Forums > Submission Feedback > JANUS2's Braid (XLA) review

Jonathan Blow is the guy who made the game, not a reviewer.

Just a heads up!

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I haven't played braid, and being a devout disliker of Xbox, I probably never will.

Powerful intro to your review, though. Got me interested right from the start.

Note to gamers: when someone shoots you in the face, they aren't "gay." They are "psychopathic."

Yeah, slightly awkward for me, this one. Firstly because Eurogamer is one of my favourite games sites and I know a lot of the guys who write there (though not this one, it has to be said), and secondly - as has been pointed out - the criticism kind of loses its weight when you get the reviewer confused with the developer.

That said, Dan's review was heavily criticised net-wide for most of the reasons you cite and, while I haven't yet played Braid, the piece does sound a little convoluted. I'm just not sure belittleing other people's opinions is the right thing to do in a review, and anyone who says "shut up about videogame narrative" or similar (which I'm not saying you did, as such) tends to get a big virtual slap from me.

Still, you make Braid sound thoroughly interesting and enjoyable, despite your argument that it isn't the second coming. I'd guess that you're probably right in that respect. Didn't Edge give it an 8? They tend to be more measured at the high end of their scale.

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As someone who tends to slip into overly-pretentious and overlong prose from time to time, I greatly enjoyed the mocking. I even went and got you some screenshots.

For us. For them. For you.

I hate the regularity of claims that anything a person didn't quite understand is therefore 'pretentious'. Again, this doesn't necessarily mean you. This review just led me to think of a few bugbears I have about the critiquing of games journalism.

Reviews in review. How meta.

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Keep it up, and I'll start questioning your methods and thus start a new trend of reviewing the reviews of reviews, then we'll have only one place left to go. Apocolypse.

Pretentious writing exists in review sites that aren't afraid to be creative -- it's unavoidable. I can happily point out half a dozen or so of my own works that don't so much hover around this line but have taken a running start and vaulted over it, but that's fine. I think as long as you have a sense of humour about it, so that when the jabs come you can take them with a smile, there's no problem. It's when you start getting defensive and climb onboard your high-horse that you, ultimatly, prove your critiquer correct.

ITT: Two people exchange bugbears while Janus' review is ignored.

For us. For them. For you.

I tend to think as long as you can justify it, you're not making any pretences at all.

Which means I should probably go back to my Thief review, cover it in Kerosine and light a match...

I am overly critical, by the way, Janus. This is a good review. I'd have just scratched off the specific allusions to other people's work.

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As long as this thread doesn't get all its opinions deleted, I think we're on the good side of criticism.,

Note to gamers: when someone shoots you in the face, they aren't "gay." They are "psychopathic."

I hate the regularity of claims that anything a person didn't quite understand is therefore 'pretentious'.

I'm not quite sure if you mean narrative in games or reviewing, but I'll address both.

I'm not suggesting that narrative depth isn't possible in video games. I like Deus Ex as much as the next guy (lame, unoriginal example, I know). I'm saying that the Braid's "depth" is a complete illusion. It delivers a bunch of plot ideas that are so disparate and unconnected that no coherent conclusion is possible without delving into the obscure references and convoluted interpretations that exist on the net. At least it's possible to come to some understanding of Deus Ex or Half-Life or whatever when the credits roll. With Braid you have absolutely no idea of what's just happened when the game ends. This sort of deliberately obtuse story-telling is unacceptable in other forms of media (look at the critical reaction to Southland Tales), so why is it encouraged in video games?

Secondly, I wanted to include quotes from other reviewers to illustrate just how silly the reaction to Braid has been. Maybe that's unprofessional, but then this isn't my profession so I don't have to worry. Pretentious writing is pretentious precisely because it isn't justified. I'm OK, to an extent, with "poetic" writing (or whatever label you want to put on it) when it's supported by reason and logic. I've tried it myself in the past with varying degrees of success. However, I've yet to read a professional review that justifies its hyperbolic praise of Braid's narrative. These reviews articulate a range of vague emotion responses that are simply ridiculous (Braid is "evergreen"? really?). I think that they all jumped on the idea of "emotional depth" without really stopping to think whether the story actually works or means anything. This is a dangerous and empty approach to video game reviewing, especially if it's an ongoing trend.

