NaissanceE, a game you've never heard of that I'd like to talk about

[Legend]

It's free on steam NaissanceE on Steam

It released a decade ago yet I only learned about it somewhat recently from Jacob Geller. Played some of it back in 2021 but yesterday I finally finished it.


It sucks! I don't understand why this game is so influential and revered. Modern critics really push it as an otherworldly experience not built for the player, but only a few sections come across that way. The rest of the game is contradictory and built specifically for the player, either narratively or as a rage platformer/puzzler.

The game has elements that I liked so I like that it has grown in popularity but it feels like so many people have just zoomed in on those good areas and tried to justify the rest of the game with them.

Spoiler for Ending Spoiler:

<br>It ends with you jumping into a bottomless pit. Unlike the other bottomless pits, I guess you can jump in this one.<br><br>You land perfectly in front of the monster/god that built this place. It chases you and you platform across sections as they get destroyed. Eventually they are too far apart, but some special force/wind throws you across the large gaps so you can make it. You reach a white opening and then releaize this white tunnel is where the game started. It&#39;s some infinite cycle or timeloop where you and this monster/god will keep doing this forever.<br><br>It&#39;s a standard action ending. I think this game is just random and struggled to bring various ideas together.<br>

Rainworld is an example of how a "not built for you" game should work.

[Legend]

I know ya'll can't wait for me to share more thoughts on this

"Not built for you" worlds need to avoid all the standard tropes. For example a normal linear game will never feel "alien" when progression is always the correct action. If you can do something, you should do something.

Rainworld is great at this. It is a very linear game in practice but the open world keeps the player cautious. The path forward feels like an element within the world, not the world itself.

Rainworld also uses npcs to decrease the importance of the player. Sure a path may be perfectly designed for platforming, but enemy lizards are just as happy to use it. The rules in the magic circle aren't identical to real life but they don't prioritize the player.

Rainworld got poor review scores because it was "unfair," but every other game cheats massively for the player. Rainworld lets enemies exist on their own even if that means frustrating gameplay. NaissanceE is frustrating just to be frustrating, while something like Rainworld gives meaning to the frustration.

[Legend]

It'll be interesting to see how frustrating Hapax ends up being. I very much want it to feel like a truly alien world not built for the player, but I don't want players to be more frustrated than necessary.

I have a fair amount of quality of life features yet what happens when players don't know they exist? Outer Wilds for example has arrows that help with space navigation, but players often just ignore them. Flying feels broken and stupid for them because they never learn how the mechanic actually works.

I feel good about my general world design at least. Every important thing can be learned in a bunch of different ways but in a non redundant way. Players should have way fewer problems with getting stuck and having no idea how to progress.

The thing I don't feel great about is player motivation. Hapax could be pretty boring if players don't have a strong goal at any given moment. Rainworld kills players a lot so just surviving is a good base goal, and they have a a worm thing that directly gives you a goal at times. My backup solution in Hapax is to put some form of companion on your phone that can help give goals.

[Legend]

Focusing back on NaissanceE, it's a game I wish I loved. It's such a unique and artistic experience, and some of the routing through levels is incredible.

Videos like this show all the creativity that is often ignored when the game is reduced to "not built for the player." Also pretty funny that at 57:30 in the video it literally builds a room for the player.


I don't know what the game means or if it means anything. You presumably play as Lucy, one room is glitchy unfinished, one bedroom makes you move super slow, a black and a white thing dance to music, there are three towers that mess with your vision when you're at the top, there is a puddle thing, there is a building that rapidly pulses from in design to constructed to destroyed, there is the wind force that helps you, and there is the worm host. Also there is a weird dream like sequence.

The short tower makes the world red and near the player black. The slightly taller tower makes the world white with maybe a hint of blue or yellow with the near stuff black. The tallest tower makes the world red and green with the stuff near the player white.

The bedroom has a computer with a large second monitor and an old crt tv. That puts the room at early to mid 2000s. Only one large bed but two child like toys are in the room.


It's probably the most incomprehensible game I've played, which makes me think of an incomprehensible game I made called Kirill Test Subject. I doubt it has a cohesive meaning.

[darkknightkryta]

I have no idea why, but this gives me early 2000 Sci Fi B movie feels.