first-person | Mohammad Moshtaghi

Bugsnax

Sun, 22 May 2022 11:00:00 -0700

Bugsnax tells the story of a ragtag band of grumpuses who followed the charismatic Aussie-explorer Elizabert Megafig to Snaktooth Island. On arrival, they discover bugsnax—part bug, part snack!—which quickly become their primary source of food and mystery. Only three things are certain: bugsnax are delicious, eating them changes body parts into the “-snax” part of bugsnax, and grumpuses are bizarrely okay with having curly fries for biceps and honeycombs for hands. But just as eating too many bugsnax morphs grumpuses into foodie-Frankensteins, so too does stitching together a glut of individually tasty gaming morsels render Bugsnax more off-putting than enjoyable.

Young Horses, perhaps better known for their indie hit Octodad: Dadliest Catch, write on their website that they’re “pushing the boundaries of game design in order to create experiences that players have not had before.” I’ll give them this much: it’s true that I’ve never covered a hamster ball in cheese to lure a sentient nacho mantis into fighting a loaded baked potato crab before. So, novel? Yes. Fun? …sometimes? “Pushing the boundaries of game design”? Well… If Inspector Gadget meets Pokémon meets Slime Rancher meets Sesame Street meets The Sims sounds like your preferred way of pushing boundaries, then by all means Bugsnax is probably a delightful way for you to spend 10–15 hours. For me, it didn’t quite hit the spot.

Gameplay is focused on entering a new area, finding its associated grumpuses who retreated there from the central town, convincing them to return to town via bugsnak-based fetch quests, and then coming back later to catch all the bugsnax you missed the first time. Hunting bugsnax involves a light amount of physics- and tool-based puzzle solving. Some need to be melted by tricking them to walk into a hot spring. Others need to be chased out of their holes using your snak-in-a-hamster-ball. Perhaps the most overpowered technique in the game is a carefully laid trip wire, ready to stun just about anything it touches. Figuring out these idiosyncrasies for the first time is good fun— repeating them for another ten hours to catch ‘em all is less rewarding.

You’d hope, then, that the grumpuses and their “charming” personality stereotypes would be the missing ingredients in this mediocre stew. Instead, they’re extra helpings of distraction with a dash of relational weight. Which is the main course: Chandlo and Snorpy’s romantic tension, their outlandish obsessions with fitness and conspiracy theories, or their untreated anxiety? Do we focus on Wambus and Triffy’s pursuits of career or their seemingly untrusting but fine marriage? Is Beffica a real grumpus worthy of care and concern, or a plot device via which we learn about everyone else? Without spoilers, the narrative wages a similarly bizarre subterfuge against its most important relationship between Eggabell and Lizbert; I couldn’t settle whether I was in their corner or wanted Eggabell to run for the hills. And don’t even get me started on Wiggle.

We probably do need more games like Bugsnax made with a huge amount of heart and goodwill. A basic sense of goodness and grumpus-kindness runs through it all, from the bright and colorful characters to the whimsy and silliness of snak-hunting. It may not have been the finest of dining, but would it satisfy at a family dinner? Hopefully so.

Outer Wilds

Sat, 24 Jul 2021 12:00:00 -0700

Against the backdrop of a diorama solar system in a diorama universe, Outer Wilds plunges forward into an ambitious adventure of wonder and exploration. You play as the sixth member of your species to venture out into space — and the first to do so with a translation device for the language of the Nomai, an ancient species that mysteriously disappeared a long time ago. Remnants of their civilization are scattered all around your solar system, like bread crumbs in a nonlinear trail, inviting you into their mystery. What were the Nomai doing? Where did they go? What’s it all for?

I enthusiastically recommend Outer Wilds to anyone who will listen; it’s a resounding 10/10. I love the world and its inhabitants, and their ideals to explore and to understand. The music frequently brings me to a very emotional place (more on that in a moment). But this game’s best quality is its unique ability to engage players at the intersection of imagination and discovery: learning new information pushes you to form new questions, which in turn makes you seek new answers, and then the cycle repeats. The nonlinear narrative supports your curiosity in whatever direction you decide to go; there are no artificial checkpoints or cutscenes pushing you towards a specific experience. The way you engage with this world is your own.

Outer Wilds is surprisingly capable at blending the whimsy and brutality of space exploration. Your spaceship is made of wood, of all things, and yet is often your only life support in the cold void of space. Plummeting into a black hole is surprisingly non-lethal, but what awaits on the other side is nevertheless crushingly isolating. Extremely bizarre things happen on a regular basis — like getting launched from a planet into low orbit only to crash back down — but manage to feel more bemusing than terrifying.

And the music! Funnily enough, when I fired up Outer Wilds for the first time, I didn’t make it past the main menu. I was captivated by the title track. As I watched the little campfire come to life, the theme’s dueling banjos sang optimism and hope into the deep black of space. The composer, Andrew Prahlow, layers a bright foreground he recorded just before development wrapped with a background that he’d recorded seven years prior — a detail that’s both beyond incredible and very difficult to appreciate without having first finished the game. Suffice it to say, this is my favorite game soundtrack, and I’ve listened to many.

Lastly, Outer Wilds achieves a mark of masterclass sci-fi, wrapping the vast happenings of the universe into a story that is deeply personal. It sets us off asking questions about physics and ancient anthropology but, along the way, teaches us to ask questions of ourselves. How could we be more open-handed and filled with wonder, like the Nomai? What do we do with the memories of people and experiences long gone? How can we live bravely in the face of a constantly uncertain future?

It’s tempting to linger in this moment, while every possibility still exists. But unless they are collapsed by an observer, they will never be more than possibilities.

The Outer Worlds

Fri, 17 Jan 2020 12:00:00 -0700

The Outer Worlds promised to let you, “the unknown variable,” truly role-play in the wild world of Halycon. Want to be the hero and save the world? Sure, who doesn’t? Want to steer your jaded friends towards self-awareness and hope? Just might work. Want to murder everyone on sight, including major companions and story-critical characters? Have a great time, you monster. Streamers have basically tried it all, and the game does indeed deliver. I particularly enjoyed embodying some kind of scientist/intellectual with an aversion for violence and a deep need to screw some corporate tools over.

What most impressed me was the world building packed into this tight, 40-ish hour experience. Every character looks different, has their own believable personality, and acts based on real fears and hopes. Most remember past encounters with you and have whole conversations scripted for the late-game, even when they’re just “extras” that have nothing to do with the ongoing story. Your companions are the best examples of the developers' care and attention to detail: one companion develops a love interest and wants to grab drinks with you to get your thoughts — this leads to a tipsy bar visit where you get to give dating advice. Other characters are working through past hurts and losses that shape who they are in the current narrative. It all feels very human, and that aspect alone (against the stark contrast of the very inhumane slave-like colony townships) is enough to pull you into the first several hours of gameplay and give gravity to the difficult choices you have to make.

The characters made me savor conversations, walking up to every NPC just to make sure I wasn’t missing personal backstories or historical context. I found myself imagining those who would be unjustly punished for my decisions to stir up trouble, or who I could win over by showing some semblance of kindness. The world felt open and full of possibility, while harboring many situations with hidden consequences.

Unfortunately, some of this delightful, game-outside-the-game enchantment faded when I realized a very simple reality: what felt like a cliff of consequence was really just a short ledge, and every mistake I made could usually be solved by shooting my way through. This wasn’t necessarily the only solution (for example, I appreciated the go-and-kill quests that offered diplomacy as a non-violent alternative), but violence was often the path of least resistance. I slowly deteriorated from a hero who respected life — killing only when just or necessary — to a skilled mercenary with a vague conscience who also happened to enjoy conversation. The magic wasn’t there in the same way after that reality set in.

Perhaps this is what The Outer Worlds had promised all along: that there would be many paths that one could fully explore, even if not all of are equally satisfying. It’s less that you live with your choices and more that your choices happen to the game, forcing it to bend and twist around you. And in that way, it really is a wonderful role-playing experience.

Bugs

I had a syncing issue with save files between different Xbox consoles, but this may have been a fluke.
There was one view on Monarch where the environment didn’t render correctly, and whole stone structures seemed to disappear.
I was awarded one achievement (“Pirate Radio”) out of the blue, unsure what exactly I did to get it.

We Were Here

Sun, 16 Jul 2017 12:00:00 -0700

In this two-player, cooperative, escape-the-room-like adventure, players take the roles of the Librarian and the Explorer. The two begin the game stranded in an unspecified snowy region, and upon discovering and entering a foreboding castle, they are knocked out and placed in separate rooms, connected only by a pair of walkie-talkies. The Librarian is primarily responsible for supplying information to the Explorer, who in turn navigates deadly traps and dimly lit mazes to reach new areas. By piecing together visual clues from both players' environments, puzzles are solved cooperatively, opening doors to new challenges.

For a free-to-play game, this was a surprisingly enjoyable and well-constructed experience (albeit a relatively short one, with an imperfect run taking roughly two hours). The crux of the gameplay rests on using voice-only communication to navigate inherently visual puzzles, which are fairly high-quality. Each puzzle balances complexity with difficulty in a pleasing way, and remains sufficiently independent of the rest, ensuring that each sequence is fresh and surprising. Even so, the overall experience was cohesive, rewarding attention to detail even when the details weren’t immediately relevant. Making the roles unique gives the game replay value as well; even though both players know the puzzle solutions after one successful run, switching roles gives a satisfying “ah, that’s what you were confused about!” kind of feeling.

The graphics are lacking in polish, but this is hardly a complaint given the game is free. In some senses, the lower quality textures add to the experience; I don’t really like horror games, but the use of creepy atmospheric elements and the ever-present sense that my partner was in danger was enough to create the right amount of suspense.

My real complaints are lodged against the bugs we encountered in our play-through, which (as of Update Five) required my Explorer to kill himself so we could restart from the checkpoint. This sort of broke the feeling of the overall experience, as death became a necessary means to an end instead of something worth fearing.

Finally, as a matter of opinion and not of critique, I wonder if the story could have offered any more resolution than what was hinted at in the final theatre sequence. Who was the shadowy figure that placed us here? What drives it to such strange games of mind-over-matter? And what does it want with the one left behind?

Bugs

As of Update Five, the introductory video has audio buffering issues. The chess puzzle has a couple bugs: the librarian often drops the film reel for no reason, and it is possible to get the film reel to play its spinning animation on the table itself if the Explorer applies the power too early.