I find it amusing that a game ostensibly about music doesn't have any background music. My quibbles aside, this one is a gem. A departure from the first few Lucasfilm Games titles, this one is entirely point and click aided by your magic staff that plays melodies which are effectively also spells.
It feels like the grandfather of the modern Indie game in that respect, where it hones in on one specific play action that informs the rest of the game. In this case, your music casting is directly tied to the story and of course how you progress through the "puzzles". It's not hard, but it has that sense of discovery to it that makes every little bit of progress you make enjoyable while retaining that Lucasfilm Games charm.
It feels like the grandfather of the modern Indie game in that respect, where it hones in on one specific play action that informs the rest of the game. In this case, your music casting is directly tied to the story and of course how you progress through the "puzzles". It's not hard, but it has that sense of discovery to it that makes every little bit of progress you make enjoyable while retaining that Lucasfilm Games charm.
It's really cool to see the LucasArts formula, which I'm mostly familiar with through a Monkey Island context, being applied in a much more serious, storytelling-oriented context. LOOM still has plenty of jokes, but it's also trying to be a more straightforward fantasy story. It's way too short to really pull it off effectively, but it's still fun to see the attempt.
By far the coolest thing about this game is the mode of interaction. It eschews the classic point-and-click "inventory and verb" system for a set of spells that are cast by playing musical notes. Although in a sense this boils down to just a broad set of verbs, it opens the possibility of gaining more verbs throughout the run by being granted them or even deducing them, which feels brilliant. Definitely a game I wish had spawned a bit more of an evolutionary branch, or even just a direct sequel.
By far the coolest thing about this game is the mode of interaction. It eschews the classic point-and-click "inventory and verb" system for a set of spells that are cast by playing musical notes. Although in a sense this boils down to just a broad set of verbs, it opens the possibility of gaining more verbs throughout the run by being granted them or even deducing them, which feels brilliant. Definitely a game I wish had spawned a bit more of an evolutionary branch, or even just a direct sequel.
The gameplay was more fun than 'Monkey Island' 1 and 2 :O
I loved Loom ... looking back to set up those harmonies give me inner peace today...and it put s always a smile on my face if I see some content pieces somewhere on the internet today.
steam version
Loom is a cult classic that you can tell was meant to be more. From the extravagant lore behind its sword & sorcery world to the 30 minute audio drama prologue, its evident tons of effort went into conceiving the project. And yet, it’s also clear that someone on the development team wasn’t too confident in the idea: the game is noticeably short, severely condensed in exploration, underutilizes its special mechanics, and ends on a cliffhanger. What exactly happened remains for some investigative journalist to uncover- while all public statements from Lucasfilm staff indicate this was what was always intended, anyone who plays through the game will know such words to be lies.
But even with these cuts, is Loom worth a playthrough? I can’t quite say. The story follows Bobbin Threadbare, a member of a guild of magicians called the Weavers, who is trying to locate his fellow wizards after they are transformed into a wedge of swans. His (brief) journey will take you through a small assembly of exotic areas, and like most modern fantasy works, Loom throws you into this world without much explanation, using the sights, sounds, and people as a form of environmental storytelling. If you’re a fan of Studio Ghibli, Stardust, or Willow, you'll be right at home with Loom- if you’re someone who prefers a bit more historical context to a fictional setting ala LOTR or Star Wars, then Loom will definitely be a harder pill to swallow.
Unfortunately, I consider myself in the latter camp, and so Loom wasn’t quite my cup of tea, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t appreciate parts of it. Despite your short interactions with the locals of the locales, they’re surprisingly memorable thanks to: the circumstances of your encounters, the unique character models, and the theatrical-esque voice acting (more on that later). Every vista is also one a kind- I’ve never played a game that had cities of green glass, castles with bright red shadows, and nomad camps decked in infinite dusk. The entire color spectrum seems to have been implemented in Loom, which goes a long way towards keeping its visuals charming amidst its 90s age. Subtle animation work like sparkles on shiny objects, blinking NPCs, and chewing motions for sheep are also worth noting.
There are defects to be sure. Whenever you’re walking in a zoomed-out, overworld section of the map, everything takes a drop in quality: horizons are blurry and characters compressed pudges- the only benefit is your walking pace is quicker (though an alleviant exists for that regardless, more on that later). Lip syncing is also horrendous to the point where it’s basically nonexistent; you instead have character bobbing their heads up-and-down like they’re on crack, and the voice acting doesn’t even line up well with those motions (part of me ponders if this was just an issue with the GOG version of the game as playthroughs on YouTube depict the two staying in synchronization).
It also really irked me whenever your staff would collapse into segments whenever you walked with it- a strange graphical hitch considering everything else stays relatively smooth.
Sound is oddly scarce. The only bites that occur are select noises during cutscenes (e.g., Bobbin’s screaming). Ambling about, you don’t hear ANYTHING: your footsteps, the wind, animals, grass, nothing- it’s as though you’re in a vacuum. I wonder if this was true in the original release or an error in the port code, but no matter, it’s a point of criticism.
Music is a little more prominent, though I emphasize the word “little” as the only things I could remember were the opening melody (a remix of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake) and a harp theme that plays whenever you cast a spell. 90s computer games often had decent scores, making me wonder why Loom went the quiet route, especially with its fantasy premise.
The voice acting, thankfully, makes up for this silent void. I like to think Lucasfilm went out of their way to hire stagecraft artisans as their performances evoke a Thespian quality. Everyone, from Bobbin to some random shepherds, manages to elocute without coming off as phony, phoned-in, or bombastic. It’s an interesting juggling act given that Loom plays things relatively straight in spite of its tongue-in-cheek facets (the character names, people not knowing what swans are, Bobbin not being intimidated by any dangers, etc…), meaning the voice artists had to avoid coming off as silly when expressing seemingly-humorous situations under solemnity, and fortunately they very much succeed. The only caveat I had with the cast was why everyone was seemingly brought over from the UK? I’m not some rah rah patriot, but given that Lucasfilm is an American company, and given that Loom takes place in a realm far-removed from our own, it didn’t make sense to me why they stuck with British, Irish, and Scottish accents only.
Gameplay takes on a different visage from most PnCs in that it’s based around using a single item to solve puzzles: the distaff. Point it at (read- click on) something and you’ll have the option to clack keyboard letters that correspond with on-screen notes, four needed per a spell. It’s a simple set-up, but the number of incantations at your disposal is unexpectedly numerous and a far cry from the usual mojo jojo (i.e., teleportation, elementals, etc…). You still have your atypical transmogrification and healing, but the others tend to be invocations you would not expect like reverse-alchemy, wool dyeing, and twisting amongst others.
As you progress further, you learn more spells; however, this whole enterprise comes with some setbacks. For starters, the instrument used to hit the notes doesn’t sound particularly pleasant like say the Ocarina did in the two N64 Zelda games. Secondly, because of how abridged the whole game is, you don’t get to play around with these spells much (including some of them entirely!), making the mechanic feel pointless. And lastly, there is no journal that automatically records all your spells, forcing you to have to jot them down in real life (and no, looking it up isn’t a feasible option given that Loom has three different patterns programmed for each piece of weavercraft).
I mentioned earlier that the sluggishness of the base walking speed can be alleviated, and that is through an in-game option to fast forward the entire pace of the game. Unlike Beneath a Steel Sky, which boasted a similar feature, this does not fast forward conversations, theoretically allowing you to keep it on for good, though this comes at the potential cost of crashing your game (warned by the menu- I personally didn’t experience anything). Luckily, the incorporation of autosaves and no death screens makes Loom a step above Beneath.
But look, at the end of the day, what graphic adventures like Loom come down are their stories, and I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t a charm to the entire escapade. Bobbin is a likable protagonist, and his conversations with the miscellaneous denizens he meets are organic enough in tone. Unfortunately, his arc is very much shortchanged by the, well, short nature of the game: other important characters aren’t fleshed out enough, especially in the third act (if you can call it that) wherein the main antagonist is introduced out of the blue, and his “reign of terror” pathetically absolved. There’s a very interesting mythos here, but it’s hardly delved into, with the adjacent Guilds, in particular, getting the raw deal in terms of their individual development. Other narratorial facets, such as the circumstances of Bobbin’s birth and the origins/power of the titular loom, are completely sidestepped altogether in favor of a rushed climax that fails to properly cap things off.
Loom is one of those older titles that truly deserves a full-fledged remake. Taking its assets and converting them into a 3D setting with exploration, sidequests, and a story containing a concise beginning, middle, and end would go a long way towards doing justice to such a fascinating IP. As it stands, the base game might be worth a go-around if anything discussed above is appealing, but most gamers are probably better off viewing a playthrough online (specifically one that has more music!).
*Note- the 30 minutes play isn’t mandatory to understanding the story as the synopsis on Wikipedia more than sums things up, though the parts I listened to were definitely well-acted.
But even with these cuts, is Loom worth a playthrough? I can’t quite say. The story follows Bobbin Threadbare, a member of a guild of magicians called the Weavers, who is trying to locate his fellow wizards after they are transformed into a wedge of swans. His (brief) journey will take you through a small assembly of exotic areas, and like most modern fantasy works, Loom throws you into this world without much explanation, using the sights, sounds, and people as a form of environmental storytelling. If you’re a fan of Studio Ghibli, Stardust, or Willow, you'll be right at home with Loom- if you’re someone who prefers a bit more historical context to a fictional setting ala LOTR or Star Wars, then Loom will definitely be a harder pill to swallow.
Unfortunately, I consider myself in the latter camp, and so Loom wasn’t quite my cup of tea, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t appreciate parts of it. Despite your short interactions with the locals of the locales, they’re surprisingly memorable thanks to: the circumstances of your encounters, the unique character models, and the theatrical-esque voice acting (more on that later). Every vista is also one a kind- I’ve never played a game that had cities of green glass, castles with bright red shadows, and nomad camps decked in infinite dusk. The entire color spectrum seems to have been implemented in Loom, which goes a long way towards keeping its visuals charming amidst its 90s age. Subtle animation work like sparkles on shiny objects, blinking NPCs, and chewing motions for sheep are also worth noting.
There are defects to be sure. Whenever you’re walking in a zoomed-out, overworld section of the map, everything takes a drop in quality: horizons are blurry and characters compressed pudges- the only benefit is your walking pace is quicker (though an alleviant exists for that regardless, more on that later). Lip syncing is also horrendous to the point where it’s basically nonexistent; you instead have character bobbing their heads up-and-down like they’re on crack, and the voice acting doesn’t even line up well with those motions (part of me ponders if this was just an issue with the GOG version of the game as playthroughs on YouTube depict the two staying in synchronization).
It also really irked me whenever your staff would collapse into segments whenever you walked with it- a strange graphical hitch considering everything else stays relatively smooth.
Sound is oddly scarce. The only bites that occur are select noises during cutscenes (e.g., Bobbin’s screaming). Ambling about, you don’t hear ANYTHING: your footsteps, the wind, animals, grass, nothing- it’s as though you’re in a vacuum. I wonder if this was true in the original release or an error in the port code, but no matter, it’s a point of criticism.
Music is a little more prominent, though I emphasize the word “little” as the only things I could remember were the opening melody (a remix of Tchaikovsky's Swan Lake) and a harp theme that plays whenever you cast a spell. 90s computer games often had decent scores, making me wonder why Loom went the quiet route, especially with its fantasy premise.
The voice acting, thankfully, makes up for this silent void. I like to think Lucasfilm went out of their way to hire stagecraft artisans as their performances evoke a Thespian quality. Everyone, from Bobbin to some random shepherds, manages to elocute without coming off as phony, phoned-in, or bombastic. It’s an interesting juggling act given that Loom plays things relatively straight in spite of its tongue-in-cheek facets (the character names, people not knowing what swans are, Bobbin not being intimidated by any dangers, etc…), meaning the voice artists had to avoid coming off as silly when expressing seemingly-humorous situations under solemnity, and fortunately they very much succeed. The only caveat I had with the cast was why everyone was seemingly brought over from the UK? I’m not some rah rah patriot, but given that Lucasfilm is an American company, and given that Loom takes place in a realm far-removed from our own, it didn’t make sense to me why they stuck with British, Irish, and Scottish accents only.
Gameplay takes on a different visage from most PnCs in that it’s based around using a single item to solve puzzles: the distaff. Point it at (read- click on) something and you’ll have the option to clack keyboard letters that correspond with on-screen notes, four needed per a spell. It’s a simple set-up, but the number of incantations at your disposal is unexpectedly numerous and a far cry from the usual mojo jojo (i.e., teleportation, elementals, etc…). You still have your atypical transmogrification and healing, but the others tend to be invocations you would not expect like reverse-alchemy, wool dyeing, and twisting amongst others.
As you progress further, you learn more spells; however, this whole enterprise comes with some setbacks. For starters, the instrument used to hit the notes doesn’t sound particularly pleasant like say the Ocarina did in the two N64 Zelda games. Secondly, because of how abridged the whole game is, you don’t get to play around with these spells much (including some of them entirely!), making the mechanic feel pointless. And lastly, there is no journal that automatically records all your spells, forcing you to have to jot them down in real life (and no, looking it up isn’t a feasible option given that Loom has three different patterns programmed for each piece of weavercraft).
I mentioned earlier that the sluggishness of the base walking speed can be alleviated, and that is through an in-game option to fast forward the entire pace of the game. Unlike Beneath a Steel Sky, which boasted a similar feature, this does not fast forward conversations, theoretically allowing you to keep it on for good, though this comes at the potential cost of crashing your game (warned by the menu- I personally didn’t experience anything). Luckily, the incorporation of autosaves and no death screens makes Loom a step above Beneath.
