The Unfinished Swan
| The Unfinished Swan | |||
|---|---|---|---|
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| Studio |
Giant Sparrow SCE Santa Monica Studio |
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| Publisher | Sony Computer Entertainment | ||
| Senior Developer | Ian Dallas | ||
| Erstveröffent- lichung |
October 16, 2012 ( PlayStation Plus ) October 23, 2012 |
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| platform | PlayStation 3 , PlayStation 4 , PlayStation Vita | ||
| genre | Adventure | ||
| Game mode | Single player | ||
| control | Dualshock 3 , PlayStation Move | ||
| medium | Download | ||
| language | u. a. German | ||
| Age rating |
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The Unfinished Swan is a computer game developed by the Californian independent studio Giant Sparrow for the PlayStation 3 console and published in October 2012 by Sony Computer Entertainment as a paid download on the PlayStation Network . In October 2014 ports for PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita came out.
The player controls the character, a boy named Monroe, from the first person perspective through an initially completely white world that can be colored by shooting black colored balls. The Unfinished Swan already received a lot of attention for an indie game from the trade press in the development phase and received mostly positive reviews. The innovative game concept and the artistic graphic style were particularly praised.
action
Ten-year-old Monroe's mother is a painter who, however, has never completed any of her paintings, and when she dies the boy feels just as incomplete. Since he is only allowed to take one of the pictures to the orphanage, he decides on his mother's favorite picture, the unfinished swan . When the swan disappeared from the painting one night, the boy follows his footsteps into a surreal world that is initially completely white.
With his mother's silver brush, Monroe can spray black paint and orient himself. Through a garden he comes to a castle in a huge labyrinth and finally to a large city by the sea, always following the swan. Little by little he gets to know the history of this world: It was once created and ruled in perfect white by a king who is portrayed as high-handed and egocentric. Since the king saw only annoying subjects in the people who lived in his kingdom, who polluted and destroyed his perfect world, he finally withdrew to an island alone and painted a house and a wife who presented himself as a female version of himself turned out to be and with which he immediately fell in love. The Queen painted pictures that she left unfinished, but shortly before the birth of her child she suddenly disappeared and had only taken one of her pictures and her silver brush with her. The king, who could not explain this, stopped painting and nine years later he wanted to create a huge monument of himself as his last legacy. This too remained unfinished and the king was caught in his dream.
When Monroe reaches the island and finally the unfinished monument, the king wakes up and lets the boy share the story of his life. He is a lonely and exhausted old man who never succeeded in accomplishing or achieving anything in his life, but who nevertheless enjoyed his ideas and creations. Finally he gives Monroe his brush. Back in his world, the boy completes the image of the swan.
Gameplay
The perspective and the controls of the game correspond roughly to those of a first-person shooter . The character can be moved in all directions with an analog stick of the gamepad and rotated with the other. With a button you can shoot balls of paint or, in some sections of the game, drops of water. A small circle mark in the middle of the screen serves as a target aid. Since the liquid moves physically correctly on a trajectory parabola , the range is not too great. The character can also jump and climb ladders or vines, for example. As an alternative to controlling with the gamepad, PlayStation Move can also be used as an input device.
The Unfishined Swan is divided into three chapters, which differ significantly in the gameplay . In a short fourth final chapter, all game elements are taken up again. In the first chapter, the aim of the game is to color a completely white game world in black so that orientation is possible. In the second chapter, the character can splash water and the essential element of the game is to use the water to make tendrils grow and to climb along them. In the third chapter, which takes place mainly in a dark forest, the aim is to activate luminous fruits with the color. If the character is in the dark for too long, it will be attacked by spiders. In addition, in some sections of this chapter, any platform can be created with the color, thus enabling further progress.
There are also balloons hidden in the game world that can be collected by shooting at them. They serve as currency to buy extras and improvements in the game menu, such as: B. a device that shows nearby balloons, or automatic fire for the color. Sometimes there are golden letters on the walls, which after shooting open a page in the style of a picture book that tells or deepens the story.
reception
Reviews
The Unfinished Swan received a largely positive response from the critics : According to Metacritic , it achieved an overall score of 79 out of 100 points out of 66 evaluated reviews. The average rating for the GameRankings website is 80.70%.
The IGN website gave the game a 9.0 / 10.0 rating. Reviewer Greg Miller described The Unfinished Swan as "nothing short of spectacular". The game is quite short with about two hours of playing time and does not offer any real challenges, but its real beauty lies in the fact that it tells a story that introduces new, varied game elements with each chapter. Above all, the beginning section with the completely white world is breathtaking and fascinating (“breathtaking and intriguing”).
Benjamin Schmädig from 4Players was much more critical of the game. He, too, described the gameplay of the first chapter as “unique” and “the most exciting discovery” that he “had experienced in a long time”, but stated that overall the various game elements would not fit together. In particular, he criticized the lack of clever puzzles and challenges. Although the story is lovingly told, it “does not do justice to its claim to be a meaningful metaphor”. The magazine awards the rating 78%.
At the same time, Carsten Görig from Spiegel Online saw himself as “beguiled and disappointed” . The game looks great, but the main problem is with relying too much on its eye-catching aesthetics. Since there were no real challenges, a good idea turned into a “short but ultimately boring game”.
Prices
The Unfinished Swan won two awards at the British Academy Video Games Awards 2013 in the Game Innovation and Debut Game categories ; in another category, Original Music , it was nominated. The game also won a Game Critics Awards : Best of E 3 2012 award for Best Downloadable Game .
Web links
- Official site at Giant Sparrow (English)
- Official site of the game on PlayStation Network
- The Unfinished Swan at MobyGames (English)
Individual evidence
- ↑ Achim Fehrenbach: The Unfinished Swan: A first-person shooter with color instead of weapons. In: Zeit Online . Retrieved February 16, 2014 .
- ↑ Dean Takahashi: The explanation behind the ending of the Unfinished Swan (interview part 2). In: VentureBeat. Retrieved February 17, 2014 .
- ↑ Jim Sterling: Review: The Unfinished Swan. In: Destructoid. Retrieved February 16, 2014 .
- ↑ The Unfinished Swan. In: Metacritic . Retrieved February 18, 2014 .
- ↑ The Unfinished Swan. In: GameRankings. Retrieved February 17, 2014 .
- ^ Greg Miller: The Unfinished Swan Review. In: IGN Entertainment . Retrieved February 16, 2014 .
- ^ Benjamin Schmädig: Test: The Unfinished Swan. In: 4Players . Retrieved February 18, 2014 .
- ↑ Carsten Görig: Alluded to: “The Unfinished Swan” beguiles and disappoints. In: Spiegel Online . Retrieved February 16, 2014 .
- ↑ BAFTA Games Awards 2013. Accessed February 17, 2014 (English).
- ↑ 2012 Winners. In: Game Critics Awards . Retrieved February 17, 2014 .