Fez

FEZ is a loveletter to video games. Classic video games mostly.

The first things I realized while playing it:

1. The visuals are amazing. 2D, but revolving around a 3D axis that is made of voxel like worlds
2. The platforming is great. Renaud must have put in a lot of attention so the game feels good to play
3. The game is huge and insanely detailed. Everything you see in screenshots usually has a reason to be there. Wow.
4. The music is the best thing I’ve heard in a long time.

So after I realized that, the first thing I did was hug Phil, because I was literally moved by all this. I forgot how much fun video games can bring to you. I forgot that you can enjoy every minute and don’t need to feel like you are being forced to get through a campaign, grind levels, drive or ride from place a to b every “mission, get through the longest cutscene in video game history, play the same mission over and over again, press quick time event buttons or walk a straight line the entire game until you see the end.

I’m not saying FEZ doesn’t have any of that. There is a lot of backtracking involved. But thankfully the game gives you a lot of chances to warp yourself to the place you want to go. Which is where the world map comes in super handy too. You see, FEZ has a huge world, in fact I think it’s made out of around 150 differently sized areas. And there is a lot to find.

The world map though seems to be complicated and confusing, and I’m sure it’ll be one of the biggest criticism of the game. I hovever think that it’s pretty neat and very clearly laid out. It’s complicated to people that only started playing the game. If you really want to finish FEZ though, you’ll notice how easy it is to figure out which place you should visit next to see what you haven’t found yet.

Because, holy crap, there is a lot to find. And the fun part about is that some of the things you need to find are filled with mystery. So much mystery that you might even end up spending up to 5 hours on a single puzzle. Don’t be scared though. If you don’t want to do that, like I did, you can simply ignore such puzzles. The game gives you a lot to do and you don’t need to see everything to enjoy your stay in the world of FEZ.

And one big recommendation I can give you, if you DO want to find out everything FEZ has to offer, is to avoid gamefaqs. I haven’t had so much joy figuring out one of the harder puzzles with my entire family by looking at the clues and trying to find a logical solution. This one little puzzle that gives you obvious points to work on got us all together, a family that has essentially only one person that likes video games, me, and still we all played it and enjoyed it a lot when we finally figured out what we were supposed to do. This is something I also forgot video games could do.

And then there’s the soundscape. I already said that the music is awesome, but the sound design is also spot on. Filled with frequency and bitrate filters, so it feels like it’s lowpoly, but it’s extremely detailed. You can hear the sound of wind, water, birds, a forest, storms. Even if the wonderful music isn’t there, the sounscape is still there to support the game’s mood.

All in all, FEZ made me happy. I forgot that video games can make you feel as good as this game made me feel.

Sheesh, I’m really not a good writer. Bleh, still, FEZ IS AWESOME.