Fatale, Tale of Tales' latest game/art/thing-that-makes-people-angry, is yet another gem. That's not to say it's perfect, just that it does something incredibly interesting, and it's worth taking note of what that is.
Here's the rundown (look away now if you want to approach the game naively). Fatale is a first-person adventure vignette based around the sad story of John the Baptist -- in particular, the part where he loses his head. It lasts around 20 minutes and is broken up into two acts and an epilogue. The first act has you waiting to be beheaded, the second has you floating around as a ghost, and the epilogue has you watching Salome bust some moves.
The art and style is classic Tale of Tales', though I think The Graveyard and The Path probably have more panache. But where Fatale is really interesting is in its approach to the user interface.
First, let me quote from the Readme.txt:
Part 1: In the Cistern
......................
Hold left mouse button, up cursor key or W key to walk forward.
Hold right mouse button, down cursor key or S key to walk backward.
Move mouse to turn while holding a mouse button.
Use left and right cursor keys or A and D keys to move sideways.
Press Space bar to jump (a little bit).
Part 2: On the Terrace
......................
Left click to float forward.
Right click to float backward.
Hold Left and Right mouse buttons simultaneously to stop floating.
Hold left or right button to drag (this if difficult to control on purpose).
Hold middle mouse button to float continuously.
Left click on a light to enter a close-up view (only works after hovering over the light for a while).
Right click to exit the close-up view.
While left dragging, you can enter a close-up view by releasing when the cursor is over a light.
In close-up view: drag to turn.
In close-up view: use cursor keys to pan.
In close-up view: hold middle mouse button to zoom.
Press Space bar for Aureola.
On Aureola: click on collected item (with letters) to enter close-up view (only when holding Space bar).
On Aureola: click on empty slot to point the camera to a light (only when holding Space bar).
Note that you cannot interact with the Aureola when it comes up through hovering over a light or dragging.
Epilogue: In the Sunlight
.........................
Hold any mouse button to zoom.
Move mouse to turn.
What's going on here? Part 1 lasts a few minutes, part two a little bit more, the epilogue is over in no time, they're all played from a first-person perspective, but they have radically different interfaces.
And take a look at how they differ. In Part 1, you can't turn the mouse to look around unless you press the mouse button, but pressing the mouse button also moves you forward. Holding the right mouse button also lets you look around, but you'll be moving backwards at the same time. WASD works as you'd expect, and you can even jump with a spacebar. Part 2 is even messier -- everything is mouse controlled, using strange combinations of clicking and dragging, and there's no WASD, which would have been bloody helpful. And the epilogue isn't much of an interface at all.
As you'd expect, Fatale's schizophrenic interface, combined with other seemingly odd design decisions (which I won't spoil here) has been criticised. I think Lewis Denby from Resolution Magazine articulates it best when he says:
Because for now, Fatale feels like it never quite heads far enough in either direction. As a game, it’s too restrictive and unfriendly to feel solid. As a work of art, it’s not insightful or penetrable enough to leave a lasting impression. Instead, there’s always the sense that Fatale is running on an abundance of clever but incomplete ideas, and technological foundations that are constantly struggling to realise them.
What's perhaps most baffling, at least superficially, is that Fatale isn't breaking any new ground. At it's core, it's a first-person adventure game -- so why have they ditched one of the most successful, intuitive, and well established interfaces we've ever seen?
Well, the answer is that the game is doing something new.
Matters of Perspective
In my mind, understanding the interface is crucial to understanding what Fatale is doing. In Part 1, you play John the Baptist waiting to be beheaded, and by preventing you from looking around unless you're moving forward, you can't help but feel anxious and scared. You find yourself pacing around, staring at walls, and stumbling over boxes. Just looking up at the hole in the ceiling requires you to shuffle around, and when ominous words appear in front of you, you find yourself glancing quickly around and reeling backwards at the same time. Rather than being a limitation, or somehow broken, the odd interface can actually connect you to John.
In Part 2, things change again. You're floating around, unable to grasp anything, constantly pushing yourself to and fro to interact with objects. You're like one of Salome's scarves, and it's fitting that aside from the lights, these are the only things you can influence. Indeed, I've not counted how many scarves are littered around the place, but you may find that you are one of Salome's scarves, rather than John's spirit.
Lastly, the epilogue. It's different again -- hell, you can move the mouse to look around -- but you can't move your body, and your field of view is limited to what's in front of you. Presumably, this puts you in the perspective of Herod while he watches Salome dance (a dance that would eventually lead to John's death) but given what you've just been through, the effect is much more abrasive than it would have been if the scene were a prologue. Again, the change in interface adds to the experience.
There are other little nuggets in Fatale that others will occupy themselves with. Why does Salome have an iPod? Who or what is igniting the lights? But to me, Fatale's most intriguing element is its use of an intentionally disruptive interface to connect you to its story, rather than push you away.
Posts
