April 2019 Playthrough - Limbo & Inside

[GrayGhost81]

When wall of text?

Well........

Honestly psyched to go deep on this one myself. I love games that have a bunch of "theories" about them.

[singlebanana]

When wall of text?

Well........

Honestly psyched to go deep on this one myself. I love games that have a bunch of "theories" about them.

Same, but I'm probably going to stay away from reading theories before the call. I kind of just want to propose mine.

[GrayGhost81]

When wall of text?

Well........

Honestly psyched to go deep on this one myself. I love games that have a bunch of "theories" about them.

Same, but I'm probably going to stay away from reading theories before the call. I kind of just want to propose mine.

You may want to avoid this thread too then. I went whole hog on all the theories and am going to dish freely about them here.

[douglie007]

Well finished Limbo, some fun puzzles, but lacking in much story... best I can get is the girl is morning over my death.[img width=700 height=340]https://uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20190412/2ab540e816f69c35bad1cbfc27e7faf4.jpg[/img]

[singlebanana]

Is she, or are you in "Limbo" for something you've done to her?

[GrayGhost81]

Or is she in the same plane, waiting for you?

[douglie007]

All I know for sure is this game company hates little boys and wants to kill them a lot.

[Crabmaster2000]

Played through Limbo 2 nights ago and have been sitting on it thinking it over since then. I went into the game expecting the experience to be something like Journey for me. With both of those games I played them far later than their initial release and had known them by there reputations, indie darlings with unique art styles and impactful experiences. While I didn't care for Journey myself I'm really glad I played it both to add to my gaming knowledge as well as play something quite unique. I felt like going into Limbo that would be my worst case scenario: maybe not a game for me, but something that was at least interesting and thought provoking for a few hours.

Unlike my time with Journey, I'm really struggling to find something nice to say about my time with Limbo. I don't know if there is an aspect to Limbo that I really enjoyed. The first thing that stands out is the art style. It just reminds me of a generic early 2000s flash game. Just really bland and lifeless. Not a world I want to spend time looking at. So maybe the sound design will make up for that....... this may be my least favorite sounding game of all time. The lack of music just makes the whole thing also feel lifeless and generic and flash game-like. And the effects that are there are either gross (pulling the legs off of a spider/getting impaled or crushed) or quite annoying (water constantly running/saw blades spinning/rainfall/electricity running/etc). To tie into the trifecta of awful the games controls are pretty sub par. I've played an insane amount of platforming games in my time and if there is one thing I hate in a platformer (puzzle or action) it's sluggish floaty characters. I never felt like I had the precision I should have with my boy. There were a few moments where I also felt like I totally should be able to make jumps or climb ledges that I didn't make. That's a big issue for me in any type of platformer, when I screw up I want to be able to take ownership of my mistake and improve, not make the same mistake multiple times in a row because I can't properly judge my characters abilities especially after more than an hour with this character with the same abilities I started with.

That's all the technical/mechanics side of the game though. What about the story, the atmosphere, and the puzzles? Judging from Grayghost81s earlier posts is sounds like the story is up for some debate, which makes sense because I have no idea at all what this was supposed to be about. That's the biggest thing I've been stewing on for the last couple days. I think I've come to the conclusion that I just didn't care enough about any part of the game while playing to get invested enough to even come up with my own idea or interpretation. No single area of the game pulled me in and told me to care about the character, the world, the situation he was in or the mystery girl.

Like many of you guys I've played a ton of games filled with violence over the years, this one sticks out to me though for it's violence. The way the violence was portrayed in Limbo even more reinforced to me this was in the style of an early flash game/video where a young designer would just be gratuitous because it was "edgy" or "cool". From watching your boy slowly drown and see the life leave him to getting stuck with arrows to getting dismembered by a saw blade it never seemed to fit the feel of the rest of the game's vibe to me. Did these kinds of things stick out to anyone else or is it just me?

The last thing I wanted to talk about was the puzzles, if they can even be called puzzles. If I had to rename Limbo based on the type of game it was I'd called it Trial and Error the video game. Nearly the entire game was just a series of me walking forward until I died and then walking the exact same path but now knowing that I had to jump over this thing that was going to stab me that I couldn't have possibly known about the first time. There is often no chance of reacting to or the game teaching you to watch for certain things in this game. "Puzzles" like the giant crushing mechanisms with buttons where the first one you have to avoid the button teaches you not to jump on a button or you get crushed. That's a fair design....until the very next button you get step on gets you crushed if you step on it and you have to avoid that one. That's just sadistic design that is not fun to interact with and happens throughout the game.

