jp
Home Talks and Slides My GameLog Research and Projects Publications Resume Teaching
Back  //   GameBreadth Project  //   Game Ontology Project  //   GameLog

Inside (PS4)

Status: Finished playing
I started playing this game on Saturday 2 June, 2018  //  I stopped playing this game on: Tuesday 5 June, 2018
Current opinion of this game
No comment, yet.

June 5, 2018 07:08:13 PM
Finished this last night and...oh, wow, that ending took a real turn to the bizarre!

The kid you've been controlling all along finally makes their way into a large tank - with a bunch of scientists watching - and you start to unplug this weird bulbous fleshy mass that's floating from a bunch of mind-control devices. Suddenly, you're sucked in!

...and you're now in control of this large bulbous fleshy mass that has multiple arms and legs sticking out of it.

It was weird!

You manage to escape from the giant tank, you wreck a lot of stuff along the way and the onlookers are generally in fear. So, your goal now is to escape from the facility - which you do eventually - by solving more puzzles, breaking stuff AND, in an interesting turn - getting help from some of the people that work in the facility! Up until now, any other human was either going to kill you immediately OR was a "drone/zombie" that was mindless and that you could ignore (or control). But now, when you're the weirdest crazy thing - some people help you escape?!

The game ends when you escape the facility, roll down a hillside and come to rest in a patch of grass. The sun is shining.

It was weird.

(I also then completed the "secret" ending - where you enter an old unused vault - walk a bunch underground and then unplug some stuff - that, if memory serves, is color-coded like the mind-control devices)

Weirdness aside, controlling the blob was a real joy - it sort of flows over things and also strains and grunts to get "tall". It can't jump or use stuff, but can grab on to things. It was a nice change of pace both in terms of verbs (what you do) but, more importantly in terms of game feel. Huh.


June 4, 2018 05:41:38 PM
I played Limbo and it was good. (I'll have to go back to my GameLogs to know for sure, but at least that's the memory I have).

I've heard two different things about Inside:
a. It's Limbo, but with more colors. Even the same puzzles!
b. OMG, this is so much better than Limbo - it's amazing!

So, I picked up the PS4 double pack to see what Inside was like.

...and so far I'm really enjoying it. I was surprised when - a few minutes in, as I was running (always running!) I missed something and was shot and killed. It was brutal - especially because the game doesn't have a whole lot going on. So, the crack of gunfire was a stark contrast to what was on-screen and coming out of my speakers.

I get a real sense of urgency when I'm running away from dogs and the swimming "creature"(?), I feel a sense of awe when I'm walking through these abandoned facilities, I feel so sad for the gray "lifeless" humans I control, I wonder where it will all end (who is the child I'm controlling and where do they want to go and why?)...


 
kudos for original design to Rodrigo Barria