Relentlessly creative and unique, Dujanah is an unforgettable experience that I will never complete or go back to. This game is incredibly indulgent in every sense of the word- it has a story to tell and it doesn't care if you're engaged at all. Unfortunately, I do. Sorry Dujanah, I don't have the patience for an art film that forces me to actively participate.
A really moving experience about accepting death, one that I always felt like I shouldn't be observing on some level, it felt so intense. Difficult to describe and even more difficult to classify, you really would need to experience it in order to understand it.
This review contains spoilers
The first word that comes to mind when thinking about Dujanah is: mess. Not that I would call the game messy, just confusing, like viewing it through a million different distorsion lenses. The (lovely) claymotion graphics, mixed with all the other aestethics, and especially the at times jarring and at times psychedelich sound give a total sense of disorientation, a simulation of mourning.
I loved the sections in which you just explore an area, the ideas it sends your way and the meditations on topics ranging from unlawful invasion of sovreign states, the bombing of civilians, how we experience works of art, what it takes to be a good lover, the stages of death. It feels like being immersed in 10 different cultures at once and those moments coalesce into some of my favourite I've seen in a game.
Had the game been just that I would have shamelessly loved it, yet this is where my enjoyment is hampered by the presence of more substantial gameplay, which I feel intrudes on the experience too much.
My favourite type of game is the one that marries its story and gameplay together through mechanics, but failing that a purely story or gameplay based experience is still great (Hell, DOOM is my favourite game of all time). The way Dujanah does it, it's just not it.
All that said, a shitty FMV/puzzle game involving pies and anuses cannot take away from me the most intense emotions I've felt playing a game in a long time
I loved the sections in which you just explore an area, the ideas it sends your way and the meditations on topics ranging from unlawful invasion of sovreign states, the bombing of civilians, how we experience works of art, what it takes to be a good lover, the stages of death. It feels like being immersed in 10 different cultures at once and those moments coalesce into some of my favourite I've seen in a game.
Had the game been just that I would have shamelessly loved it, yet this is where my enjoyment is hampered by the presence of more substantial gameplay, which I feel intrudes on the experience too much.
My favourite type of game is the one that marries its story and gameplay together through mechanics, but failing that a purely story or gameplay based experience is still great (Hell, DOOM is my favourite game of all time). The way Dujanah does it, it's just not it.
All that said, a shitty FMV/puzzle game involving pies and anuses cannot take away from me the most intense emotions I've felt playing a game in a long time
settling into dujanah after playing the honest and emotionally vulnerable beeswing, one might not be sure exactly what to expect from jack king-spooners follow-up kickstarter project; using this leverage and anticipation effectively he pulls a one-two punch on his audience
punch #1, the hitman's jab: players see king-spooner himself on a greenscreen in one of five randomized intros, where he coyly, maybe even smugly outright spells out one of five 'underlying meanings' of the whole game, ranging from catharsis, to death, to identity, existentialism, and so on and so forth. its an unexpected slice of metanarrative, but it foreshadows a great deal of the games tone and content
punch #2, the liver shot: players, not two minutes after, sit through one of the most incredibly grim and striking openings to a game ive ever seen, one that sets up the journey of muslim woman dujanah as her goal to find something takes her through arcades, dreams, punk bars, military bases, the lair of a technocrat, and caves full of spider people
it all makes for a fascinating tale. here's my issue: king-spooner's aesthetic tendencies are easily the titles strongest asset and simultaneously its undoing. king-spooner's vivid and living poetry, musings on death, his framing of little vignettes that reflect on the absurdities, mundanities, and quiet humanity inherent to life, the way the usage of clay is the fabric upon which all these elements are nestled...the way its a matryoshka doll of metatextual signals and messages - this, too, carries over from beeswing, in addition to the general structure, except this time you have to put up with some frankly not good metroidvania/shoot em up arcade games too
what i find less easy to stomach is the games general tone. i should have known from the moment the randomized intro kicked in, or perhaps when dujanahs steam description changed from an earnest description to 'apolitical' very suddenly, but this is a postmodern game that relishes in that metanarrative pool...a little too much. king-spooners randomized intros are telling the truth - the game is indeed about all those themes in fragments, allowing players to connect dots as they see fit, but its also a game with massive undercurrents of frustration, particularly artistic frustration but also frustrations with politics, the state of the world, this purgatory we all find ourselves trapped in, the ultimate questions awaiting us all at lifes end. this is where it loses me, because the game is let down by a few things for sure, but most particularly for me the level of absolute vitriolic bitterness on display here and the inclusion of dozens of author blemishes the game has is cynical to an absurdist extreme. in other words: there comes a point where something becomes a funnel purely for someones own frustration, someones own grievances. you might say, well that's all fiction, but dujanah crosses a line by moving away from beeswings brand of authenticity to a work that is not about reflecting the problems of a politically instable region, but about reflecting a westerners frustrations, sometimes particularly small-scale, petty, and insular...using the backdrop of such a conflict
this is such a difficult thing to articulate, so let me give you a couple of examples.
