Broken Age - Double Fine Adventure!

[Ozzie]

I've played Act 2 with a friend for a few hours now and we enjoyed the puzzles tremendously! Honestly, I think the puzzles of Act 2 are some of the best Tim has ever designed. It was his goal for the player to never hit upon a solution by accident, without knowing why the solution worked, and for us this has worked so far.

Storywise the game indeed wastes potential with clunky exposition and characters who accept their changed situations much too quickly. They act in a rather blasè fashion, every single one of them, to knowledge that radically alters their perspective on things. I think the challenges to their worldviews would have been dramatically valuable to explore, but Tim doesn't go for it, even though illusions and widely accepted falsehoods are a central theme of the story. So odd! Also, I would have preferred the story to remain without unambigious villains since that would have fitted the theme of growing up better (the real world doesn't know clear cut villains, after all). But it's still very good! Certainly gameplaywise it's a lot more complex and inventive than Act 1 made you expect it to be, and the world is still charming and fun to explore. The humor hasn't gone amiss, either. I particularly enjoyed that puzzle with the snake, ehehehe!!! ^^

[Professor Video Games]

But what if you have a working memory and still know what happened in act 1?

 

Hit yourself on the head until you've forgotten.

[SamKD]

I loved the story.  It was ridiculously charming, and the puzzles were satisfyingly difficult.  Only thing I lament is that when looking at reviews of this game on iOS, I remembered why I don't like looking at customer reviews...

[mikemariano]

I finally, finally watched the first episode of the Double Fine Adventure Documentary—more than three years after it was filmed.

 

Everybody who used to work at Double Fine is now dead.

 

But instead of gaping in horror at all now-ex-employees, my biggest focus is on part of Schafer's speech after the end of the Kickstarter campaign:

 

"I don't want to say this is the end of the whole games industry as we know it.  It's not; it's not.  And it's not like a total replacement of all publishers and publishing games.  There's still going to be—there still might be a few games made by publishers after today.  Just a couple games."

 

It's tongue-in-cheek, but Double Fine just put out a huge new adventure game in the same week we learned that Silent Hills is dead.  Video game publishers have spent the last three years getting more and more dysfunctional.  Their churn is more insane than Double Fine's—it's just not as public.

 

When I finally get to play Broken Age maybe I'll hate it?  But it won't be because it wasn't a worthy effort.

[Brett E]

When I finally get to play Broken Age maybe I'll hate it?  But it won't be because it wasn't a worthy effort.

 

I was very disappointed by the second part but part 1 is the best adventure game I've ever played. I'm ok with how it turned out overall because I agree it was a worthy effort and having watched all of the documentary episodes so far I understand and appreciate the passion and hard work that went into the game. Also I'm something of a DF fan and tend to be very forgiving because there's so much I love in their games. Having said that I can't disagree with any of what John Walker said about it: (Spoilers)

[Ozzie]

I didn't read your spoilers since I haven't completed Act 2 yet. I can say so far though that in some ways Act 2 disappointed me, too. Some revelations go in too cliched or expected directions, and the reveal of who the mom and dad AI really are barely makes sense.

Yet, in other ways Act 2 exceeded my expectations. I didn't expect the puzzles to become so complex and inventive, to make me feel so smart for figuring them out and have so much fun while doing so. I can't think of many adventure games that achieved this for me, even though I'm a fan of the genre (for reasons I don't understand myself really). Also it's just a joy to explore the world, to get lost in it, and while the story doesn't quite come together on the macro level, there are still countless little scenes that are priceless. I love what happens when you failed two times to answer Mom's last question:

Vella will go back to Shay's trophy room, take out a pen and piece of paper and draw a chart on it to keep track of all the information to solve the question. I loved that, how the game basically says "you're too dumb to solve this so let me take care of this". You can't access the chart anymore once you click it away, so it's not really practical. I think it's meant to be understood as a hint. But yeah, I loved that, how Vella reacts to the frustration of being unable to answer the question correctly.

There are so many little touches like this that elevate the second Act for me. The puzzle with the tree is an example of a pure dialogue puzzle being actually really good! Can't think of many that are! It is because it's just fun to try out all the options and witness the tree's reactions.

Act 2 is not perfect and it will fool nobody into thinking that it is. And yes, it's rather obvious were it falls short of its potential. Yet, since it still excels in so many ways I can't say that it is anything else than a great chunk of game.