Having said all that, I actually did enjoy Braid for what it is: an engaging, unconventional platformer with a largely irrelevant story. I hope the review reflects that.

"fuck yeah oblivion" - Jihad

Months later, having actually played the game now, I feel I can form a better response to this review.

Spoilers abound. No, really.

I thought it became reasonably obvious what Braid was about. The story has two main strands, which seem arbitrary to begin with, but they do slot into place. It presents a young man searching for a lost love, and later the story of those who invented the atomic bomb. These are the two ends of the spectrum of what Braid is trying to say: that sometimes we get so caught up in our own personal goals that we lose sight of the bigger picture, which can be disastrous. On the surface, Tim realises that, ultimately, no matter what he'd done, his princess would have fallen in love with someone else. His search for her (and is it even a search? Or is it just his memories playing back, or his mind playing tricks) was always going to be in vain, because you ultimately can't change the outcome. That in itself is a pretty courageous statement to make in a game where the mechanics are all about going back and doing things differently. It's actually a bit BioShock, but Braid has the guts to see it through.

In the last level, we go back and view the events with hindsight, and realise the only reason the princess is "always in another castle" is because she doesn't want you to find her. And when it's at least heavily implied that Tim may have been part of the Manhattan Project that built the a-bomb, that's kind of understandable. But again, Tim lost sight of this. And now he's going to have to live with the fact that his actions, across a broad spectrum of scenarios, led to bad things, for both himself and the wider world. Because no amount of looking back and regretting is going to change what happened.

(Of course, it's also quite likely that the "princess" story didn't happen at all. It's all about Tim's obssessive mind. If we assume the princess to be representative of the bomb, and his search for her to represent his guilt, we can infer that he'd love to go find the bomb and take it back, but ultimately the world has already embraced it, so he never can.)

It's funny, because you state that the story was largely irrelevant to your enjoyment, but it seems so intrinsically linked. Because your final judgement is that it's a good puzzle game with an extraneous and confusing narrative, and nothing more. But it is something more. You could argue that it's not successful because of a multitude of issues with the presentation of the themes, but you can't say it's irrelevant. It's key. If you vibe with the story, you're going to love it; if you don't, you probably won't as much. You didn't, and that's fine, but it seems to do Braid a great disservice to gloss over what was undoubtedly Blow's foremost focus and statement with his game.

What I say now is in no way meant to be a mean comment or a remark about your quality as a reviewer, but it's something I now feel quite passionate about. So apologies in advance if this gets a little ranty (and if I didn't respect your opinion on this sort of stuff, I'd not bother getting worked up about it at all, so take it as a compliment if anything).

As such, this strikes me as an unfathomably ignorant review. Surely the best game criticism attempts to see what makes a game tick, and then analyse it on that basis. This review identifies what makes the game tick, then completely dismisses that facet of the experience. It's exactly the same as reviewing an action game and saying "I hate first-person shooters. It's ridiculous that people are getting so giddy about the gunplay, 'cause all it is is shooting baddies." Okay, maybe that's an extreme example, but it fits under the same banner.

I suppose what I mean is this:

Most games establish their gameplay mechanics then work a story around them. It's usually the story that's fairly arbitrary. If Half-Life 2 had a completely different setting and characters, it'd be perfectly feasible to have the game play out in exactly the same way, because the core mechanics are the point.

In Braid, the story is the point, and I'd argue that the game is largely extraneous. In terms of it being a 2D puzzle-platformer at least - the time-manipulation is kind of essential, but it could be a third-person 3D adventure game and still do ultimately the same thing.

So it's a back-to-front view on the game. I'd say the same was true of my Gears of War 2 review. I criticised that for just being a game about shooting baddies, but ultimately, that's the point of it, and the story is secondary. Here, the point is the story, and everything else is secondary.

So I wouldn't be worked up if you'd analysed the story and come to the conclusion that it was unsuccessful because of A, B and C. I'm worked up because you claim the story is irrelevant. Which just doesn't make any sense to me.

(I also didn't find any of it pretentious at all. What did you find pretentious about it? The fragmented presentation? A whole load of acclaimed narratives use that method, so to pick one out that was criticised seems a bit of a cheap shot. For me, the story was earnest, touching and very human. Nothing arrogant or pompous about it.)

