Flower
is an independent game by thatgamecompany, and described as their '"video game version of a poem." The game takes place within the dreams of a lonely potted flower upon the windowsill of a rather dreary city apartment.
With the completion of each dream, more flowers appear upon the windowsill, and the apartment grows ever less run-down while the view out of the window grows ever more picturesque. Actual game-play consists, for the most part, of guiding a single, wind-borne petal of the presently dreaming flower, awakening other flowers and adding a petal from each to your own, until you find yourself guiding a great, winding current of blossoms and petals (along with the occasional leaf) through the game's vast and varied landscapes while the ambient music shifts and changes according to locations, movements, and events.
As the game's wordless story progresses, it takes on an increasingly subdued and eventually sinister tone, until the player finds themself witness to a triumphant charge to bring back life to a once beautiful landscape and city.
This game provides examples of:
- 100% Completion: There are secret flowers throughout the game which can be collected to achieve this.
- 11th-Hour Superpower: In the final level, you gain the power to break the girders, healing the areas around them.
- After the End: In the flower's dreams, it makes its way through a landscape that seems to be the ruins of modern civilization, revitalizing them.
- All the Worlds Are a Stage: A subtle version. The final dream passes through areas inspired by each previous dream: beginning with "awakening" the city; then restoring colour; speeding along the highway 'canyons'; the sky darkening to night; and finally an area overrun with girders.
- Anti Poop-Socking: There's a trophy for waiting ten minutes between levels. There's another for going a week without playing the game.
- Beautiful Void: There's no one but the wind, flowers and landscapes. The only animal seen is during an ending.
- Blow You Away: You have the power to control the wind. Combined with Petal Power.
- Developer's Foresight: A minor example in Dreams 5 and 6. Normally at the end of Dream 5, your petal will fall to the ground before it can reach the goal, and a new one will take its place at the beginning of Dream 6. However, if you finish Dream 5 without getting zapped, the level will just end abruptly without your petal dying, and you'll begin Dream 6 controlling the same petal (albeit without all the petals you collected in Dream 5 trailing it) until you reach the nearby goal.
- Dramatic Thunder: Loud thunder and lighting can be heard and seen throughout Dream 5.
- Dreams of Flying: In the flower's dreams, it imagines soaring on the wind.
- Easter Egg: A hidden area in Dream 3 contains audio and visual references to flOw, and a trophy of the same name for finding it. In addition, in the ending cutscene, some graffiti can be found also referencing flOw.
- Everything's Better with Rainbows: At the end of Dream 2, a rainbow arcs across the sky, just to top off the peaceful tone.
- Evil Tower of Ominousness: The massive, girder-filled structure seen throughout Dream 6. Fortunately, it will be transformed into a giant flowering tree at the end.
- Foreshadowing: At the end of Dream 3 and 4, you can see the electrical structures you'll be facing in the next dream in the distance.
- Genre-Busting: It's not easily classifiable, not least because you play as a petal on the wind.
- Glowing Flora: Several flowers can be seen glowing faintly during daytime, but Dream 4, which takes place at nighttime, takes it to breathtakingly gorgeous extremes, with entire fields of luminous flowers looking like pretty fireflies.
- Green Aesop: Evil is represented by old run-down power girders, and the game follows you replacing them with clean Wind Turbine Power while growing flowers and rehabilitating grass.
- Green Hill Zone: Dream 1 takes place in a verdant meadow full of flowers.
- High-Voltage Death: The broken electrical girders will zap you in certain areas, burning a substantial part of your petal train. You can never lose your initial petal, however.
- Hope Sprouts Eternal: The revitalization of the world is accomplished through flowers, and the final shot of the game is of a yellow flower growing atop concrete in the now-brighter city.
- Invisible Wall: A strong gust of wind will turn you around if you try to go past the level boundaries.
- It's All Upstairs From Here: The final spire in Dream 6, which must be climbed all the way to the top to finish the game.
- Level Goal: A swirling vortex of wind marks the end point of each level. You won't reach the one in the fifth level, so the 6th flower has to finish where 5th one left off.
- Ludd Was Right: Actually averted, despite the evil electric girders. The last stage has you repairing a very non-evil city with clean energy. Also, Dream 4 has the lampposts as integral and adding to the beauty.
- Mini-Game Credits: An independent level where each flower is inscribed with a developer's name. It can be played and replayed whenever one wants, all the gameplay mechanics from previous levels make an appearance, and you get a trophy for collecting all the petals.
- Mood Whiplash:
- At the end of Dream 4, the triumphant tone shifts abruptly to foreboding when one of the fuse boxes sparks out.
- A smaller one in Dream 3. You're rushing through canyons at high speed, and suddenly the lively melody will be replaced with a much calmer one, and the sky rolls on into sunset.
- One-Word Title: It's about a flower, after all.
- Petal Power: Combined with wind, flower petals are the only things you use. You collect one new petal from each flower you open.
- Power Glows: In Dreams 4 and 6, you consume so many petals that your main petal becomes a glowing ball of light—extra fast and powerful.
- Rainbow Motif: Each of the six levels is represented by a different-colored potted flower, all of which are arranged in rainbow order on the desk.
- Recurring Riff: A certain 4-note motif can be heard in all of the dreams.
- Red and Black and Evil All Over: The girders pre-healing are black, with red glowing lights. The final Evil Tower of Ominousness is composed entirely of these.
- Scenery Gorn: From the end of Dream 4 up through the beginning of Dream 6, the aesthetic is rife with twisted, black, and lifeless Urban Ruins.
- Scenery Porn: The game is filled with beautiful vistas, including a sunset and rolling meadows.
- A Storm Is Coming: The thunderstorm that brews in Dream 4 portends the bleak tone of Dream 5.
- Variable Mix: The game's music reacts in various, usually subtle ways to events and actions on the part of the player. Each color of flower also makes a certain note when opened, adding further layers to the score.
- Wham Episode: Everything is lovely until the fuse box breaks in Dream 4, at which point the tone suddenly becomes sinister and eerie.
- Wind Turbine Power: Most of Dream 3 revolves around powering up wind turbines so they can blow wind and help progression within the level.
- World-Healing Wave: In certain areas, opening all the flowers will send out a ripple healing the dying grass and growing more blossoms.
