Or maybe it's about ethics in moon tourism
March 7, 2015 2:05 PM Subscribe
"In Creatures Such as We, living on the moon is lonely, and stressful, and exhausting. Video games have always offered you an escape to a better life. The easy, happy life you wish you had. Which makes it so frustrating when the game you’ve been playing ends badly. But you have a chance to figure it out, because the next tourist group is the game’s designers. You can debate with them about art, inspire them with the beauty of outer space, get closer to any one specific designer in particular, and finally find out how to get the ending you always wanted.
Creatures Such as We is an interactive fiction game authored by Lynnea Glaser, who works in QA at Bioware Games. It's a dating sim with game developers... or a meditation on the issue of consent and non-player characters... or a philosophical musing on art in games and the respective roles of creator and player.
Remarkably enough, the disappointing ending of the eponymous game-within-the-game wasn't influenced by the kerfuffle over the conclusion of BioWare's Mass Effect triology, which inspired much internet rage.
Very interesting game! I enjoyed it a lot, especially as I'm playing Dragon Age: Inquisition right now. Well worth a play, and that's from someone who likes the idea of IF a lot but doesn't like playing them much.
posted by adrianhon at 1:03 PM on March 8, 2015
posted by adrianhon at 1:03 PM on March 8, 2015
Indy Games have been doing this for a while.
The Swapper is a philosophical take on clones, the mind and doesn't have a happy ending. You have to pay attention to the narrative to understand the twist: [spoiler]you are a woman, and you're a clone of a woman and it's quite likely that everyone male died due to their psychic pollution of the Stones resulting in the planet fighting back[/spoiler]. Takes a while to grokk that; also 100% confirmed by the awesome dev team.
Likewise, Waking Mars is just as ambivalent over human interactions with foreign ecosystems (if you dig deep enough into it).
And, of course... That game where you're dating, but everything is weird and you might discover the awful truth one day.
Meep.
posted by Themis at 5:45 PM on March 8, 2015
The Swapper is a philosophical take on clones, the mind and doesn't have a happy ending. You have to pay attention to the narrative to understand the twist: [spoiler]you are a woman, and you're a clone of a woman and it's quite likely that everyone male died due to their psychic pollution of the Stones resulting in the planet fighting back[/spoiler]. Takes a while to grokk that; also 100% confirmed by the awesome dev team.
Likewise, Waking Mars is just as ambivalent over human interactions with foreign ecosystems (if you dig deep enough into it).
And, of course... That game where you're dating, but everything is weird and you might discover the awful truth one day.
Meep.
posted by Themis at 5:45 PM on March 8, 2015
« Older What happens when Queen Elizabeth dies | Did you like 'Starlost'? Newer »
This thread has been archived and is closed to new comments
posted by emmet at 7:26 PM on March 7, 2015