Argh, it did get ranty. Sorry. I love you really. Kisses.

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Braid's "depth" is a complete illusion. It delivers a bunch of plot ideas that are so disparate and unconnected that no coherent conclusion is possible without delving into the obscure references and convoluted interpretations that exist on the net.

This, however, is a pertinent discussion to have, and it's something I've considered myself a few times. The pull-back-and-reveal. Would Braid have carried the same weight if we had known from the start that it's about the guy who invented the atomic bomb? Probably not. But I'm not sure that's quite what you were getting at in your review. If you'd have picked it apart like this, I'd have enjoyed the read a lot more.

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It's funny, because you state that the story was largely irrelevant to your enjoyment, but it seems so intrinsically linked.

As you say, "the game is largely extraneous." I think it's absolutely possible to enjoy the gameplay without enjoying the story. The only way they are intrinsically linked is in the overall ambiance, that one sequence at the end, and possibly the dinosaurs, although they only add to the confusion.

Half-Life 2 is a good example. Although the core mechanics are the point, the narrative is such an integral part of the experience that you really can't separate them (which is why it's acceptable for dagoss to suggest it's an RPG). Otherwise it isn't Half-Life. This is fantastic video game story-telling. In contrast, games like Doom, Wolfenstein, etc. are inter-changeable because the story isn't integrated in the same way. This is why you can say "I hate the story but love the game" without sounding stupid.

In Braid the plot is almost completely irrelevant to what you actually do in the game. The story is "attached." I don't like this story and I don't like the way it's attached to gameplay, but I did enjoy the gameplay. I think this is a valid approach to take, because the division between story and gameplay is so obvious. For me the gameplay is always the focus, otherwise I would read a book. I can enjoy a game with a bad story, but I can't enjoy a good story with a bad game. When a game separates the two in such a distinct way then I find the narrative irrelevant, because games are games first and foremost.

It's exactly the same as reviewing an action game and saying "I hate first-person shooters. It's ridiculous that people are getting so giddy about the gunplay, 'cause all it is is shooting baddies."

I don't think this is the same at all. Braid is a platformer. It's advertised as a platformer. On the website it says "Braid is a platform game in a painterly style where you manipulate the flow of time to solve puzzles." If I was criticising The Path in the same way then I would accept your point because that "game" is obviously not a game and (if you go to the website) this is made clear by the developers. However, from what I can tell, The Path does not separate its narrative from the gameplay in the same way that Braid does. In that sense it is cohesive and attacking the story as irrelevant definitely would be ignorant.

Anyway, I suspect we will have to agree to disagree on this.

"fuck yeah oblivion" - Jihad

Not necessarily. I think I see where you're coming from. And I don't necessarily disagree. Outside of the time mechanics, which obviously play a part in the twist and the overall statement, there's very little connection between game and plot. I think we both just come at that from different angles. Yours is: "Good little platformer - shame they didn't know how to work the story in." Mine is: "Beautiful story - but it's kind of irrelevant that it's a platformer."

I'd concede that both suggest the game isn't doing everything entirely right.

Because, actually, I think I'd give it an 8, as well. Borderline 9, but if I was in a grump mood I'd almost certainly settle for the lower score. If you got rid of the story, it'd be a 6 or 7, though. And that's what I mean - you suggest the story is "irrelevant" to your opinion of the game, but it seems so key. It's our disagreement over the narrative that's shaping our positive and negative stances on the game, so while you could debate about the quality of the storytelling, it seems totally illogical to dismiss it as not being worthy of a mention. It's just so integral.

My main bugbear is a lack of guidence, to be honest. I mean, I'm glad you're not hand-held while solving puzzles, but I got to the end before realising I'd missed loads of game-essential stuff out. I understand why - you can skip bits and come back to them - but it should have been made clearer.

Also: The only way they are intrinsically linked is in the overall ambiance, that one sequence at the end, and possibly the dinosaurs, although they only add to the confusion.
I still think that's like saying "The big twist in Fight Club isn't linked with the narrative structure preceding it." As in, you don't notice the link at the time, but that's the point. That's why it's affecting.

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