Review of RiME - Fairy tale lie
All your thorny path to release RiME passed with the label "project in the style of creations" unceremoniously pasted on by the press. He beckoned and alarmed at the same time, calling to perch on a stool and rummage around on the mezzanine of a dusty reference book of weights and measures, with which the game designer of the early 2000s tried to approach the living classics of Ueda-san and Co. However, just as we used to be studios, their work belongs rather to the cohort of so-called "impression games". This somewhat lowers the bar, on the other hand - in the same niche with the outstanding Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons and Journey, no one can feel at least a little confident.
RiME in such a company is so uncomfortable that it’s just right to start humming condescendingly to enter the duty “it’s not so embarrassing to lose to the greats”, until a little later you look over the lines again: look, and this one in the raincoat turns out to be that lively one. brainchild Tequila Works at first, there is a catastrophic lack of emotional intensity, involvement in what is happening, at the same time, adjusting their game exclusively to this criterion is the same as placing an obese passenger on the side of a reserved seat: the uncle will not enter, even if you ram the whole car.
At the same time, RiME itself begs for a direct comparison, using a similar pattern, peeped from its older comrades. A storm, several torn images, a boy in a red cloak, who turns up on the shore, which raises his eyes in surprise to the island stretching in front of him: here he and the player will spend the next 5-7 hours. That's the point, the aforementioned "living wage" of the plot would be enough to start a fleeting adventure with regular "pit stops" every 15-20 minutes. The project of the Spanish studio turns out to be a middle-distance runner, and is only warming up when the “emotional sprinters” are already approaching their equator.
Such a vacuum in the prologue could well have been avoided if the developers did not promote a natural “romance with a stone”. We climb bare rocks, move hewn blocks, interact with jigsaw puzzle statues, and contemplate ancient architecture. With such episodes, the game badly generates feedback, for the reasons indicated above, it lacks the emotional charge inherent in the introduction, it is in no hurry to surprise with unexpected decisions and images.
At the same time, RiME fails to find a link between the player and the virtual world. It could be, for example, another character who would act as a kind of “energy conductor”, like Jorda in the same (by the way, the opportunity to take this girl by the hand is still one of the most intimate moments in video games), but in this direction developers go only half way.
It is clear that we cannot run our palms over the rough terrain, breathe in the salty breeze, and because of the above omissions, we are not able to integrate into the emotional background. Therefore, as a rule, developers strew our way with a variety of game systems that can provide “acclimatization”. The authors of Ico did the same, introducing tedious and primitive, but still battles. Despite the successfully resolved issues with the perception of their history and the world, they understood that, among other things, the user needed to create a point of application of force so that the fictional universe could also be felt tactilely, reverberated in the fingers.
Therefore, it is natural to see how RiME started up when the island further begins to run its claws deeper and deeper into its ward. This is still a rather indirect interaction, but there is a conflict, new nuances in the gameplay, mechanics, finally. Straighten the shoulders and puzzles, even the context of the story begins to take on a meaningful shape, even if this part of the story is placed in the category of collectibles.
These metamorphoses are felt so consistently and organically only thanks to the transparent design. You always know at least approximately where to go and what to do, know which ledge you can jump to, how and where to use this or that object. The authors unobtrusively, but at the same time very far-sighted approached the training of the player, preferring to convey information through scenes, interior elements and color schemes, as if by chance played out. The interface is minimal, the immersion is complete.
RiME, despite some secondary nature in the soundtrack (cello parts and flute interspersed here completely), is perceived as a moderately original, elegant carved box, which was presented for the anniversary. True, when you open it, you find a large banknote there, the value of which (including artistic, of course) is much lower.
Looking back at the storyline that has been covered, at the story that remains just a lead to something grandiose, at the relatively small number of memorable mise-en-scenes, at the forcing of a series of events, you understand how a fairy tale saturated with meaningful images would work much better than in current form of metaphor. Much less obscura, but unlike the more personal Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, a living reminder of that.
Moreover, the “second bottom” of the game does not look like a weighty enough reason to fence the bottom of the first one. And after watching the final credits and going into the level selection menu, you realize that the developers chewed everything in general so that no one would leave offended. But you still leave offended. And then, remembering the story with the thoughtful ending of Journey, the idea about which the authors from thatgamecompany was prompted by a bug and the subsequent reaction of the tester to it, you regret that something similar did not happen within the walls of Tequila Works.
No matter how you look at it, RiME seems to be frozen in a half-position: in terms of timing, situations and mechanics, it is a little more than just an impression game, in terms of emotional intensity it is much weaker.
Nevertheless, I really want to recommend the project, it came out lively, sincere, a match for the perfectly animated main character, who was drawn and voiced by an unimaginable (for the indie segment, of course) number of reactions to the environment, characters and situations. To say, they say, by purchasing a budget version for PC, the work of the Spanish studio should be encouraged (after all, on PS4 for a lower price, you can join the monumental The Last Guardian). And when you read the news that the game is giving a light to the top PC configurations, you freeze in the same confusion as after the RiME finale.
Well, at least the development studio is consistent in everything.
