Resonance

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Tell us what you think! You can read and leave comments about Resonance below...

[ad7venture]

Took me a while to figure out a feature article had been written since I never look at that area any more.  I still have the demo on my computer but have been doing other things and not played through it yet.  Some of the puzzles seem hard to me.  The STM is interesting, but confused me for a while.  If I hadn't read it's use in another review, I don't think I would have figured it out.  The trouble I found with it is I end up dragging everything I can in there, so it's just sort of more work, and in one area, the one thing I didn't think of dragging in was the thing I needed to do.  I realized later it was hinted at, but I just didn't think of it and had to use a walk through.  It does give the player more responsibility and doesn't feel so much like you are rolling through a list of choices, but also slows down the pace of the game.  Personally, I think being able to ask about inventory items is enough.  The LTM was more interesting for introducing and reminding plot points to me, less boring and more visual than a journal. 
I didn't like the timed puzzle I got into and found it extremely frustrating.  I hate those things.  It's probably all right for some, but for me, it just puts me under pressure and keeps me from thinking so it's over and over the same thing.  I like playing adventures because I don't have to do that like in other games.
I know I'm being a bit picky.  It's a great looking game with an interesting plot.
Don't know what to say about a feature being written after this long, but well done.

[Trumgottist]

Good review, but a bit too normal IMHO. For a game review in Adventure Developers, I'd hope more for a look / analysis from a developer's angle, rather than what we could read at other sites.

[Erwin_Br]

Good review, but a bit too normal IMHO. For a game review in Adventure Developers, I'd hope more for a look / analysis from a developer's angle, rather than what we could read at other sites.

Thanks, I thought about this actually. I couldn't really figure out how to work that out. How is a developer's angle different from a player's angle, considering the game was made to entertain a player. Do you have any examples or thoughts about it?

[Trumgottist]

I guess what I'd want is not an answer to the questions "Is this a good game?" or "Should I play it?" That's covered well by regular reviews in for example Adventure Gamers.

Questions I'd find more interesting in this context would be: What can we, as developers,  learn from this game? Why is it a good game? Something like SPAG Specifics, perhaps.

[ad7venture]

I know what you shouldn't do and that's compare it to a template of what you think adventure games ought to be, like adventuregamers.com.  I really get sick of that, however, some of their more recent reviews seem to be getting better.

[Erwin_Br]

Thanks for the feedback guys. I'll try to incorporate some of it into future reviews. Next Saturday's review was already written, though.

Also my apologies for the misbehaving spam filter. I'm tempted to turn it off once in a while, until I see the piles of spam it saved us from.

[BigMc]

I know what you shouldn't do and that's compare it to a template of what you think adventure games ought to be

You do that too, sometimes.

How is a developer's angle different from a player's angle, considering the game was made to entertain a player. Do you have any examples or thoughts about it?

One detail example is maybe the long term / short term memory interface in Resonance. You don't necessarily have to mention that to players, but it could be an inspiration for developers. I think it was quite nice and I haven't seen it before. Was it inspired by some other game btw?

[Erwin_Br]

If I remember correctly, it was TellTale's Bone games that used a similar approach. Objects that were too large to carry around in your pocket could be stored in your inventory as thoughts, represented as a cartoony "thought bubbles". You could then use these thoughts with other objects and your character would simply get the object instead of pulling it out of his pants.

A very basic implementation of the Resonance's concept, and the idea behind it is probably very different. Maybe Bone did spark the idea, who knows?

[Igor Hardy]

If I remember correctly, it was TellTale's Bone games that used a similar approach. Objects that were too large to carry around in your pocket could be stored in your inventory as thoughts, represented as a cartoony "thought bubbles".

Several other adventure games did this as well around the same time - le.g. Tale of a Hero and A Vampyre Story. Mata Hari took this approach even further with unified set of icons for both physical items and conversation topics. Diamonds in the Rough had entirely abstract ideas as usable inventory items.

A very basic implementation of the Resonance's concept, and the idea behind it is probably very different. Maybe Bone did spark the idea, who knows?

I think in the Resonance audio commentary it was mentioned that one of the inspirations was Discworld Noir's notebook. Also, it was a general attempt at addressing the adventure genre's issue of almost self-solving conversation puzzles (i.e. the player character knows what to say before the player).

[Erwin_Br]

Oh yeah, I totally forgot about a Vampyre Story. And I played Discworld Noir too, back in the day. Fond memories!

[ad7venture]

You do that too, sometimes.

It might sound like that because I'm picking out things I like and don't like as a developer.  I don't have a template for adventure games, however.  The reviews I've read knock a star or whatever off the score because it didn't do a certain thing the reviewer thought should be in the game.   It didn't evolve the genre or something.   It wasn't that what they did, didn't work well, or worked very well.  That's the difference in having a template, at least to me.  The only thing I mention like that is a hint system, because I think adventure games need it much more than any other type of game.  I consider it sort of lazy to not include one, although I have done a game or two without one.  I'm also not doing reviews so what I'm saying should be taken as personal opinion.  I particularly remember one review that didn't think the game premise was original enough, yet it was the only game I had played with that premise and the reviewer referred to a movie that had a vaguely similar premise, but so loose that we would have to label about 9/10's of literature as clone work.  They seem to not like first person adventures for who knows what reason.   Every one is a Myst clone, which would be like saying every 1st person shooter is a Doom clone, and it never seems to happen on 3rd person games which follow more or less the same game mechanics.  They don't call them Monkey Island clones, or whatever was the first 3rd person adventure, although those don't advance the genre enough most of the time.  If it were another genre, it might be a little more applicable, but adventures live or die by their story and immersion.  It's like someone reviewing Van Gogh's Starry Night and saying, well, he painted the night sky and that's already been done before.  Two stars. 

[Igor Hardy]

adventures live or die by their story and immersion.

Template alert! Template alert!

[ad7venture]

Yeah, if you call a good story a template, then I'm guilty.

[Igor Hardy]

That adventure games live and die by how good the story is, is an opinion I'd definitely call a personal template for adventure games. Similarly the fact that you mentioned the story aspect as essential, but nothing about puzzles.

What about Gobliiins and other more puzzle oriented adventures where story is secondary? They're still great games.