![]() ![]() Mind Meld: Best Game or Interactive Fiction.The Wheel of Time Reread: The Great Hunt.Microreview : Horizon Forbidden West b.Centireview: Inheritors of Power by Juliette Wade.Much as with the original game, saying basically anything about it takes away some of the joy of discovery, but I can say that the developers seemed to ask themselves, "What mechanic have we not yet thoroughly explored?" and then built not just an entire new gameplay paradigm, but an entirely different genre onto the base game. The environments are stunning, the secrets surprising and fascinating, and the atmosphere spot-on. And yet - Echoes of the Eye not only manages to preserve everything extraordinary and meaningful about the original game, but it actually builds on it and is even more clever and wonder-inducing. Outer Wilds was a game so complete within itself that I could not imagine how a DLC could possibly work without undermining the structure and themes of the base game. We're very lucky to have such a stellar example of what a Hugo-worthy "substantial modification" of a game could look like. Now, working on the campaign in 2022, I'm learning to lean on my fellow campaigners and be gentle with myself to avoid burnout - and leave room for the very source of joy that I want our community to reward.Īnyone who's allowed me to talk about games for more than a minute will have heard that I love Outer Wilds, and the 2021 DLC for the game, Echoes of the Eye is. In the end, I found a lot of meaning in playing this game with my partners (it has a wonderful co-op mode) even as I worked on the Games Hugo campaign, getting a chance to actually enjoy the very sort of work I was championing. The game is not easy, with tricky puzzles and challenging boss battles. The style, delivery, writing, and gameplay are all very gentle even as they grapple with truly dark and complex ideas. The game looks like a digital colouring book, because it is one, and you can colour the world however you want, either for your own pleasure or to solve puzzles and deal with obstacles. She shuts herself away, at which point the player character, untrained and unchosen but eager, picks up the Brush - and discovers the darkness that has overtaken Chicory. But Chicory buckles under the constant pressure to create art to serve those around her. Chicory is current Wielder of the Brush, a powerful artifact that lets you bring colour to the otherwise colourless world. In Chicory, you play a (never gendered) dog who is the janitor for the titular Chicory. But it's also a game about people who are so overwhelmed by a responsibility they've taken on that they don't get to enjoy what that work centers around. Chicory: A Colorful Tale is a game about creativity, responsibility, depression, mental illness, burnout, and dismantling systems that no longer serve the communities they're meant to structure and support. I know, it's weird - and bad - but one of the games that I did play actually gets at this very dilemma. Teacher: Abacus and cat, you are now trying to find the word between aztecs and 4.I have a confession to make: Even as I've been campaigning for a Games Hugo, 2021 was not a good year for me actually playing games. Player 1 (same time as other player): Aztecs! Teacher: Abacus and cat, you are now trying to find the word between abacus and cat. Player 2 (same time as other player): Cat! Player 1 (same time as other player): Abacus! Sometimes the group can opt in and out and it is played between the team. Sometimes it is played with the same pair of people all the way through until they connect on a word. When we finally arrive at the same word we sing and dance to “It was a mind meld, it was a mind meld, it happens all the time, it was a mind meld.” We keep trying each time until we say the same word. We repeat the one, two, three and try to use the two previously stated things to arrive at a third, common one. Then we think what the common thing between those two things or associated with those two things would be. They then say anything at all – a person, place, idea, concept, phrase: anything. It begins by one person saying “one,” the second person saying “two,” and then both people counting to three together. The goal is for two people to say things together until they reach the same word. ![]()
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