1.) enter a house in the games sprawling opening desert, and you'll find a console. interact with it, and video overlay of king-spooner playing a character operating the twitch stream as though they are playing dujanah begins to occupy the lower left-hand side of the screen. the character goes on a rambly, incoherent twitch-esque monologue, mispronouncing the games title, filling the void and dead air of your exploring with stream-of-consciousness musings on absolutely nothing ('what is this music...? ay that's quite a jammin' tune eh? palm tree...another palm tree...invisible wall...eh, what the fuck?! fuckin eh, fencepost...this is pure shite eh')
2.) for reasons, you have to spend about an hour, maybe an hour and a half playing through a very stiff and weakly designed metroidvania, taking you out the of the flow of dujanahs general exploration-based play and removing you from the strengths of its rich atmosphere and soundtrack. upon completion, talk to an npc in the arcade and he immediately waxes philosophic and pontificates on the possible meaning of everything in the game you played. king-spooner does well to guess at the player's mindstate in this case, but its an instance where he relishes in looking down on you
in his article for unwinnable, yussef cole points out that dujanah is marred by its treatment of the middle east as pastiche, and that it "chooses...to tell a story not about the middle east, but with it, and ultimately through it - leaving behind the personal, honest narratives that could have been far behind". this is a perspective that i fully endorse and find myself agreeing with, but its interesting that we have taken different routes to reach this conclusion. i would similarly agree with cole that beeswings greatest strength was its level of personality and intimacy, and in comparison dujanah bares its fangs at everything and nothing, which could be compelling if not for the degree to which the author blemishes the work with his own frustrations. textual transcript of a trump address plays, with audio of fuming, bellowing hogs permeating the event; an arcade game called pie or anus denotes some of king-spooners witty irreverence, to be sure, but can just as easily be interpreted as distaste if not disdain for the current games market; fake level-up screens give you fake skills like 'blame the left'
im stuck in a position where i will readily admit king-spooner is a fascinating creator, and the medium would be healthier with more artists like him, but i cannot so easily be a proponent for this title either. if i had to put everything i just wrote a different way, i would say this:
when dujanah, the muslim woman who experiences immense tragedy, voicelessly notes frustrations in her marriage relating to art and interpretation of said art at an art gallery, is that dujanah or king-spooner?
when dujanah vividly imagines what it would feel like to slaughter an entire american military base, is that dujanah or king-spooner?
when dujanah speaks for the last and can only with deep agony and through clenched teeth tell you that this mess of a world is a set-up, is that dujanah or king-spooner?
punch #1, the hitman's jab: players see king-spooner himself on a greenscreen in one of five randomized intros, where he coyly, maybe even smugly outright spells out one of five 'underlying meanings' of the whole game, ranging from catharsis, to death, to identity, existentialism, and so on and so forth. its an unexpected slice of metanarrative, but it foreshadows a great deal of the games tone and content
punch #2, the liver shot: players, not two minutes after, sit through one of the most incredibly grim and striking openings to a game ive ever seen, one that sets up the journey of muslim woman dujanah as her goal to find something takes her through arcades, dreams, punk bars, military bases, the lair of a technocrat, and caves full of spider people
it all makes for a fascinating tale. here's my issue: king-spooner's aesthetic tendencies are easily the titles strongest asset and simultaneously its undoing. king-spooner's vivid and living poetry, musings on death, his framing of little vignettes that reflect on the absurdities, mundanities, and quiet humanity inherent to life, the way the usage of clay is the fabric upon which all these elements are nestled...the way its a matryoshka doll of metatextual signals and messages - this, too, carries over from beeswing, in addition to the general structure, except this time you have to put up with some frankly not good metroidvania/shoot em up arcade games too
what i find less easy to stomach is the games general tone. i should have known from the moment the randomized intro kicked in, or perhaps when dujanahs steam description changed from an earnest description to 'apolitical' very suddenly, but this is a postmodern game that relishes in that metanarrative pool...a little too much. king-spooners randomized intros are telling the truth - the game is indeed about all those themes in fragments, allowing players to connect dots as they see fit, but its also a game with massive undercurrents of frustration, particularly artistic frustration but also frustrations with politics, the state of the world, this purgatory we all find ourselves trapped in, the ultimate questions awaiting us all at lifes end. this is where it loses me, because the game is let down by a few things for sure, but most particularly for me the level of absolute vitriolic bitterness on display here and the inclusion of dozens of author blemishes the game has is cynical to an absurdist extreme. in other words: there comes a point where something becomes a funnel purely for someones own frustration, someones own grievances. you might say, well that's all fiction, but dujanah crosses a line by moving away from beeswings brand of authenticity to a work that is not about reflecting the problems of a politically instable region, but about reflecting a westerners frustrations, sometimes particularly small-scale, petty, and insular...using the backdrop of such a conflict
this is such a difficult thing to articulate, so let me give you a couple of examples.
