Month: June 2017

Sometimes it is freeing to lay down on soft soil and gaze at the ever-expanding universe above; feeling all the stress unwind from our bones and evaporate into the midst of the night. Granted, such an event is peaceful and relaxing, but busy people often deprive themselves of such natural gratification. Some might even find it outlandish and bizarre that their fellow men and women cluster stars and label them after mythical creatures. But who can blame their dry logic? Yet, matching a gaze across the eternal abyss is not the only method in relaxation. There are so many others…

Yes, here are some video games that relax your senses. Break free from those cigarette breaks, and just pick up one of these titles. Your GABA (a chemical in the brain that induces relaxation and helps eliminate stress) receptors would be very grateful.

Ecco the Dolphin

Published by Sega, developed by Novotrade International, and released in 1992, this game provides a vibrant mesh of the 90’s color palette. There is already another dolphin game on this list (HINT: it is also set under the ocean) and I seriously considered if I should add Ecco the Dolphin, but this game is just too brilliant not to add on this list. So voila! Going back to the color scheme, at times it may look pretty harsh to the eyes – it is from the 90’s – but overall Ecco the Dolphin’s gameplay would unease and relax the high-strung mind.

The main protagonist is a bottle-nosed dolphin, Ecco. Players will plunge into the ocean using Ecco as he traverses the depths, looking for the root of the storm that killed his fellow sea friends. Feel free singing to fellow clams and other sea creatures, and back-flipping in the air to your heart’s content.

Pokémon Snap

What is it with me and Pokémon? No, what is it with us and Pokémon? Ever since Nintendo announced that we can collect and pocket our own monsters, everyone jumped the wagon. It became a global addiction-pandemic, and that is why a Pokémon game is on this list, just for the sake that it has caused a macro obsession… right?

With that said, Pokémon Snap takes home the cake for its peace-loving ways. What is so different about Pokémon Snap is its method of catching Pokémons. Instead of enslaving these creatures, Pokémon Snap uses a camera to capture images of them in their natural state. My heart flutters whenever I snap a picture of Butterfree, I can almost empathize with the Pokémon as it quietly exclaims its liberty that it is free from buttery human hands. And yes, our hands are buttery, okay maybe not butter, but our skin produces natural oil (Sebum) to keep us moisturized.

Blueberry Garden

Winner of the Seumas McNally Grand Prize for ‘Best Independent Game’, at the 2009 Independent Games Festival, scoots in Blueberry Garden. It also won ‘Best Innovation’ for the 2008 Swedish Game Awards. Alas, this delectable montage of awesomeness is developed by Erik Svedäng, and personally, I feel that its soundtrack made Blueberry Garden even livelier. If it were not for Daduk’s composing prowess, this game would have been just another independent game amongst Steam’s stockpile of undeserving games.

If you want to soar through the sky and forget about your worldly troubles, then pick up Blueberry Garden, because when a game does not bother you with its plot and you find yourself playing it regardless, then it must be doing something right. I, for one, did not even get vexed about where I had to go, I just solved puzzles left and right as I led Mr. Pelican-Man through lavender skies and gentle grounds. I also remember dying in this game, and man, they made drowning look like he was sleeping on a tempur-pedic mattress.

flOw

Developed by Thatgamecompany, Jenova Chan and Nicholas Clark originally released flOw as a free flash game in 2006, which I vaguely remember playing back then. Fast forward to 2007, flOw was made available for the PS3, and later on SuperVillain adapted the game and released it for the PlayStation Portable as well in 2008. The free flash version received 100,000 downloads within the first two weeks. Such hits would only mean that flOw is definitively breathtaking or utterly stupid; good thing it’s the former.

Back in the hay days when Nokia phones were shaped like block-sized adapters, there was once a game that thrived within that cellular phone, and it was Snake. The simple concept of Snake is emulated by flOw. In the game, the player starts off as a molecular snake-like parasite – a very tiny one. Once he or she scoffs down other parasites in the cytoplasm, his or her parasite grows another segment; elongating the body until the player ceases to stop playing the game itself. Ultimately, you are the main predator in the game and everything else is prey, and without having to worry about other opposing adversaries, flOw makes for a very relaxing game.

Spore

Usually in most video games (especially in RPGs), they give players a lot of room for customizing their characters, from lime-green beards to ice-blue cataract eyes. But I feel there is always a limit with just accessorizing these characters with physical attributes, a true customization should start from the very root of life: the cell.

