The final instalment in the trilogy, "Monotony", is released!

Hooray! After about a week of work, Monotony has been released. If you're interested in avant-garde art-y games, appreciative of some good atmosphere or just want a 5-minute experience to kill time - this game is for you.

You can download it below.



If you haven't already, I highly recommend you look into Monotony's predecessors for some fairly useful context.

You can download the first in the series, Homogeny, below.



And of course, the second game in the series can be downloaded below.



If you have done, thanks for following the development cycle of these games, and I hope you enjoy! Stay tuned.

The sequel to "Homogeny"

Some of you may be aware that I recently released the game "Homogeny", which a few people seemed to enjoy. Seeing as I have an inability to not constantly have a project running, I've got a sequel in progress, named "Banality".

Unsurprisingly, this is in the same vein and art style as its predecessor. Devoid of particularly interesting mechanics, but saturated in analytical value and artistic expression.

Hmm.

I was going to continue this post with an explanation of Homogeny's themes, maybe detailing some of my influences, maybe even an early screenshot of Banality.

I'll leave that for another day.

This post is now about my view on artistic expression in video games.

"Artistic Expression" in Video Games

Followers of my work might have realized by now that I am one of the strongest subscribers to the idea that video games are art, perhaps to a fault. 

I say "to a fault" because the games I have produced so far have been primarily walking simulators - not very marketable to most. Of course, games like Proteus or even Dear Esther have been successful, and to varying degrees have earned their successes. 

The games I have and will continue to create are saturated in cryptic interpretations and messages, some more obscure than others, as anyone who has played Homogeny or Yet Another Puzzle Game can attest to.

The question most worthy of debate, "How much of this avant-garde bullshit artistic saturation is too much?"

First, let's explore the term "artistic saturation" and what I mean by this. I am referring specifically to the kind of avant-garde bullshit cryptic messages and implications that are placed in certain video games.

A fairly popular example is that of Bloodborne, which is highly inspired by H.P Lovecraft's work, and unsurprisingly shares the theme of demonization of humanity. 

In Bloodborne, this is conveyed by the ways the beasthood curse is explored -- exact examples of this are left as an exercise to the reader, in part because I don't want to spend half of this post talking about Bloodborne and in part because I believe the game is best interpreted by the individual on a very personal basis.

The most interesting part of the question are the words "too much".

What exactly defines "too much" artistic saturation? Is it when the mechanics of the game are compromised for the art's sake?

Surely, the reverse situation is just as unacceptable - this leads us into a terrible paradox, where neither can coexist. 

Maybe it's not about compromise of other components of the game. Maybe it's instead about its accessibility to the players?

This comes down to the game's purpose. If the game is designed to be mass-marketable and should be accessible to its players, then this becomes a consideration. However, if the game is made by a small hobby indie team, it has no obligation to be mass-marketable, assuming they are not financially dependant on it. 

Ultimately, it seems that there is no such thing as "too much". What a pleasant result, given that the way I develop games is nearly Souls-like in the way it tells a story or narrative while rarely directly divulging information. It requires analytical thought and some imagination to create a story that can be truly enjoyed.

I suppose that what I'm trying to say is quite simply that I'm developing the Dark Souls of walking simulators.

^this is sarcastic

In any case, if you have done, thanks for reading. Stay tuned for more avant-garde bullshit interesting content.

What is the deal with Bethesda?

Bethesda Game Studios, for those out of the loop, is the studio behind games such as Fallout 3, The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, and Fallout 4.

These games are usually produced to a pretty high degree of quality, all 3 of which boast expansive and detailed open worlds, a lot of in-depth lore and a bunch of side-quests.

Pictured below is an actual list of all the side-quests contained just within Skyrim without any DLC, or a total of 57 side quests.

With this much content and such a large world, surely Skyrim is a brilliant game?

Well, in contrast to the large fanbase these games have accumulated, I am highly inclined to disagree. It is correct that there is a lot of content in Skyrim, but what's the point in that content if it's an unenjoyable process to get through it?

The first point that I would like to cover here is the combat in this game.

The combat in this game is best described as if the combat in Dark Souls and a sloth had some kind of child, which was then implemented on a buggy-as-shit engine. Each attack takes about 14 years to complete, and often deals almost no damage at any given point in the game to make up for the fact that the scaling is incredibly artificial.

"So just don't use the swords!" is the logical continuation of that opinion, but after swords I have two other options - magic and bows. Using exclusively bows is the most boring and awkward thing to do ever, so that's a no-go. The combination of still very unresponsive and slow combat combined with limited ammunition makes it probably the worst option. At least I don't get punished for missing a sword strike.

Magic is the best out of a bunch of bad options, because at least it looks cool. It doesn't have the long-term punishment for missing that bows do, and it is in my experience marginally faster and more satisfying than swords. That's not to say it's a good experience, but it's an experience that makes me less unhappy with my decisions thus far in life.

This issue is significantly reduced in Fallout 3 and 4, which contains guns and VATS. VATS basically takes almost all the real combat gameplay out of the equation if you're like me and nearly exclusively use it to murder the opposition. The non-VATS shooting is still a bit uncomfortable, but god, Bethesda games feel so much better with guns even at that.

The strangest and in my mind, the most objectionable design choice that Bethesda have made is to keep their engine as a consistently buggy mess for about 8 years, or since Fallout 3's release. They seem to believe that having a terrible engine is part of their notoriety, or their identity in some form. This may be true to an extent, where people frequently ridicule the 75 degree surfaces you can just walk up as if they're nothing, or where the ragdoll physics are occasionally very bouncy or twitchy, but ultimately it just isn't funny anymore.

After 3 consecutive games with the same engine problems, it gets to the point where it just seems unpolished. I appreciate the initial "heh", but by now it just feels bad to play.

Of course, this is all my personal opinion. I don't represent the views of Blogger.com, you, or anyone who is not myself. It should go without saying that if you love Skyrim, then you do you! If you have fun with that game, I'd love to hear your perspective on why you do so.

Lastly, if you have done, thanks for reading.