1.) enter a house in the games sprawling opening desert, and you'll find a console. interact with it, and video overlay of king-spooner playing a character operating the twitch stream as though they are playing dujanah begins to occupy the lower left-hand side of the screen. the character goes on a rambly, incoherent twitch-esque monologue, mispronouncing the games title, filling the void and dead air of your exploring with stream-of-consciousness musings on absolutely nothing ('what is this music...? ay that's quite a jammin' tune eh? palm tree...another palm tree...invisible wall...eh, what the fuck?! fuckin eh, fencepost...this is pure shite eh')
2.) for reasons, you have to spend about an hour, maybe an hour and a half playing through a very stiff and weakly designed metroidvania, taking you out the of the flow of dujanahs general exploration-based play and removing you from the strengths of its rich atmosphere and soundtrack. upon completion, talk to an npc in the arcade and he immediately waxes philosophic and pontificates on the possible meaning of everything in the game you played. king-spooner does well to guess at the player's mindstate in this case, but its an instance where he relishes in looking down on you
in his article for unwinnable, yussef cole points out that dujanah is marred by its treatment of the middle east as pastiche, and that it "chooses...to tell a story not about the middle east, but with it, and ultimately through it - leaving behind the personal, honest narratives that could have been far behind". this is a perspective that i fully endorse and find myself agreeing with, but its interesting that we have taken different routes to reach this conclusion. i would similarly agree with cole that beeswings greatest strength was its level of personality and intimacy, and in comparison dujanah bares its fangs at everything and nothing, which could be compelling if not for the degree to which the author blemishes the work with his own frustrations. textual transcript of a trump address plays, with audio of fuming, bellowing hogs permeating the event; an arcade game called pie or anus denotes some of king-spooners witty irreverence, to be sure, but can just as easily be interpreted as distaste if not disdain for the current games market; fake level-up screens give you fake skills like 'blame the left'
im stuck in a position where i will readily admit king-spooner is a fascinating creator, and the medium would be healthier with more artists like him, but i cannot so easily be a proponent for this title either. if i had to put everything i just wrote a different way, i would say this:
when dujanah, the muslim woman who experiences immense tragedy, voicelessly notes frustrations in her marriage relating to art and interpretation of said art at an art gallery, is that dujanah or king-spooner?
when dujanah vividly imagines what it would feel like to slaughter an entire american military base, is that dujanah or king-spooner?
when dujanah speaks for the last and can only with deep agony and through clenched teeth tell you that this mess of a world is a set-up, is that dujanah or king-spooner?
feliz cumple francisco
A deeply affecting work of audiovisual art that washes over you and takes a part of you as tribute. The cynicism of its story manages to somehow not dismantle its emotional core, but strengthen it, showing the signs of a game that has been hurt by the world and screams that hurt, asking you to examine yourself in relation to it.
Nothing else looks, sounds, or feels like Dujanah. The half-star taken off my rating is owed to repeated issues with bugs during my more recent playthroughs - Maybe I will never get to play it in its purest form again. Maybe that's okay.
Nothing else looks, sounds, or feels like Dujanah. The half-star taken off my rating is owed to repeated issues with bugs during my more recent playthroughs - Maybe I will never get to play it in its purest form again. Maybe that's okay.
Visivamente molto godibile, ottima ost, ma sono stato deluso su un fronte: i dialoghi. Non c'è nulla di particolarmente memorabile. Tantissime reference, tanta complessità è solo apparente. I messaggi sono chiari e semplici ma nascosti in rovi artificiali
An...experience
probably one of the most gaming experiences I have ever had.