But look, at the end of the day, what graphic adventures like Loom come down are their stories, and I’d be lying if I said there wasn’t a charm to the entire escapade. Bobbin is a likable protagonist, and his conversations with the miscellaneous denizens he meets are organic enough in tone. Unfortunately, his arc is very much shortchanged by the, well, short nature of the game: other important characters aren’t fleshed out enough, especially in the third act (if you can call it that) wherein the main antagonist is introduced out of the blue, and his “reign of terror” pathetically absolved. There’s a very interesting mythos here, but it’s hardly delved into, with the adjacent Guilds, in particular, getting the raw deal in terms of their individual development. Other narratorial facets, such as the circumstances of Bobbin’s birth and the origins/power of the titular loom, are completely sidestepped altogether in favor of a rushed climax that fails to properly cap things off.
Loom is one of those older titles that truly deserves a full-fledged remake. Taking its assets and converting them into a 3D setting with exploration, sidequests, and a story containing a concise beginning, middle, and end would go a long way towards doing justice to such a fascinating IP. As it stands, the base game might be worth a go-around if anything discussed above is appealing, but most gamers are probably better off viewing a playthrough online (specifically one that has more music!).
*Note- the 30 minutes play isn’t mandatory to understanding the story as the synopsis on Wikipedia more than sums things up, though the parts I listened to were definitely well-acted.
straight good. An essential game that everyone should play even if youre not into point and click games
An incredible adventure game and far ahead of its time. It's a shame it got criticism at the time for being easier and shorter during the time when Sierra had plenty of awful softlocks in their adventure games because Loom has aged far better than most Sierra game and I think people recognize how good it is now. Just make sure you play the EGA version
I saw a making of video for this once and it got to the guy who animated the part where the demon makes the evil wizard explode and he just has the biggest smile on his face
This game is part of the reason why from now on I will never partake of a series of any kind, books, games, tv, or what have you, unless it is fully wrapped up. Also, thanks a lot, everyone out there in the world, for allowing me to play the first installment of a game that was meant to have two more installments twenty eight fucking years ago but went on permanent hiatus. Well, I’m glad I know there’s an unspeakable evil let loose in this lush fantasy world, and in the meantime I’m sure they’re still making MS-DOS point and click games in the year 2022, why they’ll pick this back up in no time
This game is part of the reason why from now on I will never partake of a series of any kind, books, games, tv, or what have you, unless it is fully wrapped up. Also, thanks a lot, everyone out there in the world, for allowing me to play the first installment of a game that was meant to have two more installments twenty eight fucking years ago but went on permanent hiatus. Well, I’m glad I know there’s an unspeakable evil let loose in this lush fantasy world, and in the meantime I’m sure they’re still making MS-DOS point and click games in the year 2022, why they’ll pick this back up in no time
You mean the lastest masterpiece of fantasy storytelling from LucasFilm's™ Brian Moriarty™?
Why it's an extraordinary adventure with an interface of magic... Stunning, high-resolution, 3d landscapes... sophisticated score, and musical effects. Not to mention the detailed animation and special effects, elegant point 'n' click control of characters, objects, and magic spells. Beat the rush! Go out and play Loom™ today!
Why it's an extraordinary adventure with an interface of magic... Stunning, high-resolution, 3d landscapes... sophisticated score, and musical effects. Not to mention the detailed animation and special effects, elegant point 'n' click control of characters, objects, and magic spells. Beat the rush! Go out and play Loom™ today!
Veredito: Um ótimo adventure chorável, o que infelizmente saiu de moda.
Me lembra um pouco To the Moon e outros jogos da Freebird: é tão curto, linear e limitado que parece até uma visual novel sem ramificações. O foco é 100% na beleza da história e, fora a mecânica a la músicas de Zelda antes de Zelda, Loom tem quase zero jogabilidade além de andar e observar/conversar.
Loom é um jogo infantil com uma história infantil sobre fantasia, poderes mágicos e música. Mas como toda boa história infantil (Peter Pan, Pequeno Príncipe e Corda Bamba vêm logo na cabeça) ele pega temas bem adultos sem deixar de ser acessível pras crianças. O medo, esperança, recomeço, solidão e o limite das nossas capacidades pessoais são pontos chave da trama. A parte visual e (o pouco que tem da) sonora é lindíssima também, o que óbvio não atrapalha.
Também ajuda que joguei com um monte de amigos assistindo no Discord, com direito a lágrimas e a conversas depois sobre o jogo, ressuscitando a ideia (tão rara numa pandemia) de jogos 'para um' sendo uma experiência coletiva.
Espero que outros estúdios além da Freebird peguem carona nesse bonde. Todo mundo só tem a ganhar.
Me lembra um pouco To the Moon e outros jogos da Freebird: é tão curto, linear e limitado que parece até uma visual novel sem ramificações. O foco é 100% na beleza da história e, fora a mecânica a la músicas de Zelda antes de Zelda, Loom tem quase zero jogabilidade além de andar e observar/conversar.
Loom é um jogo infantil com uma história infantil sobre fantasia, poderes mágicos e música. Mas como toda boa história infantil (Peter Pan, Pequeno Príncipe e Corda Bamba vêm logo na cabeça) ele pega temas bem adultos sem deixar de ser acessível pras crianças. O medo, esperança, recomeço, solidão e o limite das nossas capacidades pessoais são pontos chave da trama. A parte visual e (o pouco que tem da) sonora é lindíssima também, o que óbvio não atrapalha.
Também ajuda que joguei com um monte de amigos assistindo no Discord, com direito a lágrimas e a conversas depois sobre o jogo, ressuscitando a ideia (tão rara numa pandemia) de jogos 'para um' sendo uma experiência coletiva.
Espero que outros estúdios além da Freebird peguem carona nesse bonde. Todo mundo só tem a ganhar.
There's a part in this game where you meet this lamb that's sick. The shepherd that is caring for it says it's not going to survive, and her attempts to heal it have failed. You know you have a healing spell, you can even hear the notes you need to cast in her song, but you aren't strong enough yet, so you have to leave, and by the time you are experienced enough to cast that spell it's too late to do anything.
That's essentially the whole game. I loved it a lot.
That's essentially the whole game. I loved it a lot.
ASK ME ABOUT LOOM
Often people who have no idea what point and click adventure games are will very confidently tell you that the genre died because it was too reliant on "moon logic" and nobody had any patience for it. Disregarding that these people probably consider filing their tax returns to also be "moon logic", it shows just how little people understand about what made the genre such a widely popular staple of PC gaming for so long.
Monkey Island, Myst, Kings Quest, 7th Guest, all of these games were so much more than a simple string of progress blockers that everyone just had to deal with, they were truly adventures that the game took you on with the puzzles and object trading only being a fragment of the whole. The idea of games being merely sets of challenges to overcome has led people to think of point and click adventure games as some sort of "solved" riddle, the only reason to play being to win and the singular solutions being laid out in walkthroughs an indication of their humiliating defeat. After all, the game is beaten and will always be beaten in the same way, the road is completely paved.
