixels that give away the iconic character. Whether he is hiding in a coffin, a bathroom stall or a train carriage, it is up to the fastest and luckiest player to find his hiding place. It is difficult not to see in Wally wo Sagase! an indirect precursor to the WarioWare microgames, a decade before the Nintendo title was released. Most likely, Wally wo Sagase! was inspired by Japanese game shows filled with breathless absurdity. The game's sound effects, for example, are very similar to those of the TV show Magical Zunō Power (1990-1999), as is its division into several separate events. The sequences in which Waldo must be found are similar to the buzzer questions, while the mini-game at the end of the level mimics the more playful trials of the show.
Fully embracing the chaotic philosophy of the game show, Wally wo Sagase! proves to be a rather nebulous experience for a single player; it is in competition that its potential is revealed and the buzzer-shaped trackpad comes fully into its own. It is a shame that the timer for each screen is so tight and that some of the concepts work a little less effectively, such as the levels where players have to find the differences. It is when the title gets frenetic that it manages to be an intelligent adaptation of the source material, bringing something that the books cannot replicate. The arcade structure of the game, with the necessity to use credits, somewhat detracts from the overall concept, but Wally wo Sagase! is a rather addictive, if unexpected, experience. It comes as no surprise that the title was never localised in the West, probably out of fear that the concept would alienate Western audiences.
In 1991, Bethesda released a very literal adaptation of Where's Waldo (1991) for the NES, which is remembered for its structural mediocrity. Finding Waldo on the horribly pixelated screens was obnoxious, and the game never really captured the spirit of the books. The Great Waldo Search (1992) on the SNES attempted to rectify the problem with much more detailed backgrounds and a slightly impressionistic art style, but proved to be particularly trivial and failed to justify a video game adaptation. In the same year, SEGA released its own version for arcade machines, with a more frantic formula and an emphasis on player competition. While the goal is still to find Waldo, the stages are now more dynamic and players have to deal with a very tight timer.
Interestingly, the title focuses on the player's reflexes and the element of luck. In the stationary scenes, finding Waldo is mostly a matter of speed, while the fast-moving scenes force players to spot a few pixels that give away the iconic character. Whether he is hiding in a coffin, a bathroom stall or a train carriage, it is up to the fastest and luckiest player to find his hiding place. It is difficult not to see in Wally wo Sagase! an indirect precursor to the WarioWare microgames, a decade before the Nintendo title was released. Most likely, Wally wo Sagase! was inspired by Japanese game shows filled with breathless absurdity. The game's sound effects, for example, are very similar to those of the TV show Magical Zunō Power (1990-1999), as is its division into several separate events. The sequences in which Waldo must be found are similar to the buzzer questions, while the mini-game at the end of the level mimics the more playful trials of the show.
Fully embracing the chaotic philosophy of the game show, Wally wo Sagase! proves to be a rather nebulous experience for a single player; it is in competition that its potential is revealed and the buzzer-shaped trackpad comes fully into its own. It is a shame that the timer for each screen is so tight and that some of the concepts work a little less effectively, such as the levels where players have to find the differences. It is when the title gets frenetic that it manages to be an intelligent adaptation of the source material, bringing something that the books cannot replicate. The arcade structure of the game, with the necessity to use credits, somewhat detracts from the overall concept, but Wally wo Sagase! is a rather addictive, if unexpected, experience. It comes as no surprise that the title was never localised in the West, probably out of fear that the concept would alienate Western audiences.
‘’I mean’, [Alice] said, ‘that one can’t help growing older.’ ‘One can’t perhaps,’ said Humpty Dumpty, ‘but two can. With proper assistance, you might have left off at seven.’’
– Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass, 1871.
Played with BertKnot.
The genesis of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking-Glass (1871) stemmed from the relationship between Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, then a lecturer at Christ Church, Oxford, and the Hellenist Henry George Liddell. Liddell had heard of Dodgson's photographic talents and regularly asked him to take portraits of his four children. On 4 July 1862, as they strolled along the water's edge, he improvised a story for the middle daughter, Alice, which eventually became Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. For his pen name, Dodgson reversed his first name and called himself Lewis Carroll. An essential work in the modern literary canon, Alice in Wonderland has influenced many writers who have followed in its thematic footsteps: James Joyce, for example, borrowed the episodes of transformation and phantasmagoric hallucination when he wrote Ulysses (1920). But Carroll himself built Alice in Wonderland on an interplay of references and intertextuality.
Narratological and stylistic intertextualities
Carroll was inspired by a collection of children's stories, which he freely parodied and reworked, giving them a nonsensical flavour. It is difficult to read Carroll without thinking of Edward Lear's extravagant poetry; the prosody of the characters in Alice in Wonderland was certainly inspired by The Book of Nonsense (1846). Carroll also retained the anticipatory and mythological aspect that Charles Perrault had introduced into his Contes de ma mère l'Oye (1697), but offered a radical change of tone. Where Perrault wrote with seriousness for a court of aristocrats, Carroll gave way to an unbridled freedom in which intense emotions surface on every page. Just as the author relished the art of portmanteau to create new words, so Alice's encounters are fuelled by rich and varied inspirations – the fruit of an imagination that improvised children's stories in the summer heat of Godstow.
