I wasn’t totally impressed by 1000xRESIST and it’s currently at 27th on my list.
My opinion at the end credits was very similar to how I felt at the end of Nier: Automata. Neither game did a whole lot for me, but in both cases I got the impression that if I replayed it and understood the story more I’d have a much better time. The storytelling was just too disorganized and obtuse for me to connect.
Finished Indika and have more thoughts.
Indika is about real life in a way not many games aspire to be. The writing, environments, and gameplay cohere into a nuanced and individuated perspective. It’s set in an alternate-history Eastern European country only to gain some separation from realism, some freedom to present their aesthetics that fit the mood and themes. Early on, a rusty cable stretches across an icy river, towing a ramshackle wooden raft. A gigantic train yard rises out of the cold tundra, like a medeval cathedral. Rows of human-sized fish hung on hooks spin around a burning furnace.
You may have heard that Indika tackles some big themes. Free will and predestination. Navigating crises of faith. The meaning of life. These are themes present in the game only as they relate to the characters themselves through their specific circumstances, life experiences, and actions. It’s through this specificity that I am invited to reflect on my own life and what these larger themes mean to me, in my own context. In this way, Indika and Ilya feel like real people to me. Indika especially. That she’s a woman really matters in the story, and not in a tokenism way. It’s a revelation to me to have her humanity so fully realized and deftly constructed.
The game-y sections are interesting. Sometimes rote and mundane, other times tedious, I feel they are thematically relevant. Even the pixel graphic flashback sequences work on this level, despite them being kinda hokey. These sequences bring an awareness to my actions , and an opportunity to reflect on the conversation between the main characters. It’s a matter of pacing, but also a Celeste-style marriage of theme and gameplay. To be clear, that’s what Celeste is all about, but here it’s just one element. Indika is much more focused on communicating through it’s aesthetic, writing, and mood.
I love this game. I want to play it again right now. Seeing as I just finished a playthrough, I’m going to wait a little while so I can savor it yet again. It’s not perfect. Those pixel graphic sequences may have been more effective if they had been cutscenes in the normal graphical style. I found the minor level up mechanic forgettable and unnecessary, although I see what they were trying to do with it. The thing is, I didn’t need any of that stuff to get hooked. I care about Indika because she was written well, and the world she occupies was presented so well.
What a beautiful game.
this convinced me to buy the game
#getrubysunrisehercommission
I appreciated how full the game is of incidents that pass without any explanation or embellishment. I’m thinking of the interaction Indika has with whoever is inside the chain ferry building, misc grouchy nuns, Ilya and the busted trumpet, etc. Compare that to “lore” and inane quips meant to signify personality that passes for “writing” in almost all games regarded as being good in that department. Plus there’s all that ambient Platanovian surrealism in within which lots of incidental and prosaic detail is inlaid. For a game that does openly address what you cite above up to and including classic novel-style colloquies and direct address from a campy satan, that’s not what you really remember about the game is it. It’s a really imo sad game about inescapable shame and self doubt that’s justified, imagined, and externally enforced and the insufficient means Indika has to try and survive this. Anyway it’s cool to be able to talk about all this stuff the game is expressing without the “as a video game” millstone !!
Nice! Please let us know what you think.
1000xResist & anthology of the killer are my two favorite games of the year
the former is a pretty slow burn that requires a lot of investment and patience on the part of the player but in its best moments it captures something about diasporic identity/genetic memory that I’ve never seen expressed anywhere else, video games or otherwise
the latter made me feel seen in a very different way: a series of absurdist, cutting takes on the structures of late capitalism without slipping (too far) into cynicism. oddly warm and comfortable despite it all
indika has grown on me since I played it around release. shadow of the erdtree and it’s flirtation with pastoral zones without dudes constantly punching me was a great experience. tekken 8’s story mode rules
still gotta finish metaphor and check out judero, arctic eggs, nine sols, and felvidek
edit: oh and slitterhead duh
Going to look out for those two to play soon. I don’t know if Indika will run pretty good on my laptop, but well…
Poor performance will probably be thematically appropriate anyway.
Indika is a bit of a resource hog in that regard. My PC sounds like an airfield when I play it.
Indika is a game best experienced at 15 - 25 FPS, in the bitter cold, while eating a raw onion.
Nine Sols is currently 30% off on Steam.
Reporting back to say I have played this and it definitely does rock. Might be my favorite version of Tetris ever? Not just the new chroma modes but even the default standard Tetris mode maintains that gorgeous tactility. Some delightful alternate modes for variation as well. So so easy to get sucked into. Phenomenal value for such a humble package.
Nice. I’ll get it on my Lenovo PC toaster, then xD
I’ll try to search for an Xbox key and take my time.
yeah I’ve been hooked on this all week, the reversi mechanics are really challenging but the whole package is so polished and charming!! dying for a way to play it mobile…
I started playing Tetris again in August as a way to cope with grief (Tetris is a proven PTSD therapy!) and the intense amount of traveling I’ve been doing in the course of it. I suppose it makes sense that the perfect video game about perfect construction would end up defining games for me in this chaotic year, even tho nine sols stole my heart just as hard only a month before my friend died
I watched a streamer play Nine Sols and I’d like to check it out. One thing I appreciated about it was how willing it was to bend it’s presentation and introduce unique mechanics to fit a particular story beat. It leads to a really exciting feeling of “what else is going to happen??” The combat looks finely tuned. I have such little patience for these kinds of games that need time to get going (I’ve bounced off Hollow Knight three times), but I’ll check out Nine Sols anyway because it does seem like a good one of those.
I’m at the very end of the game in Nine Sols and I can only caution you that it gets a little long-winded at the end, like Hollow Knight, and like so so so many other of these kinds of game. Oddly enough, the combat that I found tough at first now feels trivial to some extent, which also doesn’t do the game any favours. Also (and this could change with the last two bosses I suppose) the boss fights have stopped being exciting for me, and feel just a little bit samey. Again, this could be just me, and it doesn’t stop me from wanting to encourage you to play it! It’s just not as transcendent as I thought it would be at like hour 5.
Some of the later bosses are a little more generic. Maybe it should have been like… Seven Sols.
The final boss rules though.
Indika is also 25% off!
It wasn’t from this year but Subnautica: Below Zero was like 70% off, so I used that savings to pick up Indika as well as Nine Sols.
I’ll let you know how I feel about Nine Sols after maybe 50-100 more hours of Factorio: Space Age, which, I repeat, was certainly the best distinct release of videogame content some kind this year, and it’s not even close.
While we’re at it, 1000xRESIST is 25% off
and the most Polish game of the year (and maybe ever?) is 40% off.
After seeing it mentioned a couple times in this thread, I rushed through the marathon mode of Tetrachroma and, dude, what a blast. Not only the concept is executed nicely but the presentation is constantly generating good time juices in my brain.
I can only compare it to stupidly giggling while being high or something like that, discovering new mechanical routes in your brain in a way that only this kind of games can do.