#psvr
#psvr
by Amr (@siegarettes)
Jupiter & Mars reads like a cautionary tale, not only about the environmental damage the story concerns itself with, but about the considerations we need to give when telling stories within games. Jupiter & Mars often talks over itself. In blunt terms, it’s too much of a videogame for its own good. Its clumsy use of game mechanics and tropes distracts from its environments and iconography, dulling the tools for visual storytelling it comes prepared with.
Jupiter & Mars has a strong central premise. The story of two dolphins making their way through the ruins of humanity, rescuing sealife from the damage inflicted upon the sea. Seeing images of our everyday lives submerged underwater comes preloaded with pathos, and provides a refreshing change from our usual modern apocalypses, which often oscillate between arid deserts and overgrowth.
by Amr (@siegarettes)
Up until its ending, I was never sure where Falcon Age was going. From the colonialist labor camp it opens on, until the final moments where you’re asked to choose between two paths, I never understood where my place in Falcon Age was. Its anti-colonialist message rings clear, and while it’s refreshing to see such a clear political stance, it never digs meaningfully into the effects or consequences, or finds a way to explore them within its framework.
Let me be clear here–its explicit enumeration of the crimes of colonialism and rejection of the colonial ideology is admirable and something I’d like to see other developers follow–my problems with Falcon Age are where it goes with ideas, which never achieve anything as coherent as its stated message. It aims to tell a story of bond between a falcon trainer and her falcon, resistance and its toll, and keeping your culture alive against a force that attempts to erase it, but it constantly distracts from its message through the act of play.
by Amr @siegarettes
Arca’s Path is straightforward. It’s a game about rolling a ball through abstract spaces, framed in a basic sci-fi plot. It never struck me as something with any big ideas, about its worldview or its mechanics. What it does have is a wonderful sense of tangibility.
The environments are basic but are rendered in chunky shapes and textured with visible brush strokes. Objects fade into view, with a gentle fog revealing the path and objects unfolding into full detail. Paired with VR’s 3D display it gives spaces a diorama-like appeal, where the materials themselves catch your attention. This works even better within its story scenes, where its comic style presentation lays panels in impressionistic spaces and uses the panel borders as windows into multi-layered scenes.