Although Alice in Wonderland is an essential work for Japan, immortalised alongside the adventures of Sherlock Holmes as a symbol of modernity in the late nineteenth century, it is surprising to see a franchise like Bayonetta picking it up to deliver a spin-off just months after the release of Bayonetta 3 (2022). Although the fushigi is an important part of Japanese culture and has exceptional plasticity, the different tone of the game is intriguing. Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon is a radical departure from previous titles, adopting a childlike visual and narrative identity.
Dreams, children's stories and the forest
The player assumes the role of Cereza, whose early years are revealed. Her mother was imprisoned and she had to seek refuge with the witch Morgana. She has been taken under her wing and taught how to become a witch herself. In the hope of obtaining the powers necessary to save her mother, the young girl decides to venture into the Avalon Forest. There she soon calls a demon, who takes possession of her pet, Cheshire. The story is told through the use of an old female narrator, who immediately sets a dreamlike mood, while the colours, sometimes pastel, sometimes shimmering, engulf the player in a restful serenity. The formula works and it is easy to get caught up in this gentle universe, despite the lengthy exposition scenes. Bayonetta Origins is driven by a very polished art direction, which contrasts with the visual chaos that was Bayonetta 3. The shading, lighting and colours give a paper-like quality to the backgrounds and characters, reinforcing the dreaminess of the adventure. Avalon Forest, a magical location with enormous trees and strange creatures, functions as a catalyst for youthful emotions.
Sometimes serene, sometimes disturbing, the forest of Bayonetta Origins borrows equally from the film adaptations of Alice in Wonderland and Hayao Miyazaki's Mononoke hime (1997). The emphasis on the light coming through the canopy is reminiscent of the 1951 adaptation of Alice in Wonderland, but the game is characterised by an abundance of visual effects and details, which contrast with the sobriety and uniform textures of the Disney film. The little wisps, although drawn from Gaelic folklore, bear a strong resemblance to the little spirits found in Miyazaki's work and their strong connection to nature. Either way, through the various elements Cereza obtains during the adventure, the game showcases varied colour palettes, which help to highlight the emotions Cereza and Cheshire go through. The calm and reassuring green of the early hours is replaced by gloomy reds or cooling blues; this variation in colour keeps things visually fresh and Bayonetta Origins manages to create some striking visuals, such as the arrival at the circus.
The red train of reference
Musically, the title features an elegant and rather intimate soundtrack, painting a charming fresco full of lyrical flourishes. The various musical tracks are built up almost like a symphonic poem; the different layers are interwoven with complex percussion, creating a particularly ethereal atmosphere. The score is similar to the compositions of Charles Villiers Stanford, who also used Irish material as a source of inspiration; his Irish Rhapsody No. 1, Op. 78 (1902) evoked the love story between Cú Chulainn and Emer, which also involved an initiation quest for the hero. Contemplative sequences follow intense, dramatic and fierce climaxes, just as dreamy melodies alternate with battle themes in Bayonetta Origins. The prominent use of the piano is reminiscent of An Irish Idyll in 6 Miniatures, Op. 77 (1901), where it contributes to the pastoral quality of the composition, while in the game it is imbued with mystery. Most striking are the small melodic motifs, which are taken directly from The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017).
Bayonetta Origins makes no attempt to hide its many aesthetic references to other video games. Unlike Bayonetta 3, where the inspirations were chaotic and failed to create an overall coherence, the borrowings in Bayonetta Origins fit well with the themes of a children's story. The micropuzzles are still reminiscent of the Zelda games, but without the holistic brilliance, and some areas are very similar to NieR:Automata's (2017) Amusement Park and Robot Village, Super Mario Odyssey's (2017) Wooden Kingdom, or Hollow Knight's (2017) final boss sequence. It seems to me that the chronological proximity of all these titles suggests a strong referential loan, matching the development cycle of Bayonetta Origins, which certainly overlapped with that of Bayonetta 3.
Rejecting the absurd: an archaic and non-subversive approach
The title nevertheless suffers a structural shortcoming in this art of reference and in its unexpected artistic direction for the series. Torn between a desire for novelty and an obligation to remain in the bosom of its franchise, Bayonetta Origins struggles to forge an experience that goes beyond a simple charming discovery. While Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass featured very disparate scenes in quick succession to emphasise the strangeness of the universe, Bayonetta Origins quickly settles into a comfortable routine. Although the environments remain charming, the world-building often has the player returning to previously explored locations, while the notable areas, frequently saved for the bosses, are abandoned rather quickly. All the more burlesque and whimsical environments are trimmed away, as if the title was afraid to really commit to variety. Similarly, the game seems afraid to tell anything other than Cereza's initiation journey and her budding relationship with Cheshire; all information about the world is relegated to collectible notes and the wisps are pretextual and underused. They never contribute to a more complex picture of the forest, as the humorous touches in their personalities are not introduced during the exploration.
Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass stand out for their use of subtle and sometimes caustic humour, which contrasts with the childlike world Carroll draws – though it is very likely that these contrasts are more or less involuntary manifestations of Carroll's paedophile impulses, that he encoded his feelings in the absurdity of his text. [1] Beyond Alice in Wonderland, these tensions are emblematic of the modernist novel. James Joyce employed the same absurdist devices to create profound contemplation. When in Book V of Ulysses, 'Calypso', the story returns to Mr. Bloom, the reader thinks they have found a haven of tranquillity after the density of the previous sections. They are then surprised by a detailed description of the character's defecation after breakfast. This passage should certainly be read as a physical representation of the powerful creativity of existence and its capacity to generate art. [2]
A structure prone to repetition
Bayonetta Origins fails to generate the same creative and invigorating excitement. Departing from the absurdity that formed the aesthetic framework of the franchise, the game loses itself in a children's story, in the strictest sense of the expression. There is no subversion, no clever rewriting of the series. Bayonetta Origins is sweet and very pleasant to explore, but it offers no other major ideas. It also fails to subvert the franchise's original gameplay, opting for an awkwardly symmetrical approach: the left half of the controller is used to command Cereza, while the right is reserved for Cheshire. This dichotomy is reminiscent of Astral Chain (2019), but clearly lacks elegance. With the camera behind the protagonist, it has always be natural to use the left stick to move them; in Bayonetta Origins, the overhead view shuffles the two characters around, making it difficult to adjust effectively. Because the title is relatively short, there is no time for the player to learn how to build up hand independence, and it is always easier to switch one's attention between Cereza and Cheshire than controlling them at the same time. This makes for generally dull fights, saved only by the dynamic light and sound effects.
The various powers acquired throughout the adventure also struggle to find an elegant expression across combat and exploration. Infusing wood allows for moderately interesting puzzles, but the next three fail to inspire the same usefulness during exploration. It is therefore unsurprising, albeit unfortunate, that the game's final chapters are a series of battles that are all very similar to each other. Bayonetta Origins seems reluctant to move forward, and the bonus chapter featuring Jeanne is a prime example of this. The title feels forced to tie its story to Bayonetta 3 in the most frustrating and obnoxious way possible, removing all the childlike magic that inhabited the spin-off.
It is unclear who the game is intended for. Understandably, Platinum Games could not have foreseen the release of Devil May Cry 5 (2019), nor the mixed reception of Bayonetta 3. Nevertheless, as it stands, Bayonetta Origins, even if welcomed as a breath of fresh air by a fraction of the franchise's fans, is a proposition so radically different from the original series that it is hard to see how it can sustain itself over time. Conversely, anyone who discovers the franchise with the spin-off will surely be disappointed by the aesthetic approach of the main series – not to mention young children, for whom it is not at all suitable. It bears repeating that Bayonetta Origins is a charming and enjoyable experience, a perfect game for children, even if it does indulge in some empty references and a repetitive structure. But if the magic works here, the title offers no real guarantee that it will be able to achieve the same feat again, clouding Hideki Kamiya's inflated ambitions, which were already undermined by a Bayonetta 3 that failed to find its identity.
__________
[1] Morton N. Cohen, Lewis Carroll: A Biography, Macmillan, London, 1995, pp. 226-231. It should be noted that for Cohen, who is generally sympathetic to Carroll, there is no doubt about his pedophile inclinations, even if he believes that they are bottled up in the literary text. These elements are clearly known, and Vladimir Nabokov made no mistake when he wrote Lolita (1955), as he scrambled his connection with the main character by denying any reference to Carroll, whereas he took the liberty of quoting Poe, whose image was not as tainted as Carroll's. On this topic, read Brandon S. Centerwall, ‘Hiding in Plain Sight: Nabokov and Pedophilia’, in Texas Studies in Literature and Language, vol. 32, no. 3, 1990, pp. 468-484.
[2] Robert S. Lehman, ‘Original Nonsense: James Joyce, Marcel Duchamp, and Modernism’s Genius’, in Modernism/modernity, vol. 27, no. 2, 2020, pp. 339-360.
– Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass, 1871.
Played with BertKnot.
The genesis of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (1865) and Through the Looking-Glass (1871) stemmed from the relationship between Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, then a lecturer at Christ Church, Oxford, and the Hellenist Henry George Liddell. Liddell had heard of Dodgson's photographic talents and regularly asked him to take portraits of his four children. On 4 July 1862, as they strolled along the water's edge, he improvised a story for the middle daughter, Alice, which eventually became Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. For his pen name, Dodgson reversed his first name and called himself Lewis Carroll. An essential work in the modern literary canon, Alice in Wonderland has influenced many writers who have followed in its thematic footsteps: James Joyce, for example, borrowed the episodes of transformation and phantasmagoric hallucination when he wrote Ulysses (1920). But Carroll himself built Alice in Wonderland on an interplay of references and intertextuality.
