![]() In 2011 Lemoore showed it off at the Game Developers Conference in San Francisco, where Kotaku received a firsthand look.Įrstwhile Kotaku EIC Stephen Totilo described a “game in which the only thing you can do is pick things up and put them down” that left him “in awe.” You could freely explore a walled city, wherein one passageway was blocked by a giant red cube. Maquette spent about a decade in the oven. I also wanted to know if I could squish myself. ![]() ![]() ![]() Were I to review the game, the whole text would amount to, simply, “Play it.” But I wanted to know more, and to learn more, and to tell you more, so I hit up Hanford Lemoore, the game’s creator, director, and lead engineer, to get the full story. I’ve played a lot of wonderful games while working at Kotaku, but none have resonated with me as much as Maquette, a first-person “recursive puzzle game” released this month for PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, and PC. The term “thinking outside the box” gets thrown around a lot in regards to puzzle games, but I’ve never seen one where it applies as aptly as in Maquette.No, really. While it’s not an overly difficult game, the introduction of its signature mechanic, the concept of “recursive worlds”, is a lot to take in and requires a decent amount of patience and playful curiosity. The concept of a recursive world is a bit difficult to explain, but it’s necessary for understanding how Maquette works. For starters, I want you to imagine a square courtyard. At each of the four sides of the square is a connected area that houses a different location with a puzzle. In the middle of the courtyard is a domed building that contains a smaller replica of the courtyard, the four surrounding areas, and even the domed building. The way the game first teaches you about recursive worlds is by blocking the path to the first puzzle area with a giant red cube. The cube is massive and impossible to lift, but if you go into the domed building in the middle of the courtyard, walk up to the model, pick up the tiny version of the red cube and move it, the large version of the red cube outside is moved as well, allowing you to proceed. If you were able to follow along this far, then I’m sure you can see where this is going. Maquette uses this concept of recursive worlds to play with size and location in truly clever ways. While moving smaller objects in the model can move larger objects outside, it’s worth keeping in mind that the concepts of “inside” and “outside” are complicated. In theory, the world of Maquette is infinite. If you get outside of the areas surrounding the courtyard then you’ll just find yourself inside a larger version of the world. It’s essentially a world in a world in a world… so on and so forth. The genius of Maquette lies in how it interconnects the same world at different scales and tasks you with moving across them to change both your size and the size of objects to solve its puzzles. While the bridge might be too small and simply fall down the chasm if you tried to place it there, it would fit perfectly fine when paired with the model, which would then reflect into the larger world by becoming a fully sized bridge.įor example, you might find a tiny handheld bridge and then discover a gigantic chasm. It’s a tough concept to wrap your brain around, but the possibilities that arise once you start making these connections is exhilarating. The game is split across multiple chapters that typically have you solving puzzles in the four connecting areas before moving on. To keep things from feeling stale, new puzzle types are added on a fairly regular basis. One chapter is centered around using different colored gems to open corresponding gates, while another is largely focused on manipulating a staircase and activating elevators to move to a smaller version of the world. While Maquette is a bit on the shorter side, clocking in at 3-4 hours, there’s a good amount of variety to the chapters and the puzzles always manage to stay engaging. One area that isn’t as engaging is the story. Maquette’s narrative is centered around a young couple that’s recently gone through a break up, with the bulk of the game focused on reliving the memories of their relationship.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |