The “games as art” movement is fine and dandy, and titles like Braid, Limbo and Flower have really rocked a lot of worlds. When poor imitators step up to try and grab some of the limelight, though, bad things happen. Bad things like Breeze.
Whatever you do, do not watch the trailer above. That is, unless you want to have to cut your own ears off and then swear off video games forever.
First of all, the obvious: If I wanted to play a game that somehow rips off Flower while at the same time being nothing at all like Flower, or one that loops the same horrible, horrible, horrible, satanic smooth jazz / easy listening track ad nauseum, or plays the Facebook chat notification sound after every level, well.. if I wanted to play that game, I would have probably strangled myself with a Gamecube controller cord by now. Why Gamecube? I don’t know, those cords never got tangled, I always liked them.
If Breeze is supposed to be relaxing, the developers severely missed their mark. From the music, which honestly makes my skin crawl, to the nails-on-a-chalkboard “AHA!” sounds that players every time you collect a piece of whatever that floating crap is, just watching this new video of Breeze makes me want to take a six hour long shower.
Why is this even here? Where did this game come from? Apparently it was released initially last month on the Xbox Live indie platform, but developer Null City Software got complaints that it was too hard. So they tinkered with the controls and recently added an “air brake” to make it easier.
Apparently no one complained about the music, though I find that hard to believe. Truly, what we have here is a prime example of misguided game design. If you want to prove that games are art, or just sell games, for that matter, don’t make an irritating imitation of what other developers have already made, especially when it’s undeniably inferior. All that’s going to accomplish is to get people like me to rip it a new one.
If for some reason you want to watch someone from Eurogamer play the game with the updated feature for fifteen, go ahead and click here, but it’s your funeral.
