THE SURREALIST TAROT

As Calunio has done a good job of broadly and briefly summarizing Surrealism as an artistic phenomenon, I will leave his words to stand for that and skip straight into my feedback on the twelve entries submitted for the Summer Games 2011 contest. The only general note I want to mention is that very few of these games are surreal at all. Many of them are trying to be surreal and failing. One did not seem to be trying at surrealism at all.

I will discuss each entry in terms of overall quality and entertainment value as well as adherence to the theme.

As one minor note, these will be listed in the order of the Major Arcana, except the games which did not choose a representative tarot card, which will be described first; this was not the order I played them in. The order I played them in was generated randomly drawing cards from a tarot deck.

EOMNIUM PROJECT

I never did find out what was going on with this weird afterlife memory mansion, because of terrible, terrible design decisions. Instant kill on touch enemies are a bad idea. Instant kill on touch enemies combined with limited save-points, slow walk speed, and lots of back tracking are a terrible idea. Instant kill on touch enemies with limited save-points, slow walk speed, enemies blocking one-tile wide pathways that are needed to progress, and parallel processing-instead-of-auto-start events that put the lights out and let you continue walking blindly while spawning said instant-kill enemies DIRECTLY IN YOUR PATH...just transcendentally awful. I hated this game on a gameplay level alone. The writing seemed fine and the music, sounds, and visuals were inoffensive. It was just lots and lots of compounded bad design decisions that could easily have been avoided. Back to the drawing board with you, Eomnium.

BEYOND THE GATE

This wasn't a bad game. The level design, graphics, music, storytelling, and game balance were all passable; I'd go as far as 'good', though not as good as Aetherion. (The technical elements of BoG weren't great. The battle balance could certainly have used some work, and again it was not really surreal, using very very traditional, familiar, and predictable western imagery (such as the grim reaper).)

However, I did find its premise silly at best and crass, insensitive, inane, and offensive at worst. The idea that you "battle terminal cancer/your emotions/feelings arising from terminal cancer" in the RPG MAKER 2003 BATTLE SYSTEM was almost ludicrously grotesque to me. The implication that people who died from cancer were buying items from Death, were facing the rm2k3 Game Over screen when they "lost" was just too shitty to take. This was very much in poor taste.

I DON'T think that it was in bad faith. I don't think that Sam was trying to offend or upset anyone with this game at all. If anything, I would call the overall premise and execution thoughtless, clumsy, and distasteful. When I wasn't wrinkling my nose in distaste, I was suppressing giggles at the silly names of the largely fungible skills and abilities. I was half expecting status effects like "Denial", "Anger" and "Acceptance" to pop up.

I did not actually take "points" off for any of this, since all of the complaints listed here (except the one-liner about the battle balance and theme adherence above) result from my own personal biases and personal life; I knew too many people who died from cancer, and I just did not find this game's treatment of the subject matter tasteful. Generally speaking, when we're talking about artistic content, I am really hard to offend at all; I am practically unoffendable, so if anything has caused me to feel that way, it's most likely some weird, bizarre, extreme edge case.

I cannot say that this is a bad game, merely that I personally found the overall premise thoughtless, distasteful, embarrassing, and upsetting upon playing from start to ending.

I hope Sam won't find this too offensive. In general I respect his work and I think he comports himself around these parts as a gentleman.

THE FOOL - ZEPHYR SKIES

This is a quintessentially, sublimely dadaist entry, which puts it very close to surrealism; if one principle of the dada movement was anti-art, than surely this is an anti-game. I don't want to spoil anything for people who haven't played it yet, so here's hoping that spoiler tags are working today.



THE LOVERS - NOVELLA

"(We paint our sins on the ceiling)
(Well I keep them glued to my chest.)
(It keeps me close like a promise kept.)"

My enjoyment of things often is emotive, aesthetic, intuitive and/or visceral; it is not cognitive, rational, or intuitive. I have studiously avoided my friend NewBlack's lengthy posted explanations and justifications of what this game "means" and "references" to preserve my enjoyment of it. Calunio and I had some very fascinating discussions about this game, and what I personally felt they boiled down to was that I had enjoyed it more for avoiding the explanation of its symbolism and Calunio had enjoyed it less because he had read such an explanation.

I guess what I'm saying is, I don't require things to "make sense", certainly not in a contest with the theme of surrealism! And I don't want this game "explained" to me, then, now, or ever. I don't have a particular interpretation of it; my enjoyment, as explained above, is not primarily interpretive.

It is not without its flaws, certainly. The first puzzle almost requires the player to be psychic to solve (I did, in fact, remember the Ocean, I just couldn't fathom how to get it onto the piano). I found its symbolism and allusions somewhat vague and sloppy; more importantly, is following closely in the visual footsteps of groundbreakers like Dali and Magritte really surrealism?