 

Edit: Man, I'm still on such a high from playing Broken Age yesterday. I need to get some work done, dammit! Maybe I should take a walk...

I read some more opinions about the game. People who call the puzzles obtuse or terrible lack a frame of reference, I feel.

[jeremywc]

I stayed up until 3 AM last night playing through the end of Act 2.

 

I still don't think the execution of the writing represents Tim's best work, but I loved the concept and the themes they were trying to hit. I felt like there were some plot points that should have been fleshed out more, but overall it was a very satisfying experience for me. I think the puzzle design was done well. I never felt cheated or saw a solution that didn't feel logical. Every time I'd start to feel frustrated, I'd think of another possibility and run back to try it.

 

I also appreciated the technical decisions they made for the game engine. Everything felt really smooth to me. I've been playing some Wadjet Eye games lately, which I generally enjoy, but man is AGS showing it's age. Ditto for some of the other point and clicks done in Flash. It's so nice to play an adventure game at full resolution with no jankiness or weird UI bugs.

[manny_c44]

Broken Age...I backed at the big box tier and was cautiously optimistic during development, but it's not really for me. Even at the sentimental level, the look and feel of the game is off-putting. Maybe I will get around to act 2 eventually but after firing it up and poking around a little bit I realize I am just not really into it.

[sclpls]

I agree, in terms of narrative arc Act 2 is sometimes off the mark, although I feel like a lot of the moment to moment dialogue is still strong. I would have preferred if the puzzles had been as easy as Act 1, but they didn't bother me. Certainly compared to Grim Fandango, which I replayed when it was released in its remastered edition, nothing felt obnoxious or too obscure. Overall I'm way impressed with how the game came out, and I hope the Double Fine team feels proud about what they accomplished because I think they deserve major props for what they accomplished.

 

I think the game will end up with a fairly mixed reaction just because there is a huge divide in philosophy about adventure games right now with some people wanting all the puzzles streamlined away, and other people wanting the more old school designs. Broken Age straddles the line and potentially offends either camp.

[Ben X]

Goddamn, this is a LOT harder than Act 1! I breezed through the first part, hardly thinking about it, but this is tough. I'm full-on stuck at the moment, at the stage where I'm wandering back and forth hoping something will click in my head!

 

I'm generally enjoying it, but I think I can guess what the major story criticisms will be (have only skimmed this thread since Act 2 release).

[Ben X]

Okay, I wouldn't normally do this, but as I want to complete it so I can fully take part in discussions, avoid spoilers and stay current with the backer experience, I'm asking for hints! Can anyone who has completed it please give me one or two very subtle hints, ideally about whether I've missed something or I'm thinking about things in the wrong way, please?

 

EDIT: here's what I was stuck on that the hints Tanu gave me helped with, along with those hints:

 

Shay - solving the snake problem. HINT: "There's a hint in Shay's Trophy room."

Shay - helping Harm'n'y - "F'th'r should be able to help you and start the real puzzle."

Edited May 4, 2015 by Ben X

[Tanukitsune]

-There is a hint on your snake problem on Shay's Trophy room on Vella's side.

 

-The Hexabot puzzle is the hardest to figure out, have you fully explored the ship on Shay's side? 

 

-F'th'r should be able to help you and start the real puzzle.

 

-Is there a way to travel on the ship faster?

[Ben X]

Haven't looked at your hints yet, as my edited in guesses I think have led me to solve all Vella's stuff. So I'll do that then take one more walk round with Shay and take a look. Thanks!

[Ben X]

Bah, not quite solved Vella. Will keep editing my spoiler text up there as I progress. Still haven't looked at your hints yet!

[Ben X]

Okay, I think I'm about to finish both Shay and Vella. I'm relatively confident that I would have got through it on my own eventually because:

 

The things holding me back were:

not waiting with the snake on me for long enough, which I probably would have ended up doing out of boredom/frustration!

not realising that I could interact with F'th'r while on the ladder because his hotspot overlapped with the cloud. Again, hopefully I would have noticed this eventually!

 

Thanks Tanu, your hints were pitched perfectly!

[Ben X]

Phew, finished it! Sorry for spamming the thread a bit.

 

I really enjoyed the game as a whole - the presentation is superb throughout, music, art, acting. And though there are some hiccups in the writing, I think it was generally very strong. Even if the big stuff doesn't always hit the right notes, the small stuff is always great.

