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Weekend edition 11/01: Estamos Pensando
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In the vein of Jason Rohrer's Passage, comes Daniel Novais's Estamos Pensando (We Are Thinking).
Estamos Pensando
While I am probably selling the game a little short, it is a Flash-based game that is closely aligned to the recent "art games" movement, such as Braid, and the aforementioned Passage, which Novais claims as partial inspiration. The game explores the idea of what happens when you are asked to do something you cannot do.
You play a guy whose girlfriend just broke up with you for not being romantic enough. After remarking that you're "not the kind of man who would go to space just to bring me stars," you are left to wander. Starting off as a platformer with wall jumping elements, similar to last week's feature Meat Boy. Halfway through, however, the game shifts and you do indeed begin collecting stars in a bittersweet manner.
While in the first section the wall climbing is a bit wonky and in the second, the flight is a bit loose, overall, it still felt good mechanically. I enjoyed small details, such as grass parting by your feet or the ukelele riff that played when you brought a star down. I kind of wish I had a bit more time to collect stars and, while I'm pretty sure it wouldn't change anything, I'm eager to replay to see if I can get all of the stars by the end of the music.
In one sense, the game kind of relies too much on overplayed tropes, specifically of the jilted boyfriend who is trying (overdramatically) to make things right. The game handles the situation delicately enough that I don't think it becomes overly schmaltzy or maudlin. The simple art style and excellent music help this a lot and the star collection segment, which I really enjoyed, help temper the to easy to overblow premise. By the end of the game, I felt rather mixed about how I felt about the main character and the actions I was made to take as a player.
Overall, it's a very quick (2 to3 5-minute playthroughs at most), but interesting experience. A bit of fun, and perhaps and interesting game about choices.
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