Comments (21)
This game is a gem. The art/audio is very good, but what especially stands out is the use of resizing windows to uncover secrets. Really very smart design, well worth your time.
this was one of the most surreal experiences ever even at 6 at night. i enjoyed how it blurs your mind to forgetting whats really happening
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k56r52Nis9Y
Vast, repetitive (in a good way), and hallucinogenic. Writing is evocative and the scenes are beautiful. Very much deserving of the IGF nom. I'll be rooting for ya on awards day!
Man, it's art
This really was a surreal experience, and I just still can't quite believe how amazingly ingenious the concept is. I don't think I've ever played such an intricate in-browser game with so much story hidden between the sprites and minigames.
Being led from one scene to another, and drip fed thoughts and memories in the midst of a weird, wonderful and also worrying set of landscapes was an altering experience, and when I got to the end of the game it took a while for me to snap out of being jarred by the whole thing (in a good way!).
This is definitely a game that throws up many ideas and theories and I really do love the way you've been talking about sexism in videogames and counteracted that with this slice of amazing work. I honestly loved every second of this, even if I do seem a bit bewildered at times haha! Keep being awesome! =)
Black Room is a browser-based, narrative game about falling asleep while on your computer, on the internet. You play as an insomniac on the verge of sleep, moving through shifting states of consciousness. Hallucinatory, pixelated visions of landscapes filled with sprites ripped directly from the arcade/NES/SNES video games of your childhood appear and disappear as you click through fragile internet spaces.
Point-n-click mini games are scattered throughout the narrative. Often interrupted, you continually return to the Black Room, a meditation technique your mother taught you for falling asleep, visualizing black flowers in a black vase on a black table in the center of a black room.
This game, conceived as a feminist dungeon crawler, features a majority female cast of video game sprites from the 1970s-current day. This work seeks to bring these characters together to form new narratives: Chun Li reposes elegantly in a desert oasis filled with flamingos; Catwoman languidly cartwheels across the nighttime beaches of Coney Island; Jennifer Simpson, the lead character from Clock Tower, runs endlessly through the brightly pixelated fantasy landscapes of the Oregon Trail. These narratives appear as “Strange Visions,” to the player, induced by shifting stages of wakefulness.
~1.5hr to play through.
UPDATE 6/19: Google Chrome's recent autoplay update has affected this game -- sound is an intergram part of Black Room, and should play on every page. If you aren't hearing sound and are on Chrome, please switch to Firefox until this issue is resolved.
Read more about Black Room here 🗡️🗡️🗡️ https://hyperallergic.com/424211/a-game-takes-you-into-deep-dreaming/
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Black Room has been featured in AMAZE Fest 2018~~~https://2018.award.amaze-berlin.de/games/nominees
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And shown at Babycastles +++++ https://babycastles.com/Black-Room
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More installations of this work coming Summer/Fall 2018.
