Sluggish Morss: A Delicate Time in History
released on Feb 18, 2013
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played october 21st for rpgmaker october
maybe my least favorite jack king spooner (+ jake clover, tho this is the only game w his name on it ive touched so far)? dujanah suffers from being overstuffed n feels kinda ponderous at times but does have some real strong moments, while this also has a few things i liked--the singing in the elevator n future beyonce to name a couple-- n the opaque sci fi texture is sorta neat, i felt mostly indifferent to it. so i guess ill take my frustrations w dujanah over the clinical if not all that deeply negative way i feel abt this. tbf i didnt finish bc i got too tired after trying to figure out the cryochamber code, but i dont feel a strong urge to come back.
maybe my least favorite jack king spooner (+ jake clover, tho this is the only game w his name on it ive touched so far)? dujanah suffers from being overstuffed n feels kinda ponderous at times but does have some real strong moments, while this also has a few things i liked--the singing in the elevator n future beyonce to name a couple-- n the opaque sci fi texture is sorta neat, i felt mostly indifferent to it. so i guess ill take my frustrations w dujanah over the clinical if not all that deeply negative way i feel abt this. tbf i didnt finish bc i got too tired after trying to figure out the cryochamber code, but i dont feel a strong urge to come back.
Simultaneously more and less legible. I don't want to necessarily say I 'roll' my eyes at postmodern accelerationist philosophical musing but it's like... well I definitely feel something close. It's all very jumbled, intentionally messy and sure there's threads everywhere but the yarn ball being interesting on each strand, to me, is not impactful. More musing ego death, not much more. The concepts are high and abstract but scrutinizing the aspects of it doesn't reveal messages it reveals craft at best. And for what it's worth, it's much better craft, although I think this sort of aesthetic makes me feel a bit insecure when I go "mmm yes very nice postmodernism" but yeah I do think the imagery is great <3 A friend of mine pointed out to me inspirations/clear references she saw so it was a bit more museum-esque in that regard. Definitely can see this being a One To Appreciate for some more entuned to this class of Getting down and dirty with the truths of Fearing Time, but for me it's sort of pouring off the windshield.
EUREKA!
It is of astonishing import that Sluggish Morss refuses to satisfy its audience with any form of linearity. Even as the player finds their barely tangible entity passing through corridors towards what is an assumed form of progression, time remains delicate, as promised. Puzzles solve themselves for you, robotic voices dissipate any minute essence of humanity, Beyonce is given a mechanical tribute -- in the game’s most brazenly comical moment, no doubt.
Yet through it all, Jack King-Spooner’s remarkable release steps beyond the boundaries of what constitutes a traditional “game.” Is it even a game? The title more serves as an examination of human control, or rather its lack of definition. Whereas Playdead’s INSIDE forces players down a strict path, poetically contradicting its three-dimensional design, Sluggish Morss paints a wrecked, immaterial canvas of vibrant polygons and distorted images.
The future is now is the past is forever; time is ripping apart at the seams; delicate, indeed. A galaxy’s history itself is vividly assembled into wicked collages, prompting many questions from its numerous, nameless individuals who ethereally wander the halls of this cavernous ship (a visually stunning evocation of ‘ghosts in the machine’). But one remains steadfast in its earnest unattainability: Where do we go from here?
In a cyclical sort of irony, the id has raced backwards into the future to contaminate and dissolve centuries of progress; it has all been written in the numbers. A mathematical philosophy governs the game’s prime scenario, in which everything boils down to a predictable science. Emotion is erased, of course, without room for moral inquiry, as in the case of NieR: Automata.
And perhaps this is what makes Sluggish Morss the most provocative philosophical release of the 2010s. It is the very lack of a determined philosophy which prompts such a fascinating and haunting portrayal of human development. The game illustrates a damned future for mankind through the notion that we are gradually erasing the very fabrics of our being one century at a time, and the end lies in an eternity which looks like data exploding off a screen.
It is of astonishing import that Sluggish Morss refuses to satisfy its audience with any form of linearity. Even as the player finds their barely tangible entity passing through corridors towards what is an assumed form of progression, time remains delicate, as promised. Puzzles solve themselves for you, robotic voices dissipate any minute essence of humanity, Beyonce is given a mechanical tribute -- in the game’s most brazenly comical moment, no doubt.
Yet through it all, Jack King-Spooner’s remarkable release steps beyond the boundaries of what constitutes a traditional “game.” Is it even a game? The title more serves as an examination of human control, or rather its lack of definition. Whereas Playdead’s INSIDE forces players down a strict path, poetically contradicting its three-dimensional design, Sluggish Morss paints a wrecked, immaterial canvas of vibrant polygons and distorted images.
The future is now is the past is forever; time is ripping apart at the seams; delicate, indeed. A galaxy’s history itself is vividly assembled into wicked collages, prompting many questions from its numerous, nameless individuals who ethereally wander the halls of this cavernous ship (a visually stunning evocation of ‘ghosts in the machine’). But one remains steadfast in its earnest unattainability: Where do we go from here?
In a cyclical sort of irony, the id has raced backwards into the future to contaminate and dissolve centuries of progress; it has all been written in the numbers. A mathematical philosophy governs the game’s prime scenario, in which everything boils down to a predictable science. Emotion is erased, of course, without room for moral inquiry, as in the case of NieR: Automata.
And perhaps this is what makes Sluggish Morss the most provocative philosophical release of the 2010s. It is the very lack of a determined philosophy which prompts such a fascinating and haunting portrayal of human development. The game illustrates a damned future for mankind through the notion that we are gradually erasing the very fabrics of our being one century at a time, and the end lies in an eternity which looks like data exploding off a screen.