It's games like Loom that really bring out the heart and soul of a point and click, taking away some of the usual tools of its peers and replacing them with a simple Casio keyboard and inviting you to push the buttons and see what happens. There's nothing complicated about playing Loom, and yet its simple loop of "repeat after me" discovery and experimentation is one that is immediately immersive and finds you soon embroiled in its simple world of cities where everybody has one job.
Loom is incredibly charming and is perhaps the chief example of why we once called this genre "adventure" games. Others have walked the same road, but the walking is not the road.
Often people who have no idea what point and click adventure games are will very confidently tell you that the genre died because it was too reliant on "moon logic" and nobody had any patience for it. Disregarding that these people probably consider filing their tax returns to also be "moon logic", it shows just how little people understand about what made the genre such a widely popular staple of PC gaming for so long.
Monkey Island, Myst, Kings Quest, 7th Guest, all of these games were so much more than a simple string of progress blockers that everyone just had to deal with, they were truly adventures that the game took you on with the puzzles and object trading only being a fragment of the whole. The idea of games being merely sets of challenges to overcome has led people to think of point and click adventure games as some sort of "solved" riddle, the only reason to play being to win and the singular solutions being laid out in walkthroughs an indication of their humiliating defeat. After all, the game is beaten and will always be beaten in the same way, the road is completely paved.
It's games like Loom that really bring out the heart and soul of a point and click, taking away some of the usual tools of its peers and replacing them with a simple Casio keyboard and inviting you to push the buttons and see what happens. There's nothing complicated about playing Loom, and yet its simple loop of "repeat after me" discovery and experimentation is one that is immediately immersive and finds you soon embroiled in its simple world of cities where everybody has one job.
Loom is incredibly charming and is perhaps the chief example of why we once called this genre "adventure" games. Others have walked the same road, but the walking is not the road.
Great and bold experiment
lacks the humour of other point and clicks, but makes up for it in the ethereal landscape it takes place upon
Este jogo é muito interessante e original, já o re-joguei várias vezes.
Complete playthrough. Seen from a modern point-of-view, LOOM feels (understandably!) rather primitive, but I'm glad to have played it as some insight into some of the earlier roots of the point-and-click adventure genre. The game's use of musical 'spells' to solve puzzles is unique amongst games that I've played and works nicely to expand on the possibility set of actions that are typically found in the genre, even if needing to remember (or take notes of) the spells is a slight annoyance.
Designed by former Infocom writer Brian Moriarty, Loom is probably the least LucasArts-styled LucasArts adventure game (next to The Dig, also co-designed by Moriarty). You'll probably have no idea what the hell is happening if you start Loom without diving first into its supplementary material: a small audio drama serving as a prologue, and a booklet also used to take precious notes. And you'll need to take notes if you play Loom.
Every puzzle is solved by using spells, called drafts. Those spells are composed of four different musical notes, that you need to enter manually by clicking on your staff. It's a system more reminiscent of text adventures and old CRPGs than your usual graphical adventure game. That spell system is both the game's strongest and weakest point. Honestly, it's really cool to use your powers, literally unfolding the fabric of reality. On the other hand, it's not quite there as a game mechanic. You need to note every draft you encounter, and if you mishear, misspell, or plainly forget to do it then... Good luck? Because there's a huge chance you won't be able to listen to them ever again (you can look up on the internet nowadays, but they're semi-randomized so it's still a pain).
Despite the draft system's apparent complexity, Loom is a very short and easy game. It's a shame because the world is fantastic, and you'll surely beg for more at the end. The art is great, the story pretty wild, and the Tchaikovsky soundtrack ties everything together.
Loom as a whole feels greater than the sum of its parts. While as a game it kind of falls short (and mostly because IT IS so damn short), it's so incredibly charming I can't help recommending it wholeheartedly.
Every puzzle is solved by using spells, called drafts. Those spells are composed of four different musical notes, that you need to enter manually by clicking on your staff. It's a system more reminiscent of text adventures and old CRPGs than your usual graphical adventure game. That spell system is both the game's strongest and weakest point. Honestly, it's really cool to use your powers, literally unfolding the fabric of reality. On the other hand, it's not quite there as a game mechanic. You need to note every draft you encounter, and if you mishear, misspell, or plainly forget to do it then... Good luck? Because there's a huge chance you won't be able to listen to them ever again (you can look up on the internet nowadays, but they're semi-randomized so it's still a pain).
Despite the draft system's apparent complexity, Loom is a very short and easy game. It's a shame because the world is fantastic, and you'll surely beg for more at the end. The art is great, the story pretty wild, and the Tchaikovsky soundtrack ties everything together.
Loom as a whole feels greater than the sum of its parts. While as a game it kind of falls short (and mostly because IT IS so damn short), it's so incredibly charming I can't help recommending it wholeheartedly.
Loom is a point & click adventure game initially released in January 1990 for MS-DOS by LucasArts using the SCUMM engine, with Brian Moriarty as its Designer. There are multiple versions for this game, but the initial release was on a floppy disk and had 16-color EGA graphics with no voice acting, while the version that I played, the "Talkie" version, released in 1992 on CD with 256-color VGA graphics. This version includes voice acting, but some scenes are censored and there are some cuts as far as conversation close-ups and puzzles with multiple solutions go.
There is also a version that came out for the Japanese FM-Towns in 1991 which many fans consider to be the "definitive version", while Brian Moriarty himself considers the initial EGA version to be the "real" edition. If you want to play the game for yourself, I can say the 1992 version compared to the 1990 version will not drastically alter your opinion of the game, so if you value VGA graphics and voice acting, I would go with that.
Anyway, what's this game about?: In Loom, you play Bobbin Threadbare, a 17-year-old who is part of the "Weaver's Guild", a group of people who became masters of woven fabric and over time gained the ability to weave "patterns of influence into the very fabric of reality", meaning they could actually change the color of something, turn invisible and heal, among other things. In this world, many other Guilds that focus on a singular craft exist and the Weavers Guild was persecuted for using "witchcraft", resulting in their escape to an island that became their new home, Loom, called after their guild symbol, a loom (an apparatus for making fabric).
Events unfold and Bobbin Threadbare is born, however in unforeseen circumstances, and the loom's pattern is thrown into chaos as a result. This means that throughout his life, Bobbin is not allowed to learn the Guild's ability to weave, since he is seen as the one who has cursed the guild. He is raised by "Dame Hetchel", an old serving woman, who in secret teaches Bobbin the basics of weaving and when Bobbin turns 17 and the story starts, it is her who gives him his mission.
At the start of the game, the Elders summon Bobbin to the Sanctuary to determine his fate. As he arrives, he sees how the Elders punish Dame Hetchel. They turn her into an egg, only for a swan to crash into the room from a window and turn all the Elders into swans as well. The Elders shout that this is all Bobbin's fault as they fly off to who knows where.
