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Pathos is a slow, experimental game that follows the story of a boy plunged into an unfamiliar world and trying to get back home.
You can read up on the interesting reaction to this game people had here.
It was made in 48 hours.
Discussion
I loved it when I had to turn the lights off on him. AHHHH!
Nice work.
Wow, that was intense
wtf it just randumly ends?
wow………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
ssssccccaaaarrrryyyy
Oh, it ends rather abruptly.
I would like to see more of this story. I loved the look and feel. Nice work!
Kind of reminds me of Inquisitive Dave flash game, but It made me kinda sad that you couldn’t let him go back before the end. Please make another that continues the story.
Click, click, click. If this is the extent of the interaction you are offering your audience, you seriously need to re evaluate what you are doing.
Wow…I actually kinda liked that. I liked turning out to be the bad guy. ^_^
There is a lesson to be learnt here indeed, but.
You leave no other way. I believe the game would be so much deeper if we had a choice.
The thing got unfunny when I tried not to do what I was told and tried to won by doing nothing and it didn’t work. You forced me into being the bad guy just to see the end. Meh.
The kid is dropped into an alien environment by force, regrets events beyond his control, then gets poked by a shadow with an implication of death.
What have I learned about myself? I learned that choices lack meaning when there is no foreshadowing or apparent consequences, and I have learned that I can share this with people on facebook and twitter!
“It was made in 48 hours.”
Clearly.
Sorry, but I didn’t care for it. The whole thing came off as an extended cut scene you’re not allowed to skip.
Well I can sort of see what you were going for here, but it just doesn’t work.
There’s no weight to it, because there’s no choice, except play or don’t. You can’t decide to not follow the rules, as then nothing happens.
And if you do it just ends without any real end.
Nice try, but you missed unfortunately. It could have been quite a bit more if you’d had a bit more time to flesh it all out.
I liked it. Not every game needs ‘choices’, they just need to tell a story. The story was told, and it indeed was a little creepy and a little sad and a lot awesome. It doesn’t need a sequel, it doesn’t need a ‘did the kid live or not?’, because that’s up to the player to decide. As soon as the screen faded to black I actually pictured the Black Child ripping the Normal Child to pieces. That’s my ending, though, and not necessarily anyone else’s.
I hope Kodmin’s right. That kid deserved it after continuously whining for 15 screens straight.
Not that interactive, but cool design and nice integration of words.
this was not so great….
you peoples should play MONDOAGENCY instead of this
cuz that game rocks
It seems people don’t get that this is a “meta game” and it’s about you forcing yourself onto characters in video games that you never questioned whether they wanted you to make them do these things or not.
Hmm, in “my” ending, the shadow and the kid are joined together to put back together the kid and his soul, which was split from him when he entered the mystery world.
Either that or the shadow was the anti-matter version of the kid and they both exploded violently into the most energetic outburst in the universe.
Think one simple thing would have improved that, on the very last bit, where he falls over, if you could end the game by leaving the screen to the left, again an open ending, but a different one.
Was a little un-interactive, but worked because of its short length.
Wow, I felt so bad for the kid. It was sad to be his monster. Very unique and very moving.
I liked it. For a game made in 48 hours, I think it is fantastic.
I don’t think taking away the choice makes it less meaningful, I actually think not giving you a choice makes it more meaningful. If I had a choice, I probably wouldn’t have done what happened in the end. But because I’m forced to do it, I have to kind of feel what happened in the end…and it was more powerful that way. Sometimes art makes you uncomfortable. But sometimes you have to get uncomfortable to see something in a way you haven’t seen before.
The whole thing was about control, to me. I was constantly fighting the kid for control the whole game—he would stop every so often and I just wanted him to get on with it. And then suddenly at the end, I had all the control…until I didn’t, because I couldn’t let him go. And then I kind of regretted pushing him forward, and chasing him down, but it was too late…I had to keep going.
I would kind of like to rationalize it by thinking that the kid joined with the shadow at the end, because it was a part of him (something kind of like Nega Scott in Scott Pilgrim). But maybe that is just my optimism shining through.
Lovely little piece of digital alchemy. Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about how to use the player/character divide as a tool for self-discovery, and for being such a short and hastily developed game, I think it does amazingly effective job with what it gets across.
Also funny to see how quickly some of the people commenting jump to the conclusion that the shadow is “bad” or a “monster”.
‘Where there’s a monster, there’s a miracle”
- Ogden Nash
“Click to advance a video: The game” would’ve been a more apt name for this. If this is your idea of a game, you should probably turn to making animations or movies, because that is what you just made.
I don’t think any of the negative comments understand that this was just a Ludum Dare piece…
I learnt it’s fun to torture people who whine about everything
If this is an LD48 entry, expand it now into something bigger with more depth.
Ignore the hate this was cool!
@ All the negative comments
Aw c’mon, are you serious?
This game is not about choices or interaction, that’s the whole point!
You are guided, forced to follow the instructions on the screen, there is no option to just go away. You simply have no choice (which could raise a very interesting debate about whether you do have a choice in real life). I mean, could you advance further when you didn’t want to kill the dungeon boss? Could you convince Bowser to give back the princess by conversation? Could you choose kill Alyx and join the Combine? Well, could you?
Personally, I found this game very interesting and also very finished (for a 48h LD entry) and, although it isn’t the only you-don’t-have-a-choice-game, I still think this one was well executed. Also, you’ve found quite a good name for this game if I remember my Old Greek correctely…
Oonsen
I should have made popcorn instead of playing this. waste of time. basically nothing happened.
