Let me tell you about “Thomas Was Alone”… This was probably the best game I’ve played this whole year, and in some regards, in the last few years!
Yep, I’ll let that sink in…
First of all, I’ll flatly state that although I like indie games, I’m not much for artsy-ones (they feel pretentious and empty, like “The Path” and “Passage”), or the usual minimalist opus (to disguise the fact that they’re lacking in graphical skills)…
But, although TWA is a bit artsy and minimalistic, it’s the exact opposite of pretentious and the minimalism doesn’t seem to be there to hid the lack of graphical skills, but as an aesthetic choice.
But what makes the game so great, you might ask? Well, the game itself is very nice… You control rectangles with different abilities, sometimes more than one in a single level (you can swap between them). Some of them can jump higher, but are too tall to pass through certain places, another acts as a trampoline and so forth.
So, you got a nifty, very well designed platformer… but there’s hundreds of well designed platformers out there, what makes this one so special?
The writing and the narration… Mike Bithell does an extraordinary work in fleshing out rectangles, creating an emotional bond between them and the player that’s surprisingly strong… Someone should force David Cage play this and learn that you don’t need high polycounts or fancy shaders to get that illusive connection in place!
In fact, I haven’t felt such a strong connection to characters in games since I played “I Can Hold My Breath Forever”… There must be something in the “child-like innocence” both of these games display, while having good gameplay mechanics and just showing enough of the story that you add the rest mentally or wait for the conclusion to find out about.
Final note to the artistic side of the game… at first it looks very minimalistic, but everything in the game is really very cared for… the skewed levels, the way text blends in the scenario, etc…
So, definitely grab this one, it’s a real work of art… 10/10