I'm grateful that the game was short and only took me about 2 and a half to 3 hours to conquer. It's not something I ever plan to revisit. I didn't kill any anticipation for Inside both because I also have really no expectation for it and because it can really only go up from here and my hope is that the developers improved a great deal from game to game.

[zophar53]

Wow, it's really interesting to hear the differing opinions on Limbo. I enjoyed nearly every aspect of it.

The story is certainly minimalistic and ambiguous, arguably to a fault. The boy is supposed to be searching for his sister, but they don't really explain that to you in the game; I think it was only in the marketing materials that that was ever stated. To me though, going in with only that barest of knowledge, the atmosphere of the game completely drew me in. The color palette made everything look scary and the shades of gray and black were really effective for me. And the not-music worked with the visuals really well. I started to think of it more like a movie score, occasionally coming in to add tension or urgency to a particular situation. It creeped me out whenever it would start up. The whole vibe of the presentation gave me the feeling that this place isn't just dark, but also cold and lonely. I got the sense that this is a place where people are not meant to be (which speaks to many of the interpretations of the ending).

I didn't see the deaths as particularly violent; they're not really bloody or gory, but they are definitely disturbing. I didn't take this as the developer being gratuitous, I saw it more as just one more thing that emphasized this place where the boy has found himself is not a friendly place. It's harsh, things are out to get him, and every time he died it sent a chill up my spine because it always looked more brutal than I would normally expect from a game of its kind.

As I mentioned above, I agree about the trial and error nature of the puzzles. They weren't too difficult once I figured out how each section worked, but the initial discovery of what each section wanted of you was a bit unforgiving.

The first time I played this game, I saw the story a couple of different ways.

Spoiler (hover to show)

I saw it as a progression from nature to a more mechanical, industrial environment, resulting in gradual disorientation and a tragic end. Kind of a metaphor for a society getting more and more advanced until it loses control and destroys itself into a post-apocolypse. I saw it as a weird dreamscape the boy wakes up into (possibly from his death, since he opens his eyes and sits up at the start of the game), and was left to wander alone for his lost sister in some weird purgatory realm. Near the end of the game when you get into the gravity changing, it struck me how the closer you get to the end, the more it takes control away from you, until the gravity shifting is happening automatically and you just have to time your jumps. In that sense I saw the final jump in the game as a darkly beautiful moment when you basically have to just let go and take a leap of faith into the unknown to complete it. But when you break through the barrier only to land back where you started, and find what is presumably your sister....it's an ending that really got my imagination going, which is rare for me. The fact that the game cuts away right as the girl starts toward you didn't make me feel any better about things. Is she glad to see him? Is she not necessarily his sister anymore in this spirit-like world and isn't going to welcome him like we want her to? Does she even see him for who/what he is, or is she still in the land of the living and either can't see the boy or sees him as a spectre? I didn't really come away with a clear idea of things, but almost every interpretation I was able to come up with was equally haunting.

Since finishing it for the first time I've looked up a bunch of ending interpretations. It's worth noting the developer hasn't ever really said what the correct interpretation is, at least not that I could find. I think the idea that the boy is dead is pretty widely agreed upon. If feels right giving the presentation and the fact that his eyes are glowy pin-pricks. I didn't notice at first that the place where you initially wake up (and end up in) is below what appears to be a tree house. The idea of the boy and his sister trying to find each other in the afterlife, but are unable to do so because they're not on the same plane of existence or because he died and she didn't, it's emotional and unsettling, and I think that's what this game is going for in its atmosphere. That might be the interpretation that feels the most "right" to me, but the idea of the big window at the end being a metaphor for the boy (and possibly his sister as well) dying in a violent car crash is fascinating as well

I love Limbo in the same way I love movies that are similarly vague. They spark my imagination to the point where I can't stop thinking about them and puzzling through all the different meanings. It's the kind of thing that invites conversations I love having, where there are no clear answers.

[Pam]

Limbo is a game I thought was great the first time through. But playing through it again it had lost a little of its charm. Initially the silence and emptiness of the world is quite effective but as I went through it I felt like that started getting a little dull. Similarly, the somewhat shocking death scenes were very effective at first but by the 12th time you see the boy get cut up by a buzzsaw it starts to feel excessive.

I enjoyed the puzzles more in the 'natural' environments as opposed to when they get more mechanical. The puzzles I alluded to really stumping me were:

Spoiler (hover to show)

- One that involved going off the assumed path and backward to get another box you needed to progress down the road.
- The one where you had to use a magnet and a lever to get two large boxes into the correct position (one up, one down). Even after I got this I honestly didn't understand how the puzzle worked.
- Also, proving my terrible memory, near the end there seems to be a leap of faith where there's nothing to land on. I jumped and fell a dozen times before I noticed the arrow that you're supposed to hit as you jump by it to change the gravity. Once I got this I remembered how this also stumped me the first time.