However: it is enough for me to say that the game was strange and dreamlike, the visual imagery and symbolism used most unsettling, the aesthetics quietly beautiful, and the puzzles impressively well-programmed devious, clever, and diverting. I enjoyed this game. I recommend this game. I do not care to have anyone ruin that by telling me what it's "about". I would like it to be finished, so I can play it in its entirety; it doesn't need to make sense to be good; I have no idea what the fuck was going on, and I'd continue to avoid any definitive "word of god" type explanations.

So far, it does not make as much sense (nor is it as good) as The Mirror Lied, but it is in the same vein, and it is a vein that I quite love. It was a triumph to be able to include this in the top three.

As a side note, I am still staggered by the similarities that keep cropping up between myself and NewBlack. If anyone was going to make a game, loudly publicizing that it was ostensibly inspired in equal parts by the band Taking Back Sunday and the novel House of Leaves, I would have guessed it would be me. : )

JUSTICE - MARIE GOES TO SPACE

This was the most surreal entry submitted for the contest. While it's certainly not the best game or even close, and is almost laughably short, everyone should still play it, preferably after smoking drugs. It won't take up much of your time at all.

Novella makes a lot more sense than this game.

If we were judging solely on the basis of which game was most surreal, this would undoubtedly win.

THE HERMIT - AETHERION
(Note: In equal parts because of my birth date and personality, in any given Tarot Spread the Hermit is the card that represents me.)

Short Version:
"Amazing game, don't get me wrong, but..."

Longer Version:
This was undoubtedly the best looking, best playing, most polished entry submitted for this contest. It's hard to believe it was made within the timeframe given considering its quality level. If the contest had no particular theme, or had a theme other than surrealism, then Aetherion would have been the clear cut winner. Unfortunately, Aetherion is not surreal at all. How could it be when it's comfortingly familiar?

It is standard light anime fare, predictably traditional, and has (as far as I can tell) the same basic plot as SkyE, which was also not-at-all-surreal. This was without exaggeration a professional quality game and immensely impressive on all technical levels. But the fact that it did not engage with the theme at all to me destroyed its chances of winning.

Not only is this game not surreal, it is comfortingly, soothingly standard and traditional, carefully taking the player's hand and walking him through with standard jRPG conventions and making standard use of common animu tropes. It seems very much like this was a game idea that they wanted to make anyway that was shoe-horned into the contest after the theme was learned without many changes at all. Either that, or Team Losers has no freaking idea what surrealism means, but I think that the former is FAR more likely.

Whatever the feeling--unease, displacement, call it what you will--that a surrealistic piece of art causes me to feel, Aetherion made me feel the opposite. Of course, it shows all signs of being an excellent game, and in the event of an influx of free time, I'd love to spend some more time with it, and perhaps publish a more in-depth review with deeper analysis of things like the (fairly unique) battle system.

Side note/Random calling out (no one take this too seriously): Solitayre should really be like, forced to make a solo game. It's something every creator should do, and besides, without an idea of what his work looks like in its purest form, it's impossible to tell or guess at what contributions here are his.

I played SkyE, and this seemed pretty much exactly like SkyE in every way except the Battle System. If Solitayre is adding something unique to Anaryu's formula, I can't see what it is. If 1 + b = 1, then mustn't b be 0? I genuinely don't know, but I'd love to see Soli make a game all on his lonesome. It's sort of a rite of passage round these here parts, anyway.

STRENGTH - FIRE WOMAN

I still don't know if pyrodoom is a joke account for trolling or what; assuming that's NOT what's going on, this game was fucking terrible, plagued with programming and graphical glitches, and lacking a story or accessible gameplay of any kind. This mess probably falls into the category of "highly surreal by accident". It is hard to tell if this was a genuine attempt at surrealism, made by a mentally handicapped preteen, or a genuine attempt at surrealism made by a mentally handicapped preteen.

People report playing this game for as much as twenty or thirty minutes at a time. They are for more masochistic than I!

DEATH - SISTERS STORYBOOK

Like a goddamn transformer, there is much more to this game than meets the eye. On the surface, this is a simple, cute, innocent, childlike Aesop, with a dirt-simple moral message. It is well-programmed, good looking, and the battles are quite well balanced. However, the reason I REALLY wanted to include this as a WINNER was the deeper, darker things that seemed to be going on below the surface.

Namely, I was thinking about the game on a whole new level since the creator chose "Death" as the tarot card to represent it. Of all the symbolism used in all of the entries, this game's recurring "boat" motif is by far the most non-standard and therefore the best and most surreal. It was deeply subliminal and deeply unsettling. And unlike other entries dealing with the theme of death, Sisters Storybook does not bother neatly explaining or revealing anything.

Nothing particularly surreal about this one, but I still really, really liked it. Even if it is possible to play the entire thing from beginning to end without piercing its innocent, childlike surface at all. (Look: I know I may be giving this game WAY too much credit/seeing hidden meaning where there isn't any. BUT even my doubts about that are undeniably the result of good use of surrealistic elements. I have no idea if I'm the only one interpreting this game correctly or if I'm feebly grasping at straws, and again, I don't want to know.)