Really nice little story
I kept trying to go back…but there really is no way, is there? Man, for something made in 48 hours, it’s a nice concept.
Sorry, Bit Battalion.
It seems that most of your audience doesn’t know what the word in this game’s title *means*.
PATHOS.
Think a little further about that, people…
I think alot of people miss the point of this little game beyond just it’s title. You know in your mind that pushing the kid on it only bringing on his demise, force him to move further and further where ever he is, torture him and then finally chase him down. All of that was your actions, not his.
It’s sad people need everything spread out for them with no room for one’s own imagination.
I knew fine well pushing him along was going to end in the lads death, and I still done it… So did we all. Says alot, doesn’t it?
Dialogue is too long when you can’t skip it.
I eventually didn’t really care for this game and kept swapping tabs and continue reading the web whilst the ‘text’ sound was still playing and switched back when there was silence.
I really liked what you had going there. There are 2 fundamental flaws though. The story is great! But it lacks being an actual game: a few mouse clicks and arrow key presses doesn’t really constitute as fun. You need to make it more interactive, and at least slightly challenging to make it a “game” rather than a picture book. The game aspect is essentially flipping pages. Also, after the chase began, I assure you the extent of your audience was hooked, and also the extent of them were probably disappointed when you just abruptly ended the story. I see what you were going for by leaving the audience guessing, but in actuality it just felt kind of incomplete.
On another note…this is Mr Pwnage from stick online. Hi there buddy!
reminded me a bit of the Milgram Experiment
Short but peculiar. 2 paradigm shifts in a few minutes – nice!
1) you’re not that protagonist, you’re a player
2) now you’re a bad guy
Big potential.
Thank you!
By far the best game you guys have brought out. Please continue this story or make more similar they’re really innovative
It was okay, came off as an extended cut-scene, which I didn’t mind too much. However it could have been greatly improved if you weren’t even given an option to go against the game.
ie. in the final scene, instead of even being allowed to turn back and walk away (which I did, but had no effect other than zooming out, forcing me to walk all the way back again towards the kid), you should HAVE to advance on him.
Letting me leave was deceiving and took away from the experience for me. Sure one could take it as the game giving you the false hope of sparing the kid, but forcing you to act upon him. However before that I had never quite felt the game work against me, rather against the kid.
Rant over. I don’t even know what I was on about.
What did I ever did to you. Why did you did this to me? That was not fair.
I loved the game and hope you make more in the series, I like to imagine that the scary guy is the boy just in a parallel universe. I would have like to see him be nice to the boy and then I dunno you’re the expert xx
Well, it is really cool to hear how all of you have taken this game/sequence (choose what you want).
For me, personally, I was waiting for waking him up from a nightmare behind the computer. And it was a methaphorical threat to him, and some kind of becoming aware of his lifestyle.
The atmosphere was awesome. 5*
It’s interesting. I hope it will be more
I fully understand the idea of doing something because you’re told to (I also read about the Milgram Experiment), but this doesn’t give you any choice between moving on and not moving on. I tried multiple times to do the opposite of what the game was telling me to do, with no avail. In that manner, it’s nothing like Milgram (because there’s no choice..you do or the game just sits there forever). I even thought I was getting somewhere in the last scene when I kept moving away (and you get to see more than you would think you could…I’ll leave it at that), but the result was the same. You HAVE to be the bad guy, whether you want to be or not.
I really liked the music, the mood and the premise. There were way too many non-interactive choke points however. I wanted more actual gameplay time – You need to give the player more actual gameplay time to soak in exploration and interaction.
And while I liked the small kid recanting his earlier snotty attitude, but by the end it came on a little thick. (Remember, sometimes less is more!)
Really though, for 48 hours this is pretty solid. Keep up the good work!
This was…. awesome. Maybe it’s just the mood I’m in. The story was great, the visual style was great, and I think the lack of character control was key. Forcing you into one situation helps tell the story. I do feel like there could be a little more, perhaps more depth to the world, to give the player a little more to think about once it’s said and done.
I share my “ending” idea with Odeon.
It’s funny to read the comments and see how many people are angry because they HAD to be the bad guy. It seems as if there wouldn’t be any problem with the lack of options in the storyline if it weren’t for this.
Anyways, I liked this very much. I can’t quite see it as a game, but some kind of thing half way between a game and an animation. I had no choice, like I don’t have when I watch a movie, but the little interaction made it easier to identify with the monster. And THAT plot twist was incredibly cool.
pa·thos [pey-thos, -thohs, -thaws]
–noun
1. the quality or power in an actual life experience or in literature, music, speech, or other forms of expression, of evoking a feeling of pity or compassion.
This game was not supposed to be full of action. It was not supposed to have you make your own choice. Skipping the cutscenes would have murdered it. It’s supposed to have you watch what’s happening to this kid, and sympathize with his unnatural plight. The game actually does this quite well.
I’m not certain if it’s supposed to be an ending where the player is meant to create his own finale, or if there will be a sequel, but I want more! The atmosphere, the music, and, yes, the long cutscenes and gameplay, are rather addictive. I enjoyed Pathos, and will be on the lookout for more.
)
(A couple more things… Hamish Todd, that was part of the cutscene dialogue, not the actual game. Another thing, when antimatter-boy showed up, I was instantly reminded of Depict1.
I tried to make him turn back every chance I got. I tried to make the dark boy leave him alone. Eventually, on the bridge, I walked left (as the anti-boy) and the screen zoomed out. The kid was still on the computer.
make a another if i was him i would fight and ask him but he looks just like the boy so greet him or kill him