Narratological and stylistic intertextualities
Carroll was inspired by a collection of children's stories, which he freely parodied and reworked, giving them a nonsensical flavour. It is difficult to read Carroll without thinking of Edward Lear's extravagant poetry; the prosody of the characters in Alice in Wonderland was certainly inspired by The Book of Nonsense (1846). Carroll also retained the anticipatory and mythological aspect that Charles Perrault had introduced into his Contes de ma mère l'Oye (1697), but offered a radical change of tone. Where Perrault wrote with seriousness for a court of aristocrats, Carroll gave way to an unbridled freedom in which intense emotions surface on every page. Just as the author relished the art of portmanteau to create new words, so Alice's encounters are fuelled by rich and varied inspirations – the fruit of an imagination that improvised children's stories in the summer heat of Godstow.
Although Alice in Wonderland is an essential work for Japan, immortalised alongside the adventures of Sherlock Holmes as a symbol of modernity in the late nineteenth century, it is surprising to see a franchise like Bayonetta picking it up to deliver a spin-off just months after the release of Bayonetta 3 (2022). Although the fushigi is an important part of Japanese culture and has exceptional plasticity, the different tone of the game is intriguing. Bayonetta Origins: Cereza and the Lost Demon is a radical departure from previous titles, adopting a childlike visual and narrative identity.
Dreams, children's stories and the forest
The player assumes the role of Cereza, whose early years are revealed. Her mother was imprisoned and she had to seek refuge with the witch Morgana. She has been taken under her wing and taught how to become a witch herself. In the hope of obtaining the powers necessary to save her mother, the young girl decides to venture into the Avalon Forest. There she soon calls a demon, who takes possession of her pet, Cheshire. The story is told through the use of an old female narrator, who immediately sets a dreamlike mood, while the colours, sometimes pastel, sometimes shimmering, engulf the player in a restful serenity. The formula works and it is easy to get caught up in this gentle universe, despite the lengthy exposition scenes. Bayonetta Origins is driven by a very polished art direction, which contrasts with the visual chaos that was Bayonetta 3. The shading, lighting and colours give a paper-like quality to the backgrounds and characters, reinforcing the dreaminess of the adventure. Avalon Forest, a magical location with enormous trees and strange creatures, functions as a catalyst for youthful emotions.
Sometimes serene, sometimes disturbing, the forest of Bayonetta Origins borrows equally from the film adaptations of Alice in Wonderland and Hayao Miyazaki's Mononoke hime (1997). The emphasis on the light coming through the canopy is reminiscent of the 1951 adaptation of Alice in Wonderland, but the game is characterised by an abundance of visual effects and details, which contrast with the sobriety and uniform textures of the Disney film. The little wisps, although drawn from Gaelic folklore, bear a strong resemblance to the little spirits found in Miyazaki's work and their strong connection to nature. Either way, through the various elements Cereza obtains during the adventure, the game showcases varied colour palettes, which help to highlight the emotions Cereza and Cheshire go through. The calm and reassuring green of the early hours is replaced by gloomy reds or cooling blues; this variation in colour keeps things visually fresh and Bayonetta Origins manages to create some striking visuals, such as the arrival at the circus.
The red train of reference
Musically, the title features an elegant and rather intimate soundtrack, painting a charming fresco full of lyrical flourishes. The various musical tracks are built up almost like a symphonic poem; the different layers are interwoven with complex percussion, creating a particularly ethereal atmosphere. The score is similar to the compositions of Charles Villiers Stanford, who also used Irish material as a source of inspiration; his Irish Rhapsody No. 1, Op. 78 (1902) evoked the love story between Cú Chulainn and Emer, which also involved an initiation quest for the hero. Contemplative sequences follow intense, dramatic and fierce climaxes, just as dreamy melodies alternate with battle themes in Bayonetta Origins. The prominent use of the piano is reminiscent of An Irish Idyll in 6 Miniatures, Op. 77 (1901), where it contributes to the pastoral quality of the composition, while in the game it is imbued with mystery. Most striking are the small melodic motifs, which are taken directly from The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild (2017).
Bayonetta Origins makes no attempt to hide its many aesthetic references to other video games. Unlike Bayonetta 3, where the inspirations were chaotic and failed to create an overall coherence, the borrowings in Bayonetta Origins fit well with the themes of a children's story. The micropuzzles are still reminiscent of the Zelda games, but without the holistic brilliance, and some areas are very similar to NieR:Automata's (2017) Amusement Park and Robot Village, Super Mario Odyssey's (2017) Wooden Kingdom, or Hollow Knight's (2017) final boss sequence. It seems to me that the chronological proximity of all these titles suggests a strong referential loan, matching the development cycle of Bayonetta Origins, which certainly overlapped with that of Bayonetta 3.
