Why Is Braid So Big?
August 7th, 2008There’s been quite a fuss over the release of Braid this Wednesday, and it’s interesting to think about why a small-scale game is creating so much buzz. After all, but Braid is at its heart not particularly notable: there are a ton of short, inventive, puzzle-oriented games out there that haven’t gotten the press coverage that it has received. Big-scale games have imaginative, impressive art too… and more complex play mechanics. (I don’t mean to diminish the game’s accomplishments - I haven’t played it, and a lot of people who have seem to think it’s pretty good.) So what’s the deal?
Let me suggest that it’s basically because of what Braid represents. To the large development community that comprises much of the blogging landscape, and the many smaller media voices out there, Braid is essentially the realization of their indie dreams: a game that was essentially made by a handful of people in a couple of years and whose ascendance to XBLA release demonstrates conclusively that independent success just might be possible indeed. In other words, it’s a Cinderella story: it creates a ray of hope for people who are often chained to a large, soulless publisher.
Sure, Braid features a pretty interesting play mechanic - but playing with time isn’t something we haven’t really seen developed as a gameplay concept plenty of times before, and it’s not the first to be inventive. It simply uses time in a slightly different way. It’s what the game symbolizes to people that makes it so interesting to them.
Posted in Geoff, PC, Xbox Live |
August 7th, 2008 at 12:36 pm
Having just played it for hours last night, there is definitely a lot more going on here than just “Sands of Time” rewinding, or even Blinx and other time-manipulation games. I’ve been pretty impressed so far with the cleverness of the worlds and puzzles.
I think you’re partially right though in that it’s what it represents that makes it so special, but it’s also the fact that it was made by an indie developer and is also quite innovative and interesting at the same time. Other games have been made by a small team of developers and haven’t made quite the same splash.
August 8th, 2008 at 7:00 am
Like I said, I wasn’t denigrating the game… just saying that there are plenty of similar games out there - and many that do a number of things as well or better - but I think we’re in agreement on why it’s getting so much publicity. It hits the two main levers of the journalistic gaming press: a nifty puzzle gimmick and an indie pedigree.
August 12th, 2008 at 2:57 pm
I think you’re right about why Braid is viewed as “important,” but I think you are doing the game a disservice by comparing it to other time manipulation games. It would be like comparing The Legend of Zelda to Oblivion, because they both have swords.
August 12th, 2008 at 11:00 pm
Having played the demo pretty extensively, I still don’t see what all the fuss is about. I feel like the “time” mechanic is pretty much a throw away and without it, the game seems almost pointless. In fact, the way it works in some cases is downright stupid. For instance, why would you KEEP a key when you rewind to before the point when you got it? That really seemed like a copout to make some puzzles more interesting at the cost of being intuitive. I really enjoy the audio though and the visual aesthetic is nice.
August 13th, 2008 at 1:37 am
cisco-
Indeed, why would you keep a key? Perhaps it has a special property which allows that… A property which is played with in relentlessly clever ways as the game progresses… =)
Honestly, I think I sort of experienced that slightly when I played the demo… I didn’t even know about the rewind mechanic until I had almost completed the demo, and didn’t even understand much of it’s use until I bought the game and played the next level. Truth be told, you have absolutely no idea what you’re in for… the game does so much more with the time mechanic (and even some other mechanics) than what you see in the demo. Some of the reviews may spoil some of these mechanics, although I would recommend buying the game without reading them. I was absolutely floored, for instance, when I stepped into World 4 and saw what was going on there.
August 13th, 2008 at 5:24 am
Yeah cisco, only some keys do that and there’s a way to tell which ones will.