At the Fantastic Arcade in Austin last week, developer ceMelusine came by to chat about his trippy indie game Glitchhikers.
Tim Schafer Discusses Grim Fandango Remake At The Fantastic Arcade [VIDEO]
ceMelusine is a mobile developer by day, and like many mobile developers he hasn’t been able to make games that are grim or dark in any way. This turns out to be good for us, though, because it's led to creating some dark games of his own in his spare time, such as this utterly fascinating title.
There were computers set up that let you try out the game for yourself, and there's a real dreamy quality to it that is quite unique. Glitchhikers sees you driving down an endless road in the middle of the night, trying to stay awake. Your eyes threaten to close and you can shift lanes, and look left and right to see the landscape passing you by. As the radio plays and strange visions appear before you, you eventually do pick up a hitchhiker, in a really great and creepy moment.
Gorogoa Developer Jason Roberts Demos His Mind-Twisting Puzzle Game
Then, you talk. You talk about life, you talk about death, you talk about meaning. There's a little bit of a dialogue system where you'll discuss some deep topic with the latest hitchhiker, before they move on to wherever hitchhikers go. You'll consider the statements you make pretty deeply, and perhaps even learn a little something about yourself while playing it.
If any game is a better metaphor for the important of caring about the journey rather than the destination, I haven't found it.
ceMelusine decided “part consciously, part unconsciously” that Glitchhikers should not care too much about you. Not that the game should hate the player, or make you not want to play the game (that would be “douchey”), but something that pushes back in ways that games usually don't. For instance, sometimes when you try to steer a conversation in a different way, the hitchhiker will stop you and talk about what they want to instead. Why should you get to dicatate the conversation?
He also talked a bit about the issue of pricing games, especially with the pricing of mobile games, when everyone wants things to be a buck or free. For Glitchhikers he's tried an interesting experiment- the game is absolutely free, but you can choose to pay up to ten bucks for the premium edition. The game is exactly the same either way, but the premium version offers the soundtrack, which is actually pretty incredible- dreamy and trippy and the perfect complement to the game.
But as for finding the game anywhere else, you might be out of luck.
“I don’t want to be on Steam, I don’t want to be on Humble,” ceMelusine said, mentioning that he fully understands that those are “words I might eat.”
For now, he seems content making weird, personal games for everyone. He’s looking into making a series of short games that he will roll out over a year, trying to sell it more like music. The first title in this series, Oracle, is available now for a mere two canadian dollars.
Glitchhikers is completely free to download on PC and Mac. It takes about 15 minutes to complete and will captivate you far more than most games you'll play this year, so don't pass it up and cough up a buck or two if you enjoy your time.
For more from the Fantastic Arcade check out all of our coverage right here.