Rejecting the absurd: an archaic and non-subversive approach
The title nevertheless suffers a structural shortcoming in this art of reference and in its unexpected artistic direction for the series. Torn between a desire for novelty and an obligation to remain in the bosom of its franchise, Bayonetta Origins struggles to forge an experience that goes beyond a simple charming discovery. While Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass featured very disparate scenes in quick succession to emphasise the strangeness of the universe, Bayonetta Origins quickly settles into a comfortable routine. Although the environments remain charming, the world-building often has the player returning to previously explored locations, while the notable areas, frequently saved for the bosses, are abandoned rather quickly. All the more burlesque and whimsical environments are trimmed away, as if the title was afraid to really commit to variety. Similarly, the game seems afraid to tell anything other than Cereza's initiation journey and her budding relationship with Cheshire; all information about the world is relegated to collectible notes and the wisps are pretextual and underused. They never contribute to a more complex picture of the forest, as the humorous touches in their personalities are not introduced during the exploration.
Alice in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass stand out for their use of subtle and sometimes caustic humour, which contrasts with the childlike world Carroll draws – though it is very likely that these contrasts are more or less involuntary manifestations of Carroll's paedophile impulses, that he encoded his feelings in the absurdity of his text. [1] Beyond Alice in Wonderland, these tensions are emblematic of the modernist novel. James Joyce employed the same absurdist devices to create profound contemplation. When in Book V of Ulysses, 'Calypso', the story returns to Mr. Bloom, the reader thinks they have found a haven of tranquillity after the density of the previous sections. They are then surprised by a detailed description of the character's defecation after breakfast. This passage should certainly be read as a physical representation of the powerful creativity of existence and its capacity to generate art. [2]
A structure prone to repetition
Bayonetta Origins fails to generate the same creative and invigorating excitement. Departing from the absurdity that formed the aesthetic framework of the franchise, the game loses itself in a children's story, in the strictest sense of the expression. There is no subversion, no clever rewriting of the series. Bayonetta Origins is sweet and very pleasant to explore, but it offers no other major ideas. It also fails to subvert the franchise's original gameplay, opting for an awkwardly symmetrical approach: the left half of the controller is used to command Cereza, while the right is reserved for Cheshire. This dichotomy is reminiscent of Astral Chain (2019), but clearly lacks elegance. With the camera behind the protagonist, it has always be natural to use the left stick to move them; in Bayonetta Origins, the overhead view shuffles the two characters around, making it difficult to adjust effectively. Because the title is relatively short, there is no time for the player to learn how to build up hand independence, and it is always easier to switch one's attention between Cereza and Cheshire than controlling them at the same time. This makes for generally dull fights, saved only by the dynamic light and sound effects.
The various powers acquired throughout the adventure also struggle to find an elegant expression across combat and exploration. Infusing wood allows for moderately interesting puzzles, but the next three fail to inspire the same usefulness during exploration. It is therefore unsurprising, albeit unfortunate, that the game's final chapters are a series of battles that are all very similar to each other. Bayonetta Origins seems reluctant to move forward, and the bonus chapter featuring Jeanne is a prime example of this. The title feels forced to tie its story to Bayonetta 3 in the most frustrating and obnoxious way possible, removing all the childlike magic that inhabited the spin-off.
It is unclear who the game is intended for. Understandably, Platinum Games could not have foreseen the release of Devil May Cry 5 (2019), nor the mixed reception of Bayonetta 3. Nevertheless, as it stands, Bayonetta Origins, even if welcomed as a breath of fresh air by a fraction of the franchise's fans, is a proposition so radically different from the original series that it is hard to see how it can sustain itself over time. Conversely, anyone who discovers the franchise with the spin-off will surely be disappointed by the aesthetic approach of the main series – not to mention young children, for whom it is not at all suitable. It bears repeating that Bayonetta Origins is a charming and enjoyable experience, a perfect game for children, even if it does indulge in some empty references and a repetitive structure. But if the magic works here, the title offers no real guarantee that it will be able to achieve the same feat again, clouding Hideki Kamiya's inflated ambitions, which were already undermined by a Bayonetta 3 that failed to find its identity.
__________
[1] Morton N. Cohen, Lewis Carroll: A Biography, Macmillan, London, 1995, pp. 226-231. It should be noted that for Cohen, who is generally sympathetic to Carroll, there is no doubt about his pedophile inclinations, even if he believes that they are bottled up in the literary text. These elements are clearly known, and Vladimir Nabokov made no mistake when he wrote Lolita (1955), as he scrambled his connection with the main character by denying any reference to Carroll, whereas he took the liberty of quoting Poe, whose image was not as tainted as Carroll's. On this topic, read Brandon S. Centerwall, ‘Hiding in Plain Sight: Nabokov and Pedophilia’, in Texas Studies in Literature and Language, vol. 32, no. 3, 1990, pp. 468-484.
[2] Robert S. Lehman, ‘Original Nonsense: James Joyce, Marcel Duchamp, and Modernism’s Genius’, in Modernism/modernity, vol. 27, no. 2, 2020, pp. 339-360.
1988
In 1987, Konami released Blades of Steel for American arcade machines, a title characterised by its intensity and emphasis on fighting. The mechanic was dramatic, interrupting the action in favour of side-view sequences where the goal was to hit the opponent five times to send them to the penalty box. There is no doubt that the title served as a direct inspiration for Nintendo to expand its Sports series. While Stick Hunter: Exciting Ice Hockey (1987) predated Ice Hockey by a few weeks, the approach was significantly different. Nintendo's title, directed by Hideki Konno, comes across as a synoptic imitation of the sport as if its director had promptly dissected what had made Blades of Steel so successful, without being an enthusiast himself. Much of the grammar of Konami's game has been retained, from the way the player can switch between characters to the fighting system and the difficulty of scoring points, as the goaltenders are such challenging obstacles to break through.
