Amanita Design are a team I really need to dive into, since I loved Chuchel from Let's Plays and I loved this game from playing it. They're really skilled at cooking up engrossing surreal animations that show you things you've never seen before, all with a fantastic illustrative style and non-verbal storytelling.
What is Happy Game about? I...don't know. I don't know if I'm meant to. But on the surface, it's about a kid, whose prior childhood consists of bad memories of loss, trying to regain the things he no longer has in dreams designed to torment him. There's some really uncanny and brutal visuals and some great tonal elements, like the unnerving "this isn't fun anymore" tone when the horror becomes too much for the kid and the use of ironic happy faces throughout. The game has great sound design but also uses flashing visuals, making it unwise playing for people prone to seizures. I can't say with any confidence if the game is allegorical, or to what degree if it is—does each entity have a specific meaning or is it just evocative of mood and theme...and if so, what? What I do know is that it nails the feeling of dream logic, with the surrealism shown in earlier AD games shifting toward horror and dreaminess. Several sequences contain puzzles and actions that make sense in the way they could only in a dream, and the game plays well with the question of when the dream is over. Gameplay is like other AD games with point-and-click puzzles, but there is also some player movement and some distinctly tactile actions that are fun to see.
This game is like art candy for me. Amazing visual concepts, gorgeous illustration, freaky horror, and clever tactile puzzles all make for an enthralling ride. If you like cinematic platformers like Inside or Little Nightmares or you want to see what Chuchel would look like as a surreal horror, check this game out.
VideoGame A gorgeously horrific dreamscape.
Amanita Design are a team I really need to dive into, since I loved Chuchel from Let's Plays and I loved this game from playing it. They're really skilled at cooking up engrossing surreal animations that show you things you've never seen before, all with a fantastic illustrative style and non-verbal storytelling.
What is Happy Game about? I...don't know. I don't know if I'm meant to. But on the surface, it's about a kid, whose prior childhood consists of bad memories of loss, trying to regain the things he no longer has in dreams designed to torment him. There's some really uncanny and brutal visuals and some great tonal elements, like the unnerving "this isn't fun anymore" tone when the horror becomes too much for the kid and the use of ironic happy faces throughout. The game has great sound design but also uses flashing visuals, making it unwise playing for people prone to seizures. I can't say with any confidence if the game is allegorical, or to what degree if it is—does each entity have a specific meaning or is it just evocative of mood and theme...and if so, what? What I do know is that it nails the feeling of dream logic, with the surrealism shown in earlier AD games shifting toward horror and dreaminess. Several sequences contain puzzles and actions that make sense in the way they could only in a dream, and the game plays well with the question of when the dream is over. Gameplay is like other AD games with point-and-click puzzles, but there is also some player movement and some distinctly tactile actions that are fun to see.
This game is like art candy for me. Amazing visual concepts, gorgeous illustration, freaky horror, and clever tactile puzzles all make for an enthralling ride. If you like cinematic platformers like Inside or Little Nightmares or you want to see what Chuchel would look like as a surreal horror, check this game out.