E3 2011: Bastion Is All Kinds of Sexy
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From its voice to its visuals, this one is slick
It's been more than a year since anyone from IGN wrote about Bastion, and that's a shame because this game is awesome and people should be talking about it. Trouble is, it can be hard to wrap your head around why this game is cool. You need to see it and hear it because that's where Bastion stands out -- in stills, it just another pretty download, but in action, it's something special.
Bastion Trailer
From developer Supergiant Games -- a studio that works out of a living room -- Bastion starts like most action RPGs: the world's been destroyed, and your character must go through a bunch of trials and environments to restore it.
However, as soon as I began moving around as "the kid," the narrator of this tale began speaking, and he wasn't just talking about the overarching plot of the game. In Bastion, the narrator narrates what you're doing on a moment to moment basis. When I sprinted through the level -- which forms around the kid as he moves in Bastion -- the narrator talked about me taking off and ignoring the surroundings. When I took my hammer and smashed the bejesus out of fruit stands and railings, the narrator talked about me blowing off steam. When I took a left and fell to my doom, the narrator proclaimed "And then, he falls to his death. I'm just foolin'" before I respawned.
Again, this interaction is hard to put on this page. It's an overarching feeling of being sucked into this game. My first instinct in Bastion wasn't to run to the end of the level or beat every enemy; it was to screw with the narrator. I sat there, I rolled around, I fired my crossbow at nothing and did every odd thing I could think of to get some new line of dialogue out of this all-seeing dude (who sounds a bit like Ron Pearlman if you're wondering). Not every action got a slow, smooth description, but when one did, I was enthralled.
Expect epicness in Bastion.
As I ran through the game and picked up new weapons such as a deadly bow and super-spear, it became clear to me why I was digging Bastion so much -- it's a living storybook. When I was a kid and my mom would read to me, I'd imagine I was the character in the story. Here, I don't have to imagine because it's happening in a world designed to look like a beautiful watercolor painting. It feels epic -- with the kid collecting pieces of his wrecked world, finding mementos of his fallen friends, and trying to bring everyone back -- and I'm the star of it.
At a glance, Bastion might not catch your attention with its midnight blue creatures and scarecrow decoys, but given just a bit of time to showcase how visuals, narration and gameplay come together, and I think it'll capture the imagination of most gamers. I know it did mine. Look for it this summer on Xbox Live Arcade and PC.
It's been more than a year since anyone from IGN wrote about Bastion, and that's a shame because this game is awesome and people should be talking about it. Trouble is, it can be hard to wrap your head around why this game is cool. You need to see it and hear it because that's where Bastion stands out -- in stills, it just another pretty download, but in action, it's something special.
Bastion Trailer
From developer Supergiant Games -- a studio that works out of a living room -- Bastion starts like most action RPGs: the world's been destroyed, and your character must go through a bunch of trials and environments to restore it.
However, as soon as I began moving around as "the kid," the narrator of this tale began speaking, and he wasn't just talking about the overarching plot of the game. In Bastion, the narrator narrates what you're doing on a moment to moment basis. When I sprinted through the level -- which forms around the kid as he moves in Bastion -- the narrator talked about me taking off and ignoring the surroundings. When I took my hammer and smashed the bejesus out of fruit stands and railings, the narrator talked about me blowing off steam. When I took a left and fell to my doom, the narrator proclaimed "And then, he falls to his death. I'm just foolin'" before I respawned.
Again, this interaction is hard to put on this page. It's an overarching feeling of being sucked into this game. My first instinct in Bastion wasn't to run to the end of the level or beat every enemy; it was to screw with the narrator. I sat there, I rolled around, I fired my crossbow at nothing and did every odd thing I could think of to get some new line of dialogue out of this all-seeing dude (who sounds a bit like Ron Pearlman if you're wondering). Not every action got a slow, smooth description, but when one did, I was enthralled.
Expect epicness in Bastion.
As I ran through the game and picked up new weapons such as a deadly bow and super-spear, it became clear to me why I was digging Bastion so much -- it's a living storybook. When I was a kid and my mom would read to me, I'd imagine I was the character in the story. Here, I don't have to imagine because it's happening in a world designed to look like a beautiful watercolor painting. It feels epic -- with the kid collecting pieces of his wrecked world, finding mementos of his fallen friends, and trying to bring everyone back -- and I'm the star of it.
At a glance, Bastion might not catch your attention with its midnight blue creatures and scarecrow decoys, but given just a bit of time to showcase how visuals, narration and gameplay come together, and I think it'll capture the imagination of most gamers. I know it did mine. Look for it this summer on Xbox Live Arcade and PC.