Ice Hockey does not include the side-view fisticuffs, which were probably considered too violent for a casual sports game. The mechanic is still very important, however, as it allows the player to create a numerical imbalance, often the only way to create viable shooting opportunities in such a fast-paced game. The goaltenders, who can be controlled when the puck is close to the net, will not let a shot go through if they are in the way, no matter how fast the puck is moving: because it is impossible to aim accurately, scoring is primarily a positional affair, rather than an accuracy contest or a chaotic battle near the net. It is therefore important to create as much space as possible by knocking out at least one opponent during a fighting sequence. Ice Hockey crystallises this spirit through a simple fighting system – all that is required is to mash the A Button – but one that keeps the game's momentum going.
The subtlety lies in selecting the players before the game. It is possible to set their stature; a frail character will be swifter and more maneuverable, but will struggle to prevail in fights; and vice versa for a heavier player. The composition of the team alters the attacking strategy: a heavy team will take the initiative more often and press the opponent back, while a light team will be more successful in quick counter-attacks. Ice Hockey is thus a simple and functional concept that manages to create good gameplay coherence. The absence of complex rules – there is the icing rule, but the offside one is not implemented – does not alienate the player and underlines Hideki Konno's desire for accessibility: it is no surprise, therefore, to note the elegant simplicity of the power-ups implementation in Super Mario Kart (1992).
Ice Hockey does not include the side-view fisticuffs, which were probably considered too violent for a casual sports game. The mechanic is still very important, however, as it allows the player to create a numerical imbalance, often the only way to create viable shooting opportunities in such a fast-paced game. The goaltenders, who can be controlled when the puck is close to the net, will not let a shot go through if they are in the way, no matter how fast the puck is moving: because it is impossible to aim accurately, scoring is primarily a positional affair, rather than an accuracy contest or a chaotic battle near the net. It is therefore important to create as much space as possible by knocking out at least one opponent during a fighting sequence. Ice Hockey crystallises this spirit through a simple fighting system – all that is required is to mash the A Button – but one that keeps the game's momentum going.
The subtlety lies in selecting the players before the game. It is possible to set their stature; a frail character will be swifter and more maneuverable, but will struggle to prevail in fights; and vice versa for a heavier player. The composition of the team alters the attacking strategy: a heavy team will take the initiative more often and press the opponent back, while a light team will be more successful in quick counter-attacks. Ice Hockey is thus a simple and functional concept that manages to create good gameplay coherence. The absence of complex rules – there is the icing rule, but the offside one is not implemented – does not alienate the player and underlines Hideki Konno's desire for accessibility: it is no surprise, therefore, to note the elegant simplicity of the power-ups implementation in Super Mario Kart (1992).
2022
'That is why both the fox and the mosquito are afraid of grass fires.'
– The Fox Sister (adapted by Heinz Insu Fenkl).
Played with BertKnot.
A tragedy of Western orientalism is that it obliterates the subversive capacity of artistic genres by imposing fantastical representations on cultural identities. In the late nineteenth century, East Asia received a new tradition of detection fiction from Europe, with Sherlock Holmes as its most famous representative: it was seen as an expression of literary modernity. Known as tantei shōsetsu in Japan or zhēntàn xiǎoshuō in China, this trend contrasted with domestic detective fiction – in China, Judge Bao gave rise to a vast number of stories, often adapted into classical operas. In this literary tradition, the case serves as a pretext for moral and ethical lessons: the almightiness of the magistrate is used to guide segments of society in the right direction, and the stories thus appear as a cross-section of Chinese social structure.
Some considerations on the East Asian detective fiction
The development of detective fiction at the turn of the 20th century should be interpreted as the emergence of a new rhetorical tool capable of highlighting the ills of a society. The predominance of urban settings illustrates a concern with modernity, and the various stories often seek to rectify ethical codes considered archaic through Western science and rationality. In other words, this new detective fiction is a means of expressing a concern for civilisation and enlightenment (bunmei-kaika, in Japan). In Korea, the reception of this genre was filtered through Japanese production, which was widely exported to the mainland during the colonial period. The overthrow of the centuries-old Joseon dynasty contributed to unprecedented social unrest, and the development of the modern press made it possible to serialise the daily crimes that plagued the period. Japanese colonial rule and its violence provided further themes for detective fiction: the emphasis on human relationships in Kim Nae-sung's novels reflects the unease of social hierarchies reinforced by the domination of the metropolis over its colony. [1]
This historical tradition explains why Asian detective stories, even in today's plurality of genres, are generally concerned with social commentary. In Japanese cultural production, the shakai-ha gives voice and agentivity to minorities and marginalised people. Paranormasight (2023) perfectly illustrates these issues, while featuring a supernatural setting, as women are put in the spotlight. It is therefore not surprising that the game is primarily a panorama of female experiences, often invisible and untold. All these cultural considerations are inoperative in the case of Suhoshin and foreshadow its structural problems, as it is a French game. According to its writer, the choice of medieval Korea was made on a whim, only because he is passionate about the country. [2]
Childish writing and an incoherent mystery
The player assumes the role of Yuri, a young officer who has just completed his training in Hanyang. After returning to his home village, he is confronted with a series of violent murders. It is up to him, with the permission of the village leaders, to investigate and unmask the culprit while protecting his relatives. After an agonisingly slow exposition, seemingly written to artificially introduce Korean vocabulary, the murders begin and Yuri begins to investigate. Whereas the old detective stories featured powerful magistrates who conducted the autopsies and evidence-gathering themselves, Suhoshin's main focus is on the mediocrity of his leading character. Incapable of asking the right questions or conducting a proper investigation, he misses obvious clues that could have prevented many deaths.
This unconvincing writing can certainly be explained by the obvious simplicity of the events that the title tries to hide behind the veneer of mystery. Yuri accumulates questionable decisions and keeps asking Kim and Lee for more time, while one death follows another. The latter magistrate is portrayed as a clichéd, insufferable, cynical bureaucrat, but it is clear that his anger is justified and that his only mistake was to trust the protagonist. Yuri is possessed by the same obliviousness as the average high school student in visual novels, in stark contrast to the intelligence that a gwageo graduate should possess. The way Suhoshin is written is unremarkable at best, with unbearable lengths and an inability to settle on a specific genre. From one scene to the next, the player is unsure whether this is a sightseeing slice of life or a bad mystery thriller.
Orientalist representations of the Joseon dynasty
The presentation of local myths is deeply artificial, and the game has the bad taste to present traditional Joseon-era rituals in a humorous tone. If baksu wore women's clothes, Suhoshin's portrayal follows a hideous stereotype, making him a kind of crazy cross-dresser that the game contrasts with the wisdom of the Buddhist monk or the Suhoshin. It is difficult to explain such a choice of imagery. The general dullness of the writing does not suggest a subversive portrayal of shamans in a context where the central state was imposing its Confucian reforms; more likely, it is a direct adaptation of the figure of the mad shaman found in Japanese visual novels. Similarly, the title says nothing interesting about the social hierarchies and seclusion of women in medieval Korea: yet the kut ritual, in which they are central, could have been used to show the margins of freedom they possessed, even under the yoke of male domination. [3]
Instead, the game slogs through the worst platitudes of the genre, multiplying hollow conversations and meaningless romantic undertones. Suhoshin is an abysmal detective game that borrows liberally from recent visual novels – Alan Menant cites the Ace Attorney series, Hotel Dusk: Room 215 (2007), Steins;Gate (2009), Raging Loop (2015) and Zero Escape games as sources of inspiration [4] – but mostly displays a severe lack of familiarity with the genre and glaring writing deficiencies. The mystery is solved by a crude artifice of writing that struggles to resolve all the narrative inconsistencies. The Flowchart, borrowed from Kotaro Uchikoshi's games, is essential to solving the story, but more than anything else exemplifies the title's inability to present its key elements in an organic way. Suhoshin's main concern seems to be its lexicon of Korean terms, which feel terribly forced and unintentionally reinforce the game's superficiality and unapologetic orientalism.
__________
[1] Jooyeon Rhee, ‘A Distorting Mirror of Modernity: Kim Naesŏng, Edogawa Rampo, and Detective Fiction in Colonial Korea’, in 出版情報：韓国研究センター年, no. 19, pp. 15-27.
[2] Alan Menant, ‘Suhoshin : Notre interview avec Alan Menant et Ji Yeong (No More 500)’, on Actugaming, 5th November 2021, consulted on 18th April 2023.
[3] Clark W. Sorensen, ‘The Myth of Princess Pari and the Self Image of Korean Women’, in Anthropos, vol. 83, no. 4-6, 1988, pp. 403-419.
[4] Alan Menant, op. cit.
– The Fox Sister (adapted by Heinz Insu Fenkl).
Played with BertKnot.
A tragedy of Western orientalism is that it obliterates the subversive capacity of artistic genres by imposing fantastical representations on cultural identities. In the late nineteenth century, East Asia received a new tradition of detection fiction from Europe, with Sherlock Holmes as its most famous representative: it was seen as an expression of literary modernity. Known as tantei shōsetsu in Japan or zhēntàn xiǎoshuō in China, this trend contrasted with domestic detective fiction – in China, Judge Bao gave rise to a vast number of stories, often adapted into classical operas. In this literary tradition, the case serves as a pretext for moral and ethical lessons: the almightiness of the magistrate is used to guide segments of society in the right direction, and the stories thus appear as a cross-section of Chinese social structure.
