Surrealist games
May 17, 2018 19:45:09 GMT -5
Post by 1upsuper on May 17, 2018 19:45:09 GMT -5
Ahoy there. Today I'd like to talk about surrealist video games, and learn about some other titles from you guys to explore.
I feel like I need to pin down what sort of vibe I'm looking for here, since video games themselves are often surreal, especially to the outsider who hasn't internalized the grammar and rules of video games.
Smashing a brick to uncover a mushroom which then causes you to double in size is absolutely surreal, and yet we have internalized that as a normality, so to us gamers it is not longer surreal. What I'm looking for here are games that manage to embody surrealism and get under your skin and possibly unnerve you, despite how many bizarre, surreal aspects of games you take for granted. It seems that surrealism is the province of the indie game. Here are my examples:
Yume Nikki and its progeny: Yume 2kki, .flow, etc. Of course, right? Yume Nikki is the poster child for surrealist video games, and the majority of the game takes place in various dreamscapes.
Middens and its sequels. Middens is quite possibly my favorite RPG maker game, barely beating Yume Nikki. Middens is one of the most literary games I have played, and if you asked me to suggest the gaming equivalent of French arthouse cinema, I would suggest Middens. Like Yume Nikki, every new screen is a collage of striking images, frequently clashing in sometimes horrific and other times beautiful ways.
OFF. While Middens is like French arthouse, OFF is just French. You play as the Batter, who has a lot of personal baggage, and each enemy encounter, like Middens, is striking and features beautiful and sometimes grotesque art. A translation patch is available.
Space Funeral. Full of blood and "charming" homemade sprites. Features an equally "charming" party including leg horse. If you can get into the art style, Space Funeral is a great experience that doesn't overstay its welcome and has a surprising payoff at the end. The creator thecatamites has some other games worth playing as well.
Hylics. Hylics is an odd one even by the standards set here. The game has a claymation art style, filtered through...something. It's visually striking, has great battle animations, and almost every NPC speaks randomly generating nonsense. They speak technically coherent sentences, but they are random and non-repeating, as I recall. Most RPGs hide or clearly place meaning in the words of their NPCs. Hylics forces you to create that meaning yourself. Despite the randomness, I still found myself talking to every NPC, not in the hopes of finding some useful information, but because I wanted to explore every corner of this bizarre game.
LSD: Dream Emulator. This game to me really captures the deeply unsettling side of surrealism. The side that makes you worry just for a moment that perhaps you are dreaming right now, or instead makes you aware of the cage of your own flesh.
There are a billion other surrealist games out there, many coming from the geniuses/crackpots at itch.io. What are some of your favorites? What have I left out that surely deserves inclusion? Do you like surrealist games? How does it make you feel? What to you constitutes surrealism?
I feel like I need to pin down what sort of vibe I'm looking for here, since video games themselves are often surreal, especially to the outsider who hasn't internalized the grammar and rules of video games.
Smashing a brick to uncover a mushroom which then causes you to double in size is absolutely surreal, and yet we have internalized that as a normality, so to us gamers it is not longer surreal. What I'm looking for here are games that manage to embody surrealism and get under your skin and possibly unnerve you, despite how many bizarre, surreal aspects of games you take for granted. It seems that surrealism is the province of the indie game. Here are my examples:
Yume Nikki and its progeny: Yume 2kki, .flow, etc. Of course, right? Yume Nikki is the poster child for surrealist video games, and the majority of the game takes place in various dreamscapes.
Middens and its sequels. Middens is quite possibly my favorite RPG maker game, barely beating Yume Nikki. Middens is one of the most literary games I have played, and if you asked me to suggest the gaming equivalent of French arthouse cinema, I would suggest Middens. Like Yume Nikki, every new screen is a collage of striking images, frequently clashing in sometimes horrific and other times beautiful ways.
OFF. While Middens is like French arthouse, OFF is just French. You play as the Batter, who has a lot of personal baggage, and each enemy encounter, like Middens, is striking and features beautiful and sometimes grotesque art. A translation patch is available.
Space Funeral. Full of blood and "charming" homemade sprites. Features an equally "charming" party including leg horse. If you can get into the art style, Space Funeral is a great experience that doesn't overstay its welcome and has a surprising payoff at the end. The creator thecatamites has some other games worth playing as well.
Hylics. Hylics is an odd one even by the standards set here. The game has a claymation art style, filtered through...something. It's visually striking, has great battle animations, and almost every NPC speaks randomly generating nonsense. They speak technically coherent sentences, but they are random and non-repeating, as I recall. Most RPGs hide or clearly place meaning in the words of their NPCs. Hylics forces you to create that meaning yourself. Despite the randomness, I still found myself talking to every NPC, not in the hopes of finding some useful information, but because I wanted to explore every corner of this bizarre game.
LSD: Dream Emulator. This game to me really captures the deeply unsettling side of surrealism. The side that makes you worry just for a moment that perhaps you are dreaming right now, or instead makes you aware of the cage of your own flesh.
There are a billion other surrealist games out there, many coming from the geniuses/crackpots at itch.io. What are some of your favorites? What have I left out that surely deserves inclusion? Do you like surrealist games? How does it make you feel? What to you constitutes surrealism?
