This week Broken Age was released in full. It’s point-and-click adventure video game, where you progress by interacting with characters and use lateral thinking to solve story puzzles. It’s a favourite genre of mine because you get to feel clever as you enjoy a good story that unfolds at your own pace, and for the humour and depth of interaction it allows for. It was made by the people who did gems like Monkey Island, Psychonauts, Grim Fandango, Day of the Tentacle and many more, so it’s no wonder that the Kickstarter to fund the project broke records. Double Fine’s long, hard journey to make and ship this game can be followed in the fascinating documentary series about it.
In the game you get to switch freely between two likable young teenage protagonists. There’s Vella, a black girl who lives in a town of bakers in a world terrorised by monsters, except that over the years it’s become tradition to see it as an honour to be visited by the monster and have the chance to appease it, despite the terrible sacrifices, but Vella decides to fight back instead.
There’s a powerful feminist reading one can make here, and also generally of how systems of injustice can hold sway over people, trapping them into a perspective of “well, that’s how it’s always been done”, and how it can be internalised to the extent that the harm that comes from them can be ignored or rationalised, and the need to break that cycle.
Fulfilling the other side of the coin is the other protagonist, Shay, a white boy that has grown up on his own on a spaceship programmed to serve his every need and to coddle him. When the game begins, he’s grown tired of this and looks for a way to escape the system and make a real difference.
The narrative continues to explore the themes of personal fulfilment and unmasking systems of power with its protagonists and the NPCs. The protagonists reside in different worlds, but as the player advances their storylines they can begin to see the connections between them and use that to get them to help each other out.
Broken Age has great twists, hilarious dialogue with brilliant voice-acting, funny and clever puzzles, so much charm, lovely characters, and looks and sounds absolutely beautiful with its painted imagery and orchestral score. And through it all, an excellent philosophy of what can be learnt from walking in another’s shoes.
Broken Age is available on GOG, Steam, Ouya, PS4 and Vita, IOS an Android.
(I submit this for Costume Quest)
