Everything feels alive in a way most 2D games just never capture.Īs incredible of a world as Playdead has built, none of that would be worth it if the game wasn’t so much fun to play. Be it people in the world reacting to you, the baby chicks that crowd around your feet on a farm, or the fish you see swimming in the water. Here however, its full of minute details that breath life into the world. In many games, including Limbo, the setting is just there for the player to conquer and explore. Part of this is due to how little the setting feels like a simple backdrop. Even now I’m still not entirely sure what is actually happening in Inside’s world, but the visuals and feelings it produces will stick with you, long after you complete the game. What begins as dead livestock and lines of people mindlessly marching eventually morphs into things that are much more sinister and strange. Without a single line of written or spoken narrative, Inside weaves a detailed, rich, grotesque, dystopian future. It echoes the same move from nature to industry that characterizes Limbo, but Playdead has gone much further than that. That said, it’s the world itself that is the true character and focus of Inside. Simultaneously, his blank, featureless face makes him look like something out of a nightmare. The boy’s little reactions, how he shies away from bright lights or crouches down when scared, all serve to humanize him. This extends even to animations and character design. Inside’s art hits the exact balance of being absurd, but having just enough reality mixed in to give the game world a palpable unease unlike almost anything else. As muted as they are, the colors and purposeful blandness of certain aspects of the world are more than enough to send a chill down your spine. Trading in the haunting shadows of Limbo for a more varied visual pallet, Inside still manages to keep a similar unsettling air to its art. Soon, without ever needing to be told why, you find yourself in a desperate struggle, trying to stay hidden. Instead of just being set decoration however, the men can move into foreground and chase you if they catch the boy in their flashlights. Cars go by in the background as strange masked men and hunting dogs scour the woods. While the boy is restricted to running left or right, the world itself is still 3D. This should sound more than familiar to anyone that’s played Limbo, but it doesn’t take long for Inside to prove it is a very different game. Not given any indication of what to do, who the boy is, or even what the controls are, you’re given only one open direction to run, and the game continues from there. You start off in a forest as a young boy who drops to the ground. With all of that in mind, it’s therefore stunning just how much mechanical and emotional depth Playdead manages to cram into the game’s short-and-sweet three hours. As minimalist as they come, there’s no dialogue, no text, very little music, and a grand total of three controls: move, jump, and grab. Like Limbo before it, it’s a sidescrolling puzzle platformer. On the surface, there really isn’t all that much to Inside. Simply put, Inside belongs in the select group of titles that both have a clear vision of what they want to be, and execute that vision to near perfection. Though the spiritual successor to Limbo, it improves on Playdead’s last game in just about every way. Unsettling, yet somehow charming, Inside is wholly unique.
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