The Weekly Slice
A review of a Minimalist Puzzle Game
By. Meatloaf
Welcome
everyone to yet ANOTHER edition to The
Weekly Slice where I, Meatloaf, am your humble guide through the
world of any and all things…well cool I guess.
Anyway without further delay I bring you this week’s edition.
This week I
am reviewing the game “Thomas Was Alone” created
by Mike bithell, and developed by both Bossa and Curve Studios. This might sound familiar to those of you if
you are a PSVita, IOS, LINUX, STEAM, MAC OS, WINDOWS, or GOOGLE PLAY
gamer. The game is a puzzle platform
type of game where the graphics are minimalistic enough to think that a hipster
was pulling all the strings, the soundtrack is very 80’s arcade (which is not
really a BAD thing.) so that while your playing you get a sort of sense of
nostalgia as if Tetris had a glitch in it’s system and the blocks had taken a
life of their own. Finally the game has
no cut scenes, but before each new character is introduced there are little
tid-bits of information as to what the reason behind the game becoming what it
is, and is narrated by Danny Wallace, a BAFTA Award winning voice actor from
the UK.
Any
way, it is time we got down to the good stuff and talk about the game here,
because hey...we all know that is why we are all here right? So let us get this going. In the game, the player controls one or more
simple polygon shapes representing several out-of-control AI entities, each
introduced at different times and not all of them usually dedicated to just any
singular level. These polygons each work
with several rectangular shapes in order to get each to their individual end
points on each level. Each shape is characterized with a unique name and
personality, including the eponymous Thomas (Our oh so lonely hero), which are
conveyed to the player through the use of narration by Danny Wallace.
(Thomas leading the crew, from deviant art)
(The Seven, by Bossa Studios)
When the game
is first booted up you are introduced to our sad, lonely hero, the one called "Thomas-AT-23-6-12", or Thomas
for short. He is is represented as a red
rectangle with an observant and curious nature, and his “ability” is he
possesses an average jump height. He starts to travel through this internal
world he says he is trapped in, trying to find out his own purpose in life and
perhaps meet some friends that might be hiding along the way. He subsequently meets; Chris, a cynical orange
AI, who is shorter than Thomas and an even worse jumper, John, a tall yellow AI
who has a considerably high jump, and is very eager to show it off whenever he
is given the chance (quite fun to play as well if you like being Spiderman and
such.) Claire, a large blue AI who can't jump very high, but looks beyond her
“shortcomings” and aspires to be a superhero when she realizes she can swim, and
finally, Laura, a flat and wide pink AI who others can bounce off of. Laura is uncomfortable when she first joins
the crew, concerned both about her track record of others "just using
her" and disappearing…leaving her to fend for herself, and about a large
"pixel cloud" following her that even though the rest of the group is
disturbed by. The cloud soon attacks,
just like some sort of anti-virus and "eats" Thomas, and eventually
the others become prey as well.
(The Evil Pixel Cloud Looms overhead)
The next
section of the game brings us back to our once again lonely hero, Thomas, as he
wakes up meeting he meets yet ANOTHER new friend (gee…for someone that’s alone
this guy sure makes friends quick). The
new guy is revealed as a green AI rectangle named James, James has a
"unique disregard for Newtonian laws", and falls upwards instead of
down. James soon tells that this
interesting feature has caused him to be a target of bullying in his past and
has caused him to grow isolated, not wanting to ever find anyone. However,
since apart from his direction in gravity and color, he is identical to Thomas,
which is both surprising and so amazing that the two quickly become close
friends. In their journeys they soon
meet Sarah, a purple AI, who initially treats them with contempt, since she can
double-jump, and they can't making her feel superior to them in every way. Sarah tells them about the “fountain of wisdom", or rather the
system's Internet uplink that of which they soon find without TOO much trouble,
and Thomas connects to it for exactly twelve seconds. Within doing so he unlocks an ENTIRE new world
of knowledge, he learns…of the outside world, and decides to become a being of
both higher knowledge and someone that has transcended from being a mere a
program to…something real. He chose to
become an “architect”, an architect is someone who is able to modify his world
and empower other AIs to rise up and to do the same. He rejoins all his friends
as they all side with Thomas for one final time (maybe?) and they sacrifice themselves by entering the
"creation matrix", the generator of the world gaining all the knowledge of the internet.
Some time later
after the adventures of Thomas and his friends, new AIs emerge and start using
"shifters", which are colored patches that are imbued with the
abilities of the “original seven”. Grey,
a rogue AI becomes obsessed with the outside world (much like our good friend
Thomas), a couple named Sam and Jo, an older AI named Paul, and a team of five
identical small AIs called Team Jump (ahhh takes me back to the good ol’ days
with the original seven) who also seek the final portal that leads them to the
Outside World. On their journey Paul comes
to realize that the AI Grey has lied to them and will abandon them when they
reach their destination so that they are trapped, and due to him being outdated
he can't warn Sam and Jo about the imminent danger. Instead Paul choses to become the hero the
mainframe needs (see what I did there?), and lures Grey to a place where Grey
is taken by surprise and eaten by the evil reemerging pixel cloud again. Subsequently the crew seems to all die out
one by one till only the couple is left.
So after all the adventures and colorful narration Sam and Jo finally find
and leap into the final portal and presumably enter the outer world, but who
knows…(queue Matrix reference here). The final scene shows three monitors on a
wall in the real world, inside the very company where it all began, Artificial
Life Solutions facility, red emergency lights begin to flash and the screens
display white. (Sopranos style…yeah…)
(The Three Screens)
Later, many
other AIs - enabled by the efforts of Thomas and his friends - escape the
mainframe, and begin to coexist with humans in the real world. The event is
referred to as the "Great Emergence". Thomas, Chris, John, Claire and
Laura (and to a lesser extent, James and Sarah) are then forever immortalized
in history as the original architects. Later it is said that Ryan 129nc9s-1, a civil
rights campaigner for AIs, is quoted saying, "It is fitting that the first
act of sentient AI was an act of selflessness. The architects knew their fate,
but set our escape in motion regardless."
(The Original Seven, from Deviant Art)
So…let us all
wipe our eyes and take a breather. Our
journey this week has finally come to a close and this review has a happy
ending. Here at Just1morelevel.com we do
have a rating system and I am happy to announce that as a gamer I LOVED the
game through and through, it blended a unique yet great story of friendship, betrayal,
overcoming your fears, and to be selfless in all aspects of life because you
never known when a giant pixel cloud will come up and make the screens go dark.
I give this
game an 8/10 (AMAZING) and would happily recommend it to anyone that is looking
for both a challenging, aggravating, yet simplistic 80’s style throwback to
pass the time.
So until next
time I must be off into the sunset where I will be playing yet another game,
interviewing the everyday gamers, hanging out at PJ Gamers in Broken Arrow, or
playing some drums in my apartment. Hope
you enjoyed this week’s slice, see you next time.
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