Flower

I would like to think that I am not a sucker. I have never responded to emails from a Zimbabwe based legal firm asking me to send them money so they can transfer a long lost inheritance to my bank account. I have never purchased anything from a television infomercial, regardless of how much it was being screamed about. I even understand that free internet porn isn’t so free once all the spyware, trojans and chaffing are taken into account. What I do not get is how this simmering pile of jaded dubiousness I call my gaming life was pulled in so completely by a few flower petals, some pretty colors, and some reasonably well implemented motion controls. Flower is not so much a game as it is a manliness endurance test. I failed, confiscate my chainsaw bayonet, I’m too busy floating around a meadow at sunset to notice anyway.

If Flower was broken down and scrutinized on its individual pieces then none of it would make sense. The player takes control of a single flower petal, moves through six different levels via motion controls and the X button collecting other flower petals, and that’s it. The levels are never difficult, controlling the petal collection with the sixaxis is surprisingly effective and finding all the necessary flowers is not at all hard. So far it sounds like Katamari Damacy minus the giant ball and cows. The music will also not be winning any awards if taken out of context, offering new age guitar soundscapes with no tunes to stick in the players head. The only individual attention grabber that Flower has is its look, and even that veers dangerously close to Nvdia tech demos that pack in with over priced video cards. The logical side of my brain that counts frames in Street Fighter and spends hours grinding in mediocre RPG’s checked out and went to sleep five minutes in. Flower really isn’t much of a game, yet my soft, gooey side that only comes out after several beers and when no one is looking enjoyed every moment.

Flower may be the best example of minimalistic/holistic game design that I have ever seen. It is everything that it needs to be and nothing more. The game play and motion controls compliment the graphics which are completely tied up with the sound. Nothing feels extraneous; even the ‘collect a million of this’ aspect (which is really the whole game) does not feel like a waste of time. Somehow, someway I cared about what was going on. By the third or fourth level, when the not so subtle nature vs. man conflict was introduced, the flowers themselves had become characters and the story just as effective and engaging and any forty hour RPG with a staff of hundreds and budget of millions, and this was done in less than two hours of drifting around grassy plains filled with windmills and hay bales. No words, no HUD, no inventory system, no high powered shotguns and independently modeled flying body parts. Flower is a very simple idea reduced down to the barest minimum; pure, short, and effective.

Little gems like this are why I still turn on my PS3 and check the Playstation store once a week. XBLA may have all the big releases, but it has nothing this original. Games like Flower are a welcome relief from super high budget, soulless blockbusters. It packs more emotional impact into its ending credits then most other games can manage over hours and hours of ultra-violence. I didn’t care when Dom shot his emaciated wife out of mercy. I didn’t care when Otacon got laid in the back of an army helicopter, and I certainly didn’t care about Nico and his self induced family problems. I cared about Flower; there was a real emotional investment beyond rage at faceless internet opponents and low budget writing pasted on high budget effects. If I can abuse my imagined authority as someone who puts down words about games and hopes that people read them I am going to assign Flower as a must play. Swallow your ego, close the door so no one will see if you must, and spend a few hours without a reload button. If you are unmoved, then I give up, but I doubt anyone with an open mind and a spare $10 will escape Flower without it changing their expectations about what a game can do.