This is where the actual gameplay begins. One of the elders dropped his "distaff" (a stick to which wool is wound for spinning), and Dame Hetchel is still in the room as an egg. You pick up the distaff, point it to the egg, and four notes start playing. You repeat this four-note pattern (called a "draft), and the egg starts to hatch ("open"). Out comes Dame Hetchel as a cygnet (young swan) and tells Bobbin about his mission, about how the "Third Shadow" will cover the world and why he has to find the swans.
So to summarize, you play Bobbing Threadbane, something is wrong with the "loom" and the Elders of your guild blame you. You are left on your own when all Elders are turned into swans and leave the island that you live in, so you pick up the distaff and have to use the "Weaving ability/magic" to try and find the flock and try to stop the world to be covered by the Third Shadow.
This is where Loom is very different to pretty much all other graphical adventures of its time. Instead of an interface with a bunch of verbs and an inventory to store items, you are solely equipped with the distaff. The distaff shows up horizontally on the interface and every few inches of it make up one sound, each being higher than the next. For each "draft" (magical ability), you need to figure out the corresponding four-note sound. For opening something, this sound turns out to be "E-C-E-D". Later on for example, you find for trees with holes in them, and each tree you click presents you with one note. Once you get all four, you have a draft. You don't know what the draft is for until you actually successfully tried it on something. This particular one for example was used to "twist sth". As you progress further and further, you unlock more and more notes on your distaff, which you need to do to be able to play some of the more advanced drafts which may use letters (like "A") that you are not skilled enough to play.
But with that, let's move over to my rating system to discuss all aspects of this game individually.
STORYTELLING: Throughout the story in this game, which only takes about 3-4 hours depending on the difficulty you pick (more on that in a bit), you visit many different areas and meet different Guilds like the Blacksmiths Guild or the Shepherds Guild. You visit the Forge, the home of the Blacksmiths, Crystalgard, the headquarters of the Guild of Glassmakers and a cathedral, home of the Guild of Clerics, among many other locations. The world created for this game overall is very unique and to know that this is not just a playground for your main character but rather a world that is actually alive definitely aids the telling of stories concerning both the main quest and of simple side stories. For each Guild you stumble upon, you meet one or multiple characters who tell you what their kind is like, what kind of problems ail them and what goals they pursue. The Glassmakers for example are building a massive Sythe atop the Crystalgard. For what purpose?
The main story that ties all this together is an interesting, yet convoluted one that falls victim to the use of a lot of "this happens so that this can happen" methods of storytelling and especially scenes that should call for urgency just don't and the pacing of it all can fall a bit flat as a result. For example, in the final showdown with Chaos, instead of taking your distaff, with which you are pretty much incompetent, and forcing you to teach him the ways, he just stands there until you do something. Worst of all, the game has been made with a trilogy in mind, and according to Brian Moriarty himself, both himself and others just wanted to do something else after Loom was finished, and they just never got back to it. So expect a cliffhanger ending and change your plans of playing this game if that bothers you. It probably should, but the game is worth experiencing nevertheless I think.
The voice acting in the versions that include it is actually much much better than I would have expected and while the main character's voice actor made him sound a bit whiny throughout, the cast overall did a great job. I played the first chapter without voice first and definitely am glad that I played the voiced version afterwards.
Unlike many other LucasArts adventure games of its time, Loom is more serious and has few humorous elements included (though they are certainly there). As someone who has tried some Monkey Island but didn't finish any of their games prior to Loom, I can say that I prefer the more humorous games and graphical adventures with often odd solutions to puzzles definitely fit the "Comedy" category more.
GAMEPLAY: There is a "Book of Patterns" that comes with your copy of the game, if you indeed do want to buy a copy for $100+ these days. For everyone else, there is the manual online which includes it, and while it's not necessary to be used in my version of the game, the initial release does have a puzzle right at the start that is unsolvable without the manual in hand. Otherwise, the "book" lists a bunch of drafts (spells) and you can use it to write down the notes that the game gives you. Otherwise, it's recommended to write down the notes elsewhere, because the first draft you learn (open) will be needed to solve puzzles in the final third of the game, and writing down is the only option to access it. Almost all drafts are randomized for each playthrough, so you can't look up the notes online either.
Apart from using drafts, there isn't really much gameplay in this game. You walk around, you find items to click on and you either are rewarded with a new draft or you can try to use known drafts on it. Some drafts I didn't really find any use for, so I wonder if they were a) a distraction or b) used for optional puzzles, but the devs found a creative use for most drafts at least twice and sometimes, the game also requires you to think outside the box. How? You learn the draft "twist". But what about when you have to untwist something? In that case, try the draft backwards.
Spelling out a draft can take quite a while, so if you try multiple ones at something to guess the puzzle solution, it can take you a few minutes to go through all of them. This is nothing unusual for games of its time but with no skip animation button it did get boring after a while to wait and see what happens. Being more skilled at these games than me might mean you figure these puzzles out quicker than me though and limit your amount of unsuccessful attempts.
Finally, when you start the game, there are 3 difficulty levels. PRACTICE, which shows you the letters for each note, which note you hear and it also spells out all four letters at the end. STANDARD, which also shows letters and marks the note you hear, but it doesn't spell it out in the end. It's pretty much the same difficulty level though. EXPERT, which neither shows letters nor which part of the distaff the note comes from, meaning you have to figure out which part of the distaff makes which noise at first and then make out those notes from hearing. It's definitely much harder than the other two difficulties but also more than doable.
MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE: The voice acting is very good. I didn't quite warm up to the voice of the main character, but the rest did a fine job. Especially later on in the game, you could hear the end of the previous dialogue line cutting into the next dialogue line, which got more and more notable right into the finale.
The game's sound design is overall good but has similar issues. When the four notes of a draft play for example, one or more of the note sounds are cut off for a split second almost every time.
The soundtrack has a mystical and classical theme and from what I've read online, it's highly regarded and a big part of the experience for many. It definitely is a big part in enhancing the experience, I agree, but I wasn't quite enamored with it. Sound cutting issues were present here as well and while I understand music was limited to the most important moments due to technical limitations, it didn't help my experience when 90% of the game was played without any music in the background. Overall, it's a solid and fitting soundtrack but the times have raised expectations on what to expect there for sure.
GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN: Loom received top or near-top grades for its graphics at the time and even today its sophisticated art design and its colorful, varied landscapes stand out over many other games coming out in and around 1990.
ATMOSPHERE: Music, sound and graphics work well in tandem with the game's lore and world building to create an atmospheric adventure, however the rarely used music due to the technical limitations at the time does take away from the atmosphere, especially whenever you are stuck on a particular puzzle and spend minutes without any sound, whether its from the soundtrack or from the musical notes coming out of the distaff.
CONTENT: There isn't that much here outside of the main story, which takes 3-4 hours to beat, but considering the premise of this game, it works in its favor that the game is shorter than comparable graphical adventures.
LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN: Overall the structure in this game works well, but at times the places you find the necessary drafts from to progress seem pretty random. In addition, the final chapter seems rushed and at least to me, the puzzle solutions seemed unintuitive.
CONCEPT/INNOVATION: The distaff being the key component is certainly unique. I think it's fair to say that it's unlikely that you've played any game quite like Loom. It didn't really stick as a concept, ostensibly, but it shows developers desire to innovate at the time where a more traditional adventure would have been a safer bet. Plus, at worst it makes Loom stand out, since the unique gameplay feature is not something that I would call "bad" at all. The game sold over half a million copies all told from what I've read, so it wasn't a commercial failure either.
REPLAYABILITY: You can replay it once to get a better grasp of the plot and especially to try the game on expert if you played your first playthrough on PRACTICE/STANDARD, but there isn't much replayability beyond that.
PLAYABILITY: The game works fine overall and is completely playable.
OVERALL: You should have probably already played this game if you're a fan of point & click adventures, especially of this day and age. Unlike many other games from this time period, this one does not require you to go through magazine or internet tips on how to solve puzzles in order to complete it. Even the manual says that the devs created this game in a way that they wanted you to complete and fully experience it, so you won't be stuck for too long at any particular puzzle. And that's good, because even if the story is not as mesmerizing today as it might have been in the early 90s, it's still one worth telling and one that a faster pace, by nature of the player being stuck at puzzles far less, does a lot of good.
_____
WHAT THEY SAID AT THE TIME:
- "Unknown Gamer" from the GamePro Issue 41 (Dec 92): "Loom's magic comes mainly from its highly creative and original use of music"
- "Leslie Mizell" from the Game Player's Issue 12 Vol. 2 Nr. 6 (June 90): "[...] sit back and watch the spellbinding graphics as the story unfolds."
There is also a version that came out for the Japanese FM-Towns in 1991 which many fans consider to be the "definitive version", while Brian Moriarty himself considers the initial EGA version to be the "real" edition. If you want to play the game for yourself, I can say the 1992 version compared to the 1990 version will not drastically alter your opinion of the game, so if you value VGA graphics and voice acting, I would go with that.
Anyway, what's this game about?: In Loom, you play Bobbin Threadbare, a 17-year-old who is part of the "Weaver's Guild", a group of people who became masters of woven fabric and over time gained the ability to weave "patterns of influence into the very fabric of reality", meaning they could actually change the color of something, turn invisible and heal, among other things. In this world, many other Guilds that focus on a singular craft exist and the Weavers Guild was persecuted for using "witchcraft", resulting in their escape to an island that became their new home, Loom, called after their guild symbol, a loom (an apparatus for making fabric).
Events unfold and Bobbin Threadbare is born, however in unforeseen circumstances, and the loom's pattern is thrown into chaos as a result. This means that throughout his life, Bobbin is not allowed to learn the Guild's ability to weave, since he is seen as the one who has cursed the guild. He is raised by "Dame Hetchel", an old serving woman, who in secret teaches Bobbin the basics of weaving and when Bobbin turns 17 and the story starts, it is her who gives him his mission.
At the start of the game, the Elders summon Bobbin to the Sanctuary to determine his fate. As he arrives, he sees how the Elders punish Dame Hetchel. They turn her into an egg, only for a swan to crash into the room from a window and turn all the Elders into swans as well. The Elders shout that this is all Bobbin's fault as they fly off to who knows where.
This is where the actual gameplay begins. One of the elders dropped his "distaff" (a stick to which wool is wound for spinning), and Dame Hetchel is still in the room as an egg. You pick up the distaff, point it to the egg, and four notes start playing. You repeat this four-note pattern (called a "draft), and the egg starts to hatch ("open"). Out comes Dame Hetchel as a cygnet (young swan) and tells Bobbin about his mission, about how the "Third Shadow" will cover the world and why he has to find the swans.
So to summarize, you play Bobbing Threadbane, something is wrong with the "loom" and the Elders of your guild blame you. You are left on your own when all Elders are turned into swans and leave the island that you live in, so you pick up the distaff and have to use the "Weaving ability/magic" to try and find the flock and try to stop the world to be covered by the Third Shadow.
This is where Loom is very different to pretty much all other graphical adventures of its time. Instead of an interface with a bunch of verbs and an inventory to store items, you are solely equipped with the distaff. The distaff shows up horizontally on the interface and every few inches of it make up one sound, each being higher than the next. For each "draft" (magical ability), you need to figure out the corresponding four-note sound. For opening something, this sound turns out to be "E-C-E-D". Later on for example, you find for trees with holes in them, and each tree you click presents you with one note. Once you get all four, you have a draft. You don't know what the draft is for until you actually successfully tried it on something. This particular one for example was used to "twist sth". As you progress further and further, you unlock more and more notes on your distaff, which you need to do to be able to play some of the more advanced drafts which may use letters (like "A") that you are not skilled enough to play.
But with that, let's move over to my rating system to discuss all aspects of this game individually.
STORYTELLING: Throughout the story in this game, which only takes about 3-4 hours depending on the difficulty you pick (more on that in a bit), you visit many different areas and meet different Guilds like the Blacksmiths Guild or the Shepherds Guild. You visit the Forge, the home of the Blacksmiths, Crystalgard, the headquarters of the Guild of Glassmakers and a cathedral, home of the Guild of Clerics, among many other locations. The world created for this game overall is very unique and to know that this is not just a playground for your main character but rather a world that is actually alive definitely aids the telling of stories concerning both the main quest and of simple side stories. For each Guild you stumble upon, you meet one or multiple characters who tell you what their kind is like, what kind of problems ail them and what goals they pursue. The Glassmakers for example are building a massive Sythe atop the Crystalgard. For what purpose?
The main story that ties all this together is an interesting, yet convoluted one that falls victim to the use of a lot of "this happens so that this can happen" methods of storytelling and especially scenes that should call for urgency just don't and the pacing of it all can fall a bit flat as a result. For example, in the final showdown with Chaos, instead of taking your distaff, with which you are pretty much incompetent, and forcing you to teach him the ways, he just stands there until you do something. Worst of all, the game has been made with a trilogy in mind, and according to Brian Moriarty himself, both himself and others just wanted to do something else after Loom was finished, and they just never got back to it. So expect a cliffhanger ending and change your plans of playing this game if that bothers you. It probably should, but the game is worth experiencing nevertheless I think.
The voice acting in the versions that include it is actually much much better than I would have expected and while the main character's voice actor made him sound a bit whiny throughout, the cast overall did a great job. I played the first chapter without voice first and definitely am glad that I played the voiced version afterwards.
Unlike many other LucasArts adventure games of its time, Loom is more serious and has few humorous elements included (though they are certainly there). As someone who has tried some Monkey Island but didn't finish any of their games prior to Loom, I can say that I prefer the more humorous games and graphical adventures with often odd solutions to puzzles definitely fit the "Comedy" category more.