 

I think

the big changes from act 1 to 2 - harder puzzles, sudden swerve into Dune-esque story, loads of exposition at the front of Act 2 -

would actually work better for someone playing it as one full game rather than two acts - it would come across more as a storytelling device than, say, reactions to fan feedback.

 

If this had been developed behind locked doors with publisher money, and only announced 6-12 months before release, I think it would be getting huge amounts of love on the internet right now.

[toblix]

So here's what happened to me: I was determined to play this without looking up anything, and this worked for a while until I got stuck with both characters and spent almost two hours making no progress with either character. My attitude started at "oh boy, this is really working my brain! I can't wait until the next breakthrough suddenly forms in my mind!" and was able to keep that up for surprisingly long, but eventually frustration took hold and I suddenly realized I was super angry at the game. Then, of course, I looked up a thing and got super annoyed as I realized I would never find the solution, because I had spent hours exploring a possibilty space that did not include the actual solutions. With both characters I had at some point made an ass out of you and me regarding a thing, and, even though the next step in both puzzles was right in front of me, I had already excluded them from my mind. The two things were:

 

Shay:

In the cloud town I had decided that the bird with the egg was blocking the path it was next to, and was sure that solving the egg thing would let me proceed up the path.

 

Vella

I never caught the pause icon on the camera system, so I had this whole alternate solution in mind regarding the vacuuming robot thing.

 

In both cases I passed through the relevant screen many times, trying everything except the right thing, and by the time I broke down and looked up the solution, naturally, weak as I am, I just continued doing that at every subsequent hint of challenge; which is natural, because obviously I didn't want to waste another couple of hours chasing wrong ideas just because I had mentally tagged some critical element as non-essential! I don't know what to take from that experience other than that your game should have a good hint system.

[Tanukitsune]

I didn't notice the pause button on the camera either and thought I had broken the game. Before I thought the spillage was caused by the inflatable Shay and since I no longer had it.... I panicked.

[Ben X]

Toblix, that first assumption is especially weird as you were assuming against your experience in Act 1!

[toblix]

Story of my life!

[Bjorn]

I'm almost done with this, but quit playing last night as both the kid and the lady were getting tired, but wanted to see the finale.  I did hit my only brickwall though, figuring out what to do with that snake.  I finally had the lady look up a hint just to see if I would be likely to figure it out on my own.  Nope!  I totally wouldn't have solved that.  Everything else has seemed like it was able to be solved pretty straightforwardly though.

 

My only real complaint right now is that so much of the story has been delivered through a few info dumps, that the actual gameplay isn't really tied to discovery or learning about what's going on.  I felt like in the first half, solving the puzzles, exploring and learning about the world all went hand-in-hand in a way they haven't in the second half.

[mikemariano]

the kid

 

to

 

hit

 

.

[Bjorn]

 

:tup:

 

 

 

Finished it up tonight!  Ultimately I really liked all the puzzles (even the snake in hindsight), except that I could have done without...

 

having to repeat and mess with the Hexipals so much.  That's one of those puzzles where, as a player, I feel like I've proven I can solve the puzzle you've presented me, and now you're just making me repeat it.  And everything about those have a bunch of needless friction, like the time to identify and change the symbols, or having to rewire the robots multiple times if you screw up the ending (which I did multiple times, because apparently I can't make more than one step of progress at a time with these things).   I felt like the hexipals just added like an hour of wasted frustration to an otherwise really good experience. Oh, and I did have to look up one thing tonight, which is that I could use the mallet on the hexipal.  I just totally brainfarted that I should mash inventory items together to see what happens.

 

I think the thing that actually made me smile the most was at the very end...

 

when Vella just kicks the crap out of Marek.  No one has to save her, not even the player.  She's a strong, confident, capable woman who has already overcome so much that she's not going to let Marek stand in her way.  It definitely finishes off with refusing to bite on any of the shitty sexist tropes that would commonly show up in a story like this, like having to have Shay save her at the end or something. 

[SamKD]

Thank you for this.  I had totally forgotten about that song.

 

Is there a collection of Remo's songs from the show anywhere?

 

 

On a note back to Broken Age: I may have missed some of the dialog, but did they ever explain the..

weird head deformations of the larunian people?  And why Shay's parent's didn't have the same grotesque deformations?

[Tanukitsune]

I think it's safe to assume they aren't Lorunian, if they capture children for genes, it wouldn't be too hard to have "normal people" just for this project.