Some considerations on the East Asian detective fiction
The development of detective fiction at the turn of the 20th century should be interpreted as the emergence of a new rhetorical tool capable of highlighting the ills of a society. The predominance of urban settings illustrates a concern with modernity, and the various stories often seek to rectify ethical codes considered archaic through Western science and rationality. In other words, this new detective fiction is a means of expressing a concern for civilisation and enlightenment (bunmei-kaika, in Japan). In Korea, the reception of this genre was filtered through Japanese production, which was widely exported to the mainland during the colonial period. The overthrow of the centuries-old Joseon dynasty contributed to unprecedented social unrest, and the development of the modern press made it possible to serialise the daily crimes that plagued the period. Japanese colonial rule and its violence provided further themes for detective fiction: the emphasis on human relationships in Kim Nae-sung's novels reflects the unease of social hierarchies reinforced by the domination of the metropolis over its colony. [1]
This historical tradition explains why Asian detective stories, even in today's plurality of genres, are generally concerned with social commentary. In Japanese cultural production, the shakai-ha gives voice and agentivity to minorities and marginalised people. Paranormasight (2023) perfectly illustrates these issues, while featuring a supernatural setting, as women are put in the spotlight. It is therefore not surprising that the game is primarily a panorama of female experiences, often invisible and untold. All these cultural considerations are inoperative in the case of Suhoshin and foreshadow its structural problems, as it is a French game. According to its writer, the choice of medieval Korea was made on a whim, only because he is passionate about the country. [2]
Childish writing and an incoherent mystery
The player assumes the role of Yuri, a young officer who has just completed his training in Hanyang. After returning to his home village, he is confronted with a series of violent murders. It is up to him, with the permission of the village leaders, to investigate and unmask the culprit while protecting his relatives. After an agonisingly slow exposition, seemingly written to artificially introduce Korean vocabulary, the murders begin and Yuri begins to investigate. Whereas the old detective stories featured powerful magistrates who conducted the autopsies and evidence-gathering themselves, Suhoshin's main focus is on the mediocrity of his leading character. Incapable of asking the right questions or conducting a proper investigation, he misses obvious clues that could have prevented many deaths.
This unconvincing writing can certainly be explained by the obvious simplicity of the events that the title tries to hide behind the veneer of mystery. Yuri accumulates questionable decisions and keeps asking Kim and Lee for more time, while one death follows another. The latter magistrate is portrayed as a clichéd, insufferable, cynical bureaucrat, but it is clear that his anger is justified and that his only mistake was to trust the protagonist. Yuri is possessed by the same obliviousness as the average high school student in visual novels, in stark contrast to the intelligence that a gwageo graduate should possess. The way Suhoshin is written is unremarkable at best, with unbearable lengths and an inability to settle on a specific genre. From one scene to the next, the player is unsure whether this is a sightseeing slice of life or a bad mystery thriller.
Orientalist representations of the Joseon dynasty
The presentation of local myths is deeply artificial, and the game has the bad taste to present traditional Joseon-era rituals in a humorous tone. If baksu wore women's clothes, Suhoshin's portrayal follows a hideous stereotype, making him a kind of crazy cross-dresser that the game contrasts with the wisdom of the Buddhist monk or the Suhoshin. It is difficult to explain such a choice of imagery. The general dullness of the writing does not suggest a subversive portrayal of shamans in a context where the central state was imposing its Confucian reforms; more likely, it is a direct adaptation of the figure of the mad shaman found in Japanese visual novels. Similarly, the title says nothing interesting about the social hierarchies and seclusion of women in medieval Korea: yet the kut ritual, in which they are central, could have been used to show the margins of freedom they possessed, even under the yoke of male domination. [3]
Instead, the game slogs through the worst platitudes of the genre, multiplying hollow conversations and meaningless romantic undertones. Suhoshin is an abysmal detective game that borrows liberally from recent visual novels – Alan Menant cites the Ace Attorney series, Hotel Dusk: Room 215 (2007), Steins;Gate (2009), Raging Loop (2015) and Zero Escape games as sources of inspiration [4] – but mostly displays a severe lack of familiarity with the genre and glaring writing deficiencies. The mystery is solved by a crude artifice of writing that struggles to resolve all the narrative inconsistencies. The Flowchart, borrowed from Kotaro Uchikoshi's games, is essential to solving the story, but more than anything else exemplifies the title's inability to present its key elements in an organic way. Suhoshin's main concern seems to be its lexicon of Korean terms, which feel terribly forced and unintentionally reinforce the game's superficiality and unapologetic orientalism.
__________
[1] Jooyeon Rhee, ‘A Distorting Mirror of Modernity: Kim Naesŏng, Edogawa Rampo, and Detective Fiction in Colonial Korea’, in 出版情報：韓国研究センター年, no. 19, pp. 15-27.
[2] Alan Menant, ‘Suhoshin : Notre interview avec Alan Menant et Ji Yeong (No More 500)’, on Actugaming, 5th November 2021, consulted on 18th April 2023.
[3] Clark W. Sorensen, ‘The Myth of Princess Pari and the Self Image of Korean Women’, in Anthropos, vol. 83, no. 4-6, 1988, pp. 403-419.
[4] Alan Menant, op. cit.