Published by Electronic Arts, Spore gives us that option. Now, players have the ability to develop their own species in the infinitesimal biological level. There are five stages in the game: the Cell stage, the Creature stage, the Tribal stage, the Civilization stage, and the Space stage. Each stage has a specific objective, and players must complete this objective in order to advance to the next evolution. Unlike previous games in this list, Spore has a main goal, and that is to reach a super massive black hole and obtain the “Staff of Life”. In the back of my mind, I am starting to think this game is really fitting for anyone suffering from delusions of grandeur or god complexes, then I chuckle to myself because in the end, everyone wants to be their own God one way or another.

You can look forward to more ‘Games that Relax Moods’ in Part II coming soon! Which games relax you reader?

Many gaming communities pride themselves on being “inclusive”. While one can endlessly discuss what that term actually means, I have to chosen to focus on a certain type of inclusiveness: game accessibility – the one that should be way more evident than it actually is. With a quick search on Google, there is no reason to doubt the existence of articles and websites that offer information and measures on accessibility in games. However, I personally was not aware of how extensive this issue was. If you’re in the same boat as me, I encourage you to continue reading.

Recently, a friend showed me a YouTube video of Naughty Dog, PlayStation, and Josh Straub, one of the spokespersons for gamers with disabilities, talking about some of the efforts being made in the video game industry – it was essentially about how these small achievements make a huge difference for these gamers.

“What developers need to realize is that these games do more than just entertain the disabled. First of all, they provide an escape from the doldrums of being disabled. And second of all, they provide a social space where instead of being judged by physical appearance we’re purely judged by the action that we do and the things we produce in the game.” – Josh Straub.

Since there are so few gaming companies out there that don’t acknowledge the problem that not everybody can play their games, I believe there are more people out there like me who are not aware of this.

According to PR Newswire, 20% of casual gamers, that means one in five, have a mental, physical or developmental disability. Keep in mind, we are talking about disabilities ranging between bipolar, dyslexia, blindness, broken arm, and cerebral palsy – in other words, when they made this survey, they had a very wide grasp of the word “disability”. Either way, I still think it is important to acknowledge any type of disability, as it affects in a larger aspect how exactly we perceive games.

An example could be the development of virtual reality, which is a major step forward in the gaming world. However, when we think about the accessibility of said VR, it is not that big of a step. There are many who aren’t able to try this revolutionary way of gaming because of a disability rendering them unable. Furthermore, this does not just apply to this new way of playing games, but also the traditional way too. While this is a subject that one could write a dissertation about, I only choose to highlight some important points.

According to the PR Newswire survey, games relieved disabled gamers of stress, it lifted their mood, and served as a distraction from issues related to the disability. It also functioned as a way to improve concentration and mental workout – each benefit varied from the type of disability. Upon acknowledging the fact that we all live different lives, have different life stories, we therefore obviously play games for different reasons. While many non-disabled gamers might relate to the same benefits of playing a game, and perhaps play games for the same reasons, I think it is important to acknowledge the fact that the same source of outlet has a major difference in accessibility.

“When I turn on a game like Uncharted, I’m not confined to a wheelchair. I’m a swashbuckler treasure hunter like Nathan Drake. That brief period of escape is why accessibility is so crucial, because the more games that offer that, the more people with disabilities will be able to escape and have better lives.” – Josh Straub.

Slowly, but surely, more developers are starting to listen. In a dialogue with Straub, Naughty Dog and PlayStation took what they heard into careful consideration, and started to introduce some important changes. Keep in mind that these are only a few of the many changes they introduced:

• They added a color-blind mode in the multiplayer section of the game
• The camera has lock-on features – this focuses on using only one joystick controller
• Upon pressing down one button, the game will act as though you are pushing it down repeatedly

Naughty Dog should be proud of themselves for stepping forward as a role model when it comes to accessibility, making games available for as many gamers as possible. This goes to show how some video game developers are able to be considerate of their audience, by working towards the goal that every player should receive the same gaming experience. While there are still a lot of developers that could do a lot better in this regard, it’s good to take what we can get at the moment, and help bring the discussion into the light.

In my opinion, the fact that huge gaming companies that work alongside Naughty Dog do not talk loudly enough about this angers me. It creates an unnecessary unfairness that wasn’t meant to be there in the first place. 

As more game developers take into consideration the fact that people require different means of accessibility, the inclusiveness of the gaming community will expand. I think that with the right attitude and awareness, the goal is easily achievable. With further development, games will be available to a wider audience – everybody wins. We would thrive on a community where everybody receives an equal gaming experience. There are so many fantastic games out there: let’s include everybody in the fantastic world that is video games. I will never take for granted the opportunity I have to play any game, however I want, ever again.

You can read more about why and how accessibility matters here. You can also find the AbleGamers Foundation’s Game Accessibility Guidelines here.