Comments on: Indie | Freedom Bridge

By: Jordan Magnuson

Jordan Magnuson — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 03:41:26 +0000

Just wanted to say thanks a lot for this encouraging write-up Fraser. It’s such a huge motivation-booster to read something like this.

As far as some of the criticism in the comments here: I don’t mind it. Freedom Bridge was a small experiment, and if it’s not your cup of tea, that’s fine. I appreciate anyone who takes the time to express their views, whether positive or negative.

Cheers.

By: Desper

Desper — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 08:35:12 +0000

You know, a game doesn’t become good or moving just because a poignant message is flashed at the end. It just means that you’ll read awe and skill into anything that effectively raises a flag telling you to.

Hey, maybe that’s the message of the game!

By: Ben

Ben — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 01:30:05 +0000

“My mum attempted to move out of the field of play and around the fences, unaware really of what she was doing.”

I did the same thing, I don’t think that is just a thing that people do because they don’t understand games. I did it because, “Hey, that looks like barb wire, I’m sure there will be repercussions for crossing it.” Then I realized the play space is bound to what you see, only scrolling side to side. And I knew what the game was going to do next.

The limits that are placed tell me what this game wants to do right off the bat and in being so transparent, the ending didn’t have a strong affect for me. It could be a matter of perspective, these stories of people climbing over walls, drowning in rivers, getting shot, starving, are almost commonly told in the immigration debate in America. I didn’t have knowledge of the specific location in the game though.

Still, thank you for sharing it. An interesting exercise for sure.

Also, to devon, comparing it to Passage. Passage is great not only because of the core idea of living through a person’s entire life but the fact that how you interact with the game is reflected in that telling of a person’s life. (Something I don’t think Freedom Bridge quite captures, interactivity still matters but not to the same degree as Passage) If you just held down the right arrow key for five minutes in Passage (like the other fellow did for this game), think, what does that say about that life you just experienced? If you didn’t even bother holding down a key for five minutes or maybe just meandered around the place you start, you still played the game, and again, what does that say about that life?

That is where Passage is brilliant.

By: devon

devon — Mon, 05 Jul 2010 16:37:08 +0000

I think the interaction required does add to the experience. You really feel the resistance when you go over the barbed wire. That said I don’t think it really does anything different from Passage, besides changing the metaphor to be political. And no, I didn’t find it any more emotionally riveting or meaningful than shooting an alien in the face. I did like the questions it doesn’t answer like, “is this a specific place?” and “who is this square?” etc. But I suppose the same could be said about the alien I’m shooting in the face.

I also felt like I wanted the square to die, the barbed wire made me feel like I was probably a prisoner and maybe I did something horribly wrong to be here, and then the other side of the bridge looked like more of the same horrible barbed wire world. Black square was not a likable character.

By: Fraser McMillan

Fraser McMillan — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 23:59:35 +0000

But you do have control. It’s not the same as pressing the play button because you’re required to drive the experience forward, even if all that involves is holding down one button, which in this case it doesn’t have to. The player is a necessary component of the whole – you’re doing it rather than merely watching it.

To this end I’ve never really understood the “DVD remote” argument. I wouldn’t care much for Freedom Bridge were it a YouTube video.

By: BigJonno

BigJonno — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 12:41:41 +0000

Don’t take my criticism to mean that I don’t see the worth in such things. I do, but I don’t think that Freedom Bridge has enough to it to differentiate it from a simple animation. I have a fairly simple view on games as a medium; for games to be a worthwhile vehicle for messages, meaning and emotion, they need to bring something to the table that movies, books, plays and other media cannot, otherwise someone may as well make an animation. That thing is interactivity. It doesn’t have to be a lot of interactivity, but it has engage the audience more than pressing play on a remote.

Freedom Bridge requires you to hold down your right cursor key. There are no consequences for inaction, no decision making involved and no reward for doing otherwise, other than the slightly perverse pleasure you may gain from making patterns with your blood.

So while I agree that Freedom Bridge does a very good job of conveying a message in an incredibly stripped-down form, I don’t believe that it being a game rather than an animation adds anything to it.

By: Riptide

Riptide — Sun, 04 Jul 2010 01:02:25 +0000

@BigJonno
You know, there are bigger things to be learned from computer games besides how to get a head-shot. Freedom Bridge may not really be a “game” per-se, but it’s a quick, powerful story that the player has to interact with briefly to complete. Things don’t have to overly engage you to create meaning, there are meaningful movies out there that do not require you to be overly engaged to understand the meaning.

As for Freedom Bridge, it’s great and there should be more games like it.

By: BigJonno

BigJonno — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 00:52:21 +0000

Sorry, but I have a hard time calling this a game. The supposed interaction was so limited as to be meaningless. It took me about five seconds to realise that yes, I was going to have to go straight over the barbed wire and was then entertained for another five, incredibly puerile, seconds by the blood trail. After that, it became an exercise in holding my right arrow key down, like I was watching an animation on a broken DVD player.

There has to be a reason for interaction. It has to be inherently entertaining, challenging or necessary to progress. Even something as simple as obstacles to navigate would have triggered the engagement necessary for any kind of meaning to be created.