I did really like the very last puzzle though.

Story theories

Spoiler (hover to show)

As for the story, I always sort of took it at face value that the boy was dead and in purgatory. As for how he died, it could be a car crash, signified by crashing through the glass. But also when you get to the end and find the sister they're under a tree house. In the credits you see a shot of this same tree house but there are flies buzzing around where both characters were standing. Maybe one or both of them fell out of the tree house?

I also kind of wonder (spoilers for the game Braid here)

Spoiler (hover to show)

I wonder if the story is something similar to braid. You think you're going after the sister (Princess in Braid) to save her, but actually she's running away from you. When you find her she doesn't seem to be all that happy to see you. Maybe you did something bad to her or were the cause of her death.

I started Inside and am finding it much more engaging when comparing them directly.

[zophar53]

Story theories

Spoiler (hover to show)

As for the story, I always sort of took it at face value that the boy was dead and in purgatory. As for how he died, it could be a car crash, signified by crashing through the glass. But also when you get to the end and find the sister they're under a tree house. In the credits you see a shot of this same tree house but there are flies buzzing around where both characters were standing. Maybe one or both of them fell out of the tree house?

Spoiler (hover to show)

The buzzing flies was something else I overlooked the first time I played this, but yeah, it feels like that is a big piece to the puzzle. I've also seen theories that suggested there was some abuse of the children going on in their life, and some of the various traps throughout the game hint at that violence. This made me think of that old movie Radio Flyer, where the kids build a plane thing out of their old wagon so the younger brother can escape their abusive step-father. Maybe that's why they fell out of the tree house; maybe they were hiding or trying to escape a danger. I tend not to like thinking about that interpretation though. The game is already dark enough as it is. Adding abuse into the mix makes it even more sinister.

I also kind of wonder (spoilers for the game Braid here)

Spoiler (hover to show)

I wonder if the story is something similar to braid. You think you're going after the sister (Princess in Braid) to save her, but actually she's running away from you. When you find her she doesn't seem to be all that happy to see you. Maybe you did something bad to her or were the cause of her death.

That's an interesting comparison, to Braid. It makes sense though, that interpretation. The ending of Braid hit me really hard, but the circumstances around me playing it were pretty unique, so my thoughts on it are more complicated.

[Crabmaster2000]

Played through Inside last night. Had a much better time in nearly every way than I did with Limbo. Also took about 3 hours to beat in a single sitting and didn't overstay it's welcome. The controls on Inside also felt a bit floaty, but despite that there wasn't a single moment in which I didn't make a jump/climb/grab that I felt I should have. Any mistakes were my own fault. I like the look and style of inside a lot better. Still not my favorite art style around, but far better than the flash animation of Limbo. The minimalist, dark and gloomy 3D environments with a small splash of color and light was pretty cool at times.

The puzzles in this game were actually puzzles! None of them were ever overwhelming and just enough to keep me engaged in the game. I really liked the ones that involved interacting with the background of the game and the ones that involved recruiting other people via the helmet and using them to help you move objects/climb up to things/open doors/etc. Felt good to have a posse running around with you.

I got a lot more into the atmosphere of Inside too. Those dogs gave me strong Resident Evil vibes and the creepy "ring" girls in the underwater sections were pretty terrifying enemies. But there were also a fair amount of moments that were intriguing, cute, and triumphant and not just all straight spooky and tense. I got really worried early on that the game was going to make me grind up a bunch of sweet little baby chicks for some reason and was quite relieved to have them all survive the puzzle to knock the hay bail down. That happened really early in the game and was a great way to play with my expectations that I had from my time with Limbo where everything was all violence all the time. Speaking of the violence I didn't find it nearly as jarring as I did in Limbo. The deaths were far far less frequent in this game and only a few were as brutal and even when they were they seemed to fit the scenario. Of course getting ripped apart by ravenous dogs is going to look a lot more intense than getting shot or falling from a high ledge.

This was a world that I was very interested in as well. I did want to know who this boy was, why was he in this situation, where was he going, how did people end up like this brainwashed zombies, who where the people controlling them, where the zombie-people made that way or did they used to be normal, why were some people helpful to you and some violent towards you, why did that one creepy underwater girl save you while the rest tried to destroy you, do the zombie people feel or think, where/when does this take place, did you die at the end or are you simply enjoying a bit of freedom, what are the orb-like things that you disable to get the trophies in the game and what is there purpose. I had so many questions while playing and every new area opened up more.

