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Every now and then you play a game that completely turns your brain inside out. Maybe the plot has multiple incomprehensible layers or the graphics are so bananas that some part of your brain just shuts down. Recursive Ruin was in danger of causing a total cranial explosion. It describes itself as a ‘kaleidoscopic first-person narrative puzzle game’ and the key word there is ‘kaleidoscopic’. Imagine you were shrunk down and then stuffed into a kaleidoscope and you’d have a decent idea of what it’s like to play Recursive Ruin.
It took a bit of an adjustment to get used to it. It was the same story with another key word, ‘puzzle’. So now we’re inside a kaleidoscope with a rubik’s cube. On top of that, we have a tragic story that gradually unfolds. The end result is a strong desire to sit down in a dark room. Recursive Ruin does marry its parts together rather well, though it does start to unravel towards the end.
20 Goto 10
Trying to recount the plot of Recursive Ruin is going to be a losing battle. Let’s try it. A frustrated artist, fighting off the throes of depression and a deep-seated guilt, finds a game disc in his apartment and pops it in. Then a strange mannequin man with a violin and no face tells him that he has special powers. Kind of feels like we can stop the recount there. Through its bizarre imagery, Recursive Ruin touches on some quite poignant themes. There’s a strong feeling of artistic frustration for one, embodied by an artist who’s traded artistic freedom for a steady pay cheque.
It’s a theme that resonated with me personally. I’ve first hand experience of how working a routine job can blunt and squash creative passion. Recursive Ruin doesn’t stop there, though. It also brings up the effects of childhood trauma, and the complicated relationships it causes, as well as the destructive effects of grief. It was handled sensitively too and I found myself quite invested towards the end, even though the protagonist’s slightly janky voice acting did put something of a dent in it.
With all of this going on, you’re bound to end up with something crazy in the graphics department. As you can see in the screenshot above, it’s absolutely bonkers. The key is in the recursion – the world repeats itself ad infinitum. It’s a sea of stark, metallic colours. Shiny whites, blacks and reds. Look to the left and you’ll see the world repeated, complete with an infinite ‘you’s, all staring dumbfounded. It’s as fascinating as it is slightly sickening. It all contributes nicely to the protagonist’s internal struggle. Art, in its most distilled form, that’s trapped in an endless loop, coming back to haunt you.
Man In The Mirror
There’s a tendency for games of this nature (and reviews of the same) to descend into overt self-indulgence. To wallow in the themes while thoroughly boring the audience. The lifeline that links it all together is the gameplay, bringing us to the ‘puzzle’ word in the genre description. The key element is a button that shifts the world around you, which either brings the recursion into focus or pushes it away. You can then interact with the repeated versions of the world. Pushing a cube through a window will result in it popping through the identical window behind you. It’s a little mind melting.
Once you get used to it, it makes for a handful of clever puzzles. The standout was a level with four buildings, each with their own mini puzzle inside, which required you to interact with smaller, mirrored versions of themselves. It was very imaginative and virtually impossible to explain in words. Suffice to say, it made me feel like a clever clogs once I’d figured it out. That said, there aren’t many meaty puzzles to be solved here, with a large percentage being transporting a cube to a nearby eyeball via a bit of casual world manipulation.
I suspect the emphasis is more on the ‘narrative’ than ‘puzzle’. That’s clear from the levels that are just us bumbling around our apartment, talking to our possibly demonic cat. At the start, Recursive Ruin does a good job at blending together its narrative and gameplay but then it starts falling apart. Levels that are just us walking forward start creeping in and there’s an increasing amount of time spent watching abstract videos. Video games have the unique potential to blend interaction and artistic meaning and Recursive Ruin gives it a go. All too soon though, it begins forgetting that we’re holding a controller and starts assuming there’s a box of popcorn there instead.
Try Googling Recursion
I do wonder how much I would’ve liked Recursive Ruin if the central themes hadn’t resonated with me from the beginning. Perhaps the kaleidoscopic visuals would’ve been just sickening, as opposed to fascinating. It’s definitely a game for a certain type of person in a certain mood. If you don’t have the patience for a game that likes to take the circuitous route, then you’ll probably tire of it quickly. I wouldn’t blame you – extended sessions did wear me down – but I do think you’d miss out.
There’s an emotional story at the heart of Recursive Ruin. I wouldn’t call it original but the presentation is certainly unique. At the halfway mark, I wasn’t even sure how I was going to review it. How would you review a film that paused every few minutes to send you down a rollercoaster? The unique aesthetics are paired with some promising gameplay but it never quite digs in deep enough. Best to play if you’re interested in some unconventional narrative. Though I would brace for deep sadness, only alleviated by a few jokes from a talking cat. Lucky sod. Best we writers get is a cat that communicates by scratching the sofa.