THE DEVIL - TRANSITION

There were a lot of games about fire, it seemed like, even without counting fire woman. This one was some weird, trippy shit. I was really digging it until I ran up against what seemed like an impossible segment, and after several tries, I quit in frustration.

Poor translation and (I think) underlying weak writing limited the impact of this game, which was very visual. The gameplay was fine until it became impossible, and at least from the beginning, this is one of the few games that genuinely verged on the surreal.

THE TOWER - I'M SCARED OF GIRLS

Full disclosure: when I declared this game as my personal winner and went to bat for it (there was actually no resistance; Calunio and StarSkipping wanted it for first too) I was totally unaware of Yume Nikki, and was therefore crediting this game with 1000% more originality than it deserved. However, I think I might have given it the win anyway.

Playing I'm Scared of Girls is a deeply, deeply upsetting experience. It seemed like every other surrealism entry was about death or the afterlife, which I just found macabre, depressing, triggering, and eventually *yawn* boring. However, this was the only one that was about death, the afterlife, and CROSS-DRESSING.

To a degree, this game was, to put it mildly, immensely pretentious, obnoxiously hipsterish, in-your-face "indie" and insufferably smug. I loved it anyway.

ISOG's cute, simple graphics and familiar, traditional gameplay (the game is like a massively simplified Metroidvania or Zelda style adventure game, primarily free-form exploration with some simple and mindless battles thrown in) creates major cognitive dissonance with its subject matter, which is some truly transgressive, X-rated shit. I absolutely adored the dichotomy. The prose in this game is excellent (for once, its frequent delving into squick actually enhanced its overall quality), and the early gameplay is addictive. (Later on, when you only have one or two red gems left in the whole game world, the backtracking and random searching can get really dull, tedious, and repetitive.).

ISOG is not a perfect game by any means. Most of the powerups and unlockables don't see to do anything, let alone what they're supposed to do, the "battle system" is an unapologetic RNG crapshoot, and the ending, both story-wise and boss-fight wise, is unfinished and/or does not make sense. However, we must also pay careful attention to this game's merits. I applaud all of the following:

* Intensely surrealistic dichotomy between form and content. Well played!
* 100% original art, in abundant variation and looking GREAT.
* Beautifully chosen, unfamiliar, unsettling soundtrack.
* Gorgeously written and often-disturbing prose.
* Unequaled sense of exploration, mystery, and discovery. The less you know about it going in, the better you'll like it, I think. The way the story unfolds in the game is great, as is how little the player is given to go on in the beginning. This game does not hold your hand and show you the way.
* Deeply unsettling, balls-to-the-wall premise, with no regard whatever for political correctness or delicate sensibilities.

Everyone should play this. It is an aesthetic and storytelling treat, and with a little more work and time the gameplay could be awesome too. I hope Moga/CARRIONBLUE will be inspired to finish this project and sand off all of the rough edges, cause we could have an indie gaming masterpiece on our hands.

THE MOON - WEIRD DREAMS

This game wasn't even slightly surreal, wasn't pretty, didn't impress me with its creativity, wasn't very polished, had RTP graphics I'm getting sick to death of, and most importantly had SOME OF THE WORST BATTLE BALANCE I'VE ENCOUNTERED IN RECENT MEMORY, preventing me from making much progress in at all. I know that's harsh, Marrend, but don't feel discouraged in your overall game making efforts. To paraphrase Stephen King, everyone's gotta get x amount of crappy games out of their system before they get to the good ones.

THE WORLD - ESOTERICA

Representing the last of the major arcana, this was the first game I played due to random luck-of-the-draw, and naturally it's one of the last I wind up reviewing so I don't REMEMBER it as well as I should.

This game was far too self-consciously apologetic for its gameplay, offering constant and eventually obnoxious "skip gameplay" options. The gameplay itself was wrought with bizarre glitches, and the use of parallel process instead of auto-start on cut scene events was a major problem in this and other entries, where moving at the wrong time could result in a fatal freeze.

My main issue with this game is that even after being explained to me in a "creator's afterward" at the end of the game, the story still did not make sense. In this contest, I don't require a story to make sense, but if you're going to include an EXPLANATION in the game itself, at the very least the explanation should make sense. I feel like there was a kernel of an interesting story that could have germinated, but what resulted was rushed, sloppy, illogical ,and poorly written.

Overall, this is one of the entries, like Transition, that was neither notably good nor notably bad. It had its good and bad points.

***

As a closing note, it is interesting how so many people have certain associations with the word "surrealism", and how so many games concerned death, dreams, and/or the afterlife: a truly massive amount, including Beyond the Gate, Eomnium, Esoterica, Sisters Storybook (I think), Weird Dreams, I'm Scared of Girls, and depending on your interpretation, possibly a few others. Since surrealism has nothing explicitly to do with death, the afterlife, or dreams let me just say: the collective subconscious is a truly fascinating thing, here as anywhere else.

I hope you, reader, have enjoyed this feedback, and most importantly, I hope that the games' creators are reading this, as to me generating feedback is the primary purpose of such a contest. I hope to follow up this article with more in depth reviews of several of the games discussed here!