Addiction

A Visual Novel about breaking up with your girlfriend? That's indie in more ways than one -- we're dipping into indie music territory here. This is a game for everybody who's been in a bad relationship that lingered on more than it should have, which should cover just about everybody in attendance. The backstory is vague enough that you can impose yourself into the role of the protagonist, who is struggling with ending a courtship that isn't exactly healthy. The game plays out as a series of conversations with the young lady supplemented by your own interior monologue. Occasionaly you're prompted to choose between two options, which usually either relent and placate her or push towards ending your entanglement. The game's short so exploring the various options doesn't take much time, and the dialogue is well written and easily identifiable with. The pixel art has a clean and appealing style to it but the tinny chip music wears thin after a while. Instead I'd recommend some early Elliott Smith to set the mood. With that in mind, give it a shot and come back for spoilers and musings. I'll promise to not pull out my acoustic guitar.

In Platonic philosophy an archetype (or Form) is some intangible ideal exemplifying a trait or object that subsists outside of our perceptions of space and time. If you want me to pull out the Cave Allegory, anything and everything we perceive are mere shadows of the 'real' thing, it's essence. But fuck that noise, right? And not just because that creates a hell of a bloated ontology; you want to play a game... right? And not one that would take you out of your comfort zone design-wise or thematically, it's not like you want to play a game about an old man in a hospice or anything. Pokemon was cool, no? Gotta catch 'em fuckin all. And every nerd, self-respecting or otherwise, has played a TCG in his or her day. I sheepishly admit to being addicted to both when I was younger, and thankfully our pal Stephen 'increpare' Lavelle provides a double dose of both in the form of a Flash title. This is a game with meaning attached, but if you like rolling dice you'll have fun. I swear. And therein lies the message, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

Damn you Arvi! You stole the concepts for two Game Maker games I'm developing and merged them into one devious package. This man has got to have a time machine, I swear.** Like his recent forays with platformers, (G.E.N.E.R.I.C., FallOver, et al.) Addicsjon subverts the genre's tenets and drastically changes the way you travel within the XY plane. This time around he tackles drug addiction and player agency. Pity it lasts only five levels.

I need to sleep, why don't you let me? Insomnia, in dry terms, is a vertical forced-scrolling platformer made for TIGS' Common Place Book competition from roughly a year ago. Like Eversion, a title from the same compo, Insomniais a 2D low-fi interpretation of the works of H.P. Lovecraft. Your initial playthrough may seem underwhelming. Mine did. However, after a couple of playthroughs and a rereading of the introductory text I found that there is something lurking beneath the surface -- the mark of any good horror piece. What ultimately makes Insomnia compelling is its dual interlocking mechanics of sleep deprivation and the drugs the protagonist uses to combat it, and what comes across as a result.