And I have to say that the final sequence in this game is bonkers. At no point did I see that coming and I loved every second of it. Such a bizzare concept with equally weird controls and physics to match it. My son and his friends got home from school just as I was at this point of the game and were all fascinated to watch and kept asking questions that I just couldn't answer. I had a dumb smile on my face from the second you enter that final water tank until the credits rolled. It was a great deal of fun to play the last 20 minutes of this game.

One of my favorite things about Inside was the changes in tone. At first it seemed to be very much like Limbo in the sense that you just feel incredible powerless and are just trying to survive as long as you can until your inevitable death or capture. But at many points in this game I found myself feeling very empowered and capable and to switch back and forth between those two feelings was really great. When you first steal the submarine-like device I felt invincible while exploring for a while, then those underwater ladies eventually removed that sense of safety. While exploring by myself I was always leery of any potential hazard, but when I had a group of mind controlled people by my side to help catch me from big falls or to work in unison to open a heavy gate I felt very strong. It was the same with the puzzles too. For example when I entered the area with the background explosions that caused me to die simply from being out in the open I felt very weak, but they simply give you a sliding metal door to shield you from the explosions as you progress and I had that sense of safety in the same area. And how you feel from being hunted at the start of the game to smashing through walls like they were paper at the end was pretty jarring, but in a great way.

I'm glad I played Inside despite my dislike of Limbo. It was a very cool experience and as someone who almost always feels like they don't connect with these "indie darlings" it was nice to finally find one that hit the sweet spot for me. This is one I could see myself returning to down the road both to play that final sequence again and to see if I can and deactivate all of the hidden devices in the game.

EDIT: also forgot to mention that I dislike the sound design in Inside as much as I did in Limbo. I really don't like listening to these games.

[Crabmaster2000]

One thing I realized I forgot to mention that drove me nuts about Inside was it wouldn't let me use the D-Pad! Limbo you could use either the D-Pad or the Analog stick, and even though Inside isn't a 3D environment they cut that control method out. Not fair!

[singlebanana]

Well, I finished the game Inside last night.  While I enjoyed both games very much, I can tell that Playdead's latter release is a bit more polished than its predecessor. But that's the point, right? No developer wants to intentionally take a step back and therefore, improvements are typically made. Having said that, I agree with a lot of what Crabby said about this game and I think the things that really make it work better are the story, and the way it is segmented.

In Limbo, the story is very vague, to the point where you have to make your own interpretations. However, Inside gives you much more insight into what is going on in the game, but still never really makes it clear cut.  While I would deem Inside a futuristic, dystopian game, there seems to be an inkling of "history repeating itself" with a few nuances here (I'll go into more detail in the podcast). As a result, you still have that WTF moment at the end of the game and think about it days later, but the story fills a bit more satisfying and well-rounded.

As I mentioned previously, I really think that the segmenting of Inside makes it work better. While Limbo is a singular black and white dreamscape full of traps and puzzles, Inside is a vast environment that differs throughout.  For instance, you begin in a woodland setting and make your way into a steel laboratory/"processing" center and eventually

Spoiler (hover to show)

back out again for the rescue??

. Along the way, you traverse forests, farmlands, factories, underwater, and sound blasting levels, etc. Each environment takes on a different feel and creates a different set of challenges, which get more and more difficult....until later.

Like Crabby, I really LOVED the last 20 minutes of the game. It's so weird, f@#ked up, goofy, and fun. It's almost like the game turns into a Monty Python skit.  Plus, there are very few puzzles and little to no aggravation, which you experienced up to that point.  This is such a great way to end a game and I wish that more developers would take note. It's funny, but for me, this only works in a game like this. If the game had boss fights and the last boss was a pushover, I would certainly feel cheated. Not here though.  

I will have to disagree with the opinions on sound design once again. In Limbo, sound was limited and I feel that this gave the game that dreamscape quality I felt the developers were probably going for. Although it had no soundtrack to speak of, I think it really fit the mood of the game. Similarly, Inside was more about sound effects than soundtrack. Again, it really works for me. I love the grotesque sounds of the game, the loud rumblings of the machinery, and the silence present in a game, which is primarily based on stealth and infiltration.  I just think that an overbearing/blaring soundtrack would obtrusive here and what the developers have done only works to heighten the mood. I'm not trying to insinuate that most people think that every game needs a soundtrack, but I think that the lack of one is an acceptable artistic choice and can make a game even more powerful and thought-provoking.  I believe this to be the case with Limbo and Inside and I applaud Playdead for going against the grain with this choice.

Like Crabby, I am really glad that I got to play both of these games, since they are ones I will remember for years to come.

[douglie007]

I enjoy the puzzle in both of these games, I didn't finish inside (I'm in the submarine)  but I do like how the same and different the two games are.