GAMEPLAY: There is a "Book of Patterns" that comes with your copy of the game, if you indeed do want to buy a copy for $100+ these days. For everyone else, there is the manual online which includes it, and while it's not necessary to be used in my version of the game, the initial release does have a puzzle right at the start that is unsolvable without the manual in hand. Otherwise, the "book" lists a bunch of drafts (spells) and you can use it to write down the notes that the game gives you. Otherwise, it's recommended to write down the notes elsewhere, because the first draft you learn (open) will be needed to solve puzzles in the final third of the game, and writing down is the only option to access it. Almost all drafts are randomized for each playthrough, so you can't look up the notes online either.
Apart from using drafts, there isn't really much gameplay in this game. You walk around, you find items to click on and you either are rewarded with a new draft or you can try to use known drafts on it. Some drafts I didn't really find any use for, so I wonder if they were a) a distraction or b) used for optional puzzles, but the devs found a creative use for most drafts at least twice and sometimes, the game also requires you to think outside the box. How? You learn the draft "twist". But what about when you have to untwist something? In that case, try the draft backwards.
Spelling out a draft can take quite a while, so if you try multiple ones at something to guess the puzzle solution, it can take you a few minutes to go through all of them. This is nothing unusual for games of its time but with no skip animation button it did get boring after a while to wait and see what happens. Being more skilled at these games than me might mean you figure these puzzles out quicker than me though and limit your amount of unsuccessful attempts.
Finally, when you start the game, there are 3 difficulty levels. PRACTICE, which shows you the letters for each note, which note you hear and it also spells out all four letters at the end. STANDARD, which also shows letters and marks the note you hear, but it doesn't spell it out in the end. It's pretty much the same difficulty level though. EXPERT, which neither shows letters nor which part of the distaff the note comes from, meaning you have to figure out which part of the distaff makes which noise at first and then make out those notes from hearing. It's definitely much harder than the other two difficulties but also more than doable.
MUSIC/SOUND/VOICE: The voice acting is very good. I didn't quite warm up to the voice of the main character, but the rest did a fine job. Especially later on in the game, you could hear the end of the previous dialogue line cutting into the next dialogue line, which got more and more notable right into the finale.
The game's sound design is overall good but has similar issues. When the four notes of a draft play for example, one or more of the note sounds are cut off for a split second almost every time.
The soundtrack has a mystical and classical theme and from what I've read online, it's highly regarded and a big part of the experience for many. It definitely is a big part in enhancing the experience, I agree, but I wasn't quite enamored with it. Sound cutting issues were present here as well and while I understand music was limited to the most important moments due to technical limitations, it didn't help my experience when 90% of the game was played without any music in the background. Overall, it's a solid and fitting soundtrack but the times have raised expectations on what to expect there for sure.
GRAPHICS/ART DESIGN: Loom received top or near-top grades for its graphics at the time and even today its sophisticated art design and its colorful, varied landscapes stand out over many other games coming out in and around 1990.
ATMOSPHERE: Music, sound and graphics work well in tandem with the game's lore and world building to create an atmospheric adventure, however the rarely used music due to the technical limitations at the time does take away from the atmosphere, especially whenever you are stuck on a particular puzzle and spend minutes without any sound, whether its from the soundtrack or from the musical notes coming out of the distaff.
CONTENT: There isn't that much here outside of the main story, which takes 3-4 hours to beat, but considering the premise of this game, it works in its favor that the game is shorter than comparable graphical adventures.
LEVEL/MISSION DESIGN: Overall the structure in this game works well, but at times the places you find the necessary drafts from to progress seem pretty random. In addition, the final chapter seems rushed and at least to me, the puzzle solutions seemed unintuitive.
CONCEPT/INNOVATION: The distaff being the key component is certainly unique. I think it's fair to say that it's unlikely that you've played any game quite like Loom. It didn't really stick as a concept, ostensibly, but it shows developers desire to innovate at the time where a more traditional adventure would have been a safer bet. Plus, at worst it makes Loom stand out, since the unique gameplay feature is not something that I would call "bad" at all. The game sold over half a million copies all told from what I've read, so it wasn't a commercial failure either.
REPLAYABILITY: You can replay it once to get a better grasp of the plot and especially to try the game on expert if you played your first playthrough on PRACTICE/STANDARD, but there isn't much replayability beyond that.
PLAYABILITY: The game works fine overall and is completely playable.
OVERALL: You should have probably already played this game if you're a fan of point & click adventures, especially of this day and age. Unlike many other games from this time period, this one does not require you to go through magazine or internet tips on how to solve puzzles in order to complete it. Even the manual says that the devs created this game in a way that they wanted you to complete and fully experience it, so you won't be stuck for too long at any particular puzzle. And that's good, because even if the story is not as mesmerizing today as it might have been in the early 90s, it's still one worth telling and one that a faster pace, by nature of the player being stuck at puzzles far less, does a lot of good.
_____
WHAT THEY SAID AT THE TIME:
- "Unknown Gamer" from the GamePro Issue 41 (Dec 92): "Loom's magic comes mainly from its highly creative and original use of music"
- "Leslie Mizell" from the Game Player's Issue 12 Vol. 2 Nr. 6 (June 90): "[...] sit back and watch the spellbinding graphics as the story unfolds."
i played this as a kid, or tried to, on a 286 with a monochrome crt and just the pc speaker for sound. as you may imagine, sound and colour being essential gameplay elements, it didn't go so well until my parents upgraded the computer.
i'm almost certain i finished it then, already more or less capable of keeping up with english, but constantly looking up unfamiliar words, and that way of experiencing it made it maybe twice as magical and dreamlike as it would have been for anyone else.
i came back to it in my 20s. the magic, you won't be surprised to find out, was gone. if you've ever played lucasarts adventure games or experienced any kind of fantasy story, you'll probably think it's more or less okay. charming, sure, a bit symbolist and mysterious, absolutely, but probably not life-changing.
if you're not playing it with a ten-year-old's amazement like i did, loom's biggest strength is still that it refuses to entirely explain itself. it's just a weird and wonderful world that odd things happen in, and to this day, that's worth a lot to me.
i'm almost certain i finished it then, already more or less capable of keeping up with english, but constantly looking up unfamiliar words, and that way of experiencing it made it maybe twice as magical and dreamlike as it would have been for anyone else.
i came back to it in my 20s. the magic, you won't be surprised to find out, was gone. if you've ever played lucasarts adventure games or experienced any kind of fantasy story, you'll probably think it's more or less okay. charming, sure, a bit symbolist and mysterious, absolutely, but probably not life-changing.
if you're not playing it with a ten-year-old's amazement like i did, loom's biggest strength is still that it refuses to entirely explain itself. it's just a weird and wonderful world that odd things happen in, and to this day, that's worth a lot to me.
Art vs entertainment.
