By Fraser McMillan

During a recent episode of the Idle Thumbs podcast, Gamasutra’s Chris Remo drew a comparison between the trailers for Noby Noby Boy and Blueberry Garden.

Though he pointed out that the pair are leagues apart in concept and execution, the analogy came in the form of his astonishment and confusion at each game’s video previews. These revealed scant details on exactly what the games entailed, but were all the more intriguing for their mystery.

He hit the nail on the head by saying that, upon playing, his puzzlement was converted into a knowing “aha!” moment in each case. The realisation that it is possible to replicate the craziness of the trailers in-game is wonderful, and that the developers managed to disguise the nature of their games’ respective mechanical groundings – even within apparent gameplay footage – is nothing short of spectacular. But where I agree less with Remo is in his claim that there are few similarities beyond this experience. Scratching the surface would prove his summation correct, but digging a little deeper, it’s possible find some surprising parallels between the two in terms of their design approach.

//Berry picking
Erik Svedäng’s Blueberry Garden – the new golden boy of independent development, having scooped the prestigious Seumas McNally Grand Prize at this year’s Independent Games Festival – is a marvellous little chunk of exploration and discovery purveyed using the conventions and restraints of a two-dimensional platform game. Its expansive, malleable setting is complemented by an aesthetic that could only be described as beautiful; a milky white background blooms hazily around the terrain’s stark black lines, various inanimate objects and obstacles providing the near-ethereal surroundings with a subdued smattering of colour. The player assumes control of a flying bird-like avatar whose only purpose, in purely objective terms, is to make a big pile of objects and see what’s at the top. Its controls are simple, and it’s a short, relaxing piece of artware with some limitations that work in its favour. So far, so unique.

Noby Noby Boy, on the other hand, is a non-game from the same cracked mind behind Katamari Damacy. It would appear to break convention to the point that it abandons it completely, but in actual fact the experience is built upon two of gaming’s most prized flagstones. It takes player input and the on-screen interpretation of said actions – in effect “gameplay” and “graphics” – and exaggerates them. In its outright rejection of traditional structural tropes, it becomes a toy rather than videogame. There is a meta-goal in the form of Girl, but other than that, incidental tasks and the micro-objectives formed around these are performed at the player’s will. Leave Boy sitting for an hour and there are no consequences. Do nothing other than seek out each and every vegetable on the play area and eat it and there’s no reward. In a way it’s a brave experiment; Noby Noby Boy snatches the safe blanket of clearly defined goals from the player, asking questions of them rather than laying bare the answers. It’s a touch too esoteric for some, and that’s fine, but those prepared for a game whose capacity to entertain is contingent upon their own ability to create will find an experience unlike any other.

Except, I daresay, Blueberry Garden.

//Same difference
Okay, there are innumerable differences. It’s hardly as clear-cut a correlation as, say, the one for which Banjo-Kazooie is indebted to Mario 64, so first, we must identify why Noby Noby Boy is nothing like Blueberry Garden. The first reason – and it’s not inconsiderable – is that the former is a three dimensional game and the latter a whole plane of existence short of that. Secondly, Svedäng’s creation is simple to handle. Left, right, jump, grab, eat. Takahashi and his team, conversely, have squeezed every possible action that Boy might want to perform onto the PlayStation pad. Each intricacy in movement is catered for by an unwieldy button combination of some sort, and even then precision is not something one can reasonably expect from Boy and his stretchy exterior. Thirdly, Noby Noby Boy is as much about inventing comedic scenarios in compact areas filled with junk as it is flying to new planets by proxy of everyone’s length contributions to Girl. Blueberry Garden is of the more minimalist, understated stock, and is far less exuberant in the expression of its driving concepts.

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