For years, we’ve been classifiyng different forms of media in either of these categories. For some reason, certain kinds of media (example: Music) are universally considered art, while some others (streaming) are hardly considered as such, being instead classified as mere entertainment, with the implication of being a minor form of expression. Yet, even in the same media we can find certain discussions, that might sound a bit absurd: It comes as no surprise that some people might consider Bach and Mozart as real artistic expressions while considering Drake and Beyoncé a simple entertainment. Yet, all of them are music. And it’s also noteworthy that certain forms of art actually started off being disregarded as a minor expression: in it’s beginnings, Cinema wasn’t a canonical form of art as it is right now. That place was occupied by forms like Theatre and even Literature, and it took many decades for filmmakers to have their works universally considered as a form of art.
Videogames? It’s pretty logical to consider them as an artistic expression nowadays. For some people that’s an obvious facts, and many others might agree, given the proper arguments. Yet, it wasn’t always like this.
To understand what Loom was trying to do, you have to understand that by 1990, the common picture society had when it came to videogames might have been something closer to Mario or Pac-Man. How could that, in those times, could even dream about being considered a real art form? Videogames weren’t still considered something dangerous (as they did post-columbine) but rather something closer to a toy. Something to play with.
Loom (and probably some other contemporary games) did it’s best to state that video-games could be a channel for the artistic expression of beauty as much as some other better-reputed media. To do so, they necessarily had to evoke that art as much as posible.
Loom tells a story that basically suggest it’s own mithology. After all, it is a tale of creation, just like many myths, and even the book of Genesis.
In the visual aspect, the artists of the game did their best to push the boundaries of the already dated EGA-graphics. The result? Probably some of the finest EGA-pixel art ever done.
The music is basically a MIDI rendition of the different sections of Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake. This is one of the aspects where the artistic pretention become more obvious, but in a good way. After all, Loom’s music is not mere decorative: It’s actually a stellar part of it’s essence.
Loom even left some room for innovation in the gameplay department: Instead of the classic inventory puzzle that was so popular at the time in the then rising point n’click genre, Loom introduced a gameplay where the puzzles were solved with music. Basically, playing the proper sequence of notes, you would cast the proper spell given the necessity. And of course, you had to grab a pen and a paper in order to register all the melodies/spells that the game will progressively introduce to you. You only grab an item once in the entire game: when you pick your magic staff.
There are games (aswell as films and books) that give you enjoyment for the moment, and that’s it, that’s where it ends. But some others, they become somewhat of a recurring thought. You can find yourself at a random place, in a moment of “disasociation”, thinking about that game, analyizing it, discovering things that weren’t obvious the first time around. Games that really resonate with you. And for me, Loom is definitely one of those games.
Loom may not have change the destiny of videogames but it definitely had the vision to predict it’s future.
For years, we’ve been classifiyng different forms of media in either of these categories. For some reason, certain kinds of media (example: Music) are universally considered art, while some others (streaming) are hardly considered as such, being instead classified as mere entertainment, with the implication of being a minor form of expression. Yet, even in the same media we can find certain discussions, that might sound a bit absurd: It comes as no surprise that some people might consider Bach and Mozart as real artistic expressions while considering Drake and Beyoncé a simple entertainment. Yet, all of them are music. And it’s also noteworthy that certain forms of art actually started off being disregarded as a minor expression: in it’s beginnings, Cinema wasn’t a canonical form of art as it is right now. That place was occupied by forms like Theatre and even Literature, and it took many decades for filmmakers to have their works universally considered as a form of art.
Videogames? It’s pretty logical to consider them as an artistic expression nowadays. For some people that’s an obvious facts, and many others might agree, given the proper arguments. Yet, it wasn’t always like this.
To understand what Loom was trying to do, you have to understand that by 1990, the common picture society had when it came to videogames might have been something closer to Mario or Pac-Man. How could that, in those times, could even dream about being considered a real art form? Videogames weren’t still considered something dangerous (as they did post-columbine) but rather something closer to a toy. Something to play with.
Loom (and probably some other contemporary games) did it’s best to state that video-games could be a channel for the artistic expression of beauty as much as some other better-reputed media. To do so, they necessarily had to evoke that art as much as posible.
Loom tells a story that basically suggest it’s own mithology. After all, it is a tale of creation, just like many myths, and even the book of Genesis.
In the visual aspect, the artists of the game did their best to push the boundaries of the already dated EGA-graphics. The result? Probably some of the finest EGA-pixel art ever done.
The music is basically a MIDI rendition of the different sections of Tchaikovsky’s Swan Lake. This is one of the aspects where the artistic pretention become more obvious, but in a good way. After all, Loom’s music is not mere decorative: It’s actually a stellar part of it’s essence.
Loom even left some room for innovation in the gameplay department: Instead of the classic inventory puzzle that was so popular at the time in the then rising point n’click genre, Loom introduced a gameplay where the puzzles were solved with music. Basically, playing the proper sequence of notes, you would cast the proper spell given the necessity. And of course, you had to grab a pen and a paper in order to register all the melodies/spells that the game will progressively introduce to you. You only grab an item once in the entire game: when you pick your magic staff.
There are games (aswell as films and books) that give you enjoyment for the moment, and that’s it, that’s where it ends. But some others, they become somewhat of a recurring thought. You can find yourself at a random place, in a moment of “disasociation”, thinking about that game, analyizing it, discovering things that weren’t obvious the first time around. Games that really resonate with you. And for me, Loom is definitely one of those games.
Loom may not have change the destiny of videogames but it definitely had the vision to predict it’s future.
One of my fav graphic adventures ever. Really imaginative, very funny, full of charm
Não é o melhor jogo da LucasArts (esse seria o clássico The Secret of Monkey Island), mas é certamente o mais lindo. Não me refiro aqui à beleza audiovisual, mas sim artística como um todo. É uma obra com fortíssimo teor autoral, sendo antes de tudo uma forma do Brian Moriarty (designer e roteirista) se expressar. Sendo a expressão artística de um indivíduo específico, não é de se admirar que o resultado seja único mesmo anos depois. Trata-se de um adventure game sem itens, sem inventário, sem árvores de diálogos. Um jogo que mesmo se separando e evitando tudo o que faz do gênero o que é, captura sua essência como ferramenta narrativa por excelência de forma magistral.
Mas para ficar bem claro: audiovisualmente também é uma obra incomparável, e isso considerando não apenas no catálogo da LucasArts. Ouso dizer que ainda não surgiu um exemplo de pixel-art mais incrível que Loom - especialmente a versão EGA, que usa técnicas como dithering e blending de maneira incrível.
Mas para ficar bem claro: audiovisualmente também é uma obra incomparável, e isso considerando não apenas no catálogo da LucasArts. Ouso dizer que ainda não surgiu um exemplo de pixel-art mais incrível que Loom - especialmente a versão EGA, que usa técnicas como dithering e blending de maneira incrível.
Must play for any point-and-click fan. Amazing game that's only fault is that it's so short.