You know what’s kind of cool? The 2013 game Proteus. For those who have never journeyed through the bizarre world that is Proteus, the game falls mechanically within that “first-person experiencer” niche. It gives you nothing more than the ability to walk around and control a first-person camera, and is really just about soaking in the environment you’re presented with. The whole game looks like a 3D realisation of an Atari 2600 game where blossoms are enormous squares that drop from jagged-edged trees, and frogs are vague, green clumps of pixels that bound away as you approach. Underlying all of this is an electronic soundtrack that casts the island in a quirky, other-worldly light, and a symphony of hums and chimes that are closely synchronised with the flora and fauna of your surroundings. There’s a tone almost like an 8-bit gong that sounds as wind rustles through the trees, while the swarms of insects flying about ring with wavering synths. The game’s sights and sounds create a bizarre and potent atmosphere. It’s about experiencing a wholly natural environment, but through a powerfully synthetic lens.

The instinctive thing to do is to lump Proteus in with games like Gone Home, Dear Esther, The Stanley Parable, and so on, and that’s not entirely bad practise, but there’s a lot of fundamental differences between these games that we ignore if we just try to group them by their mechanics. It seems like a particularly bad idea because the lack of traditional “gamey” components in these games is in part there to let their other elements take a more primary role. These other games are heavily narrative-driven, while Proteus is not, and for the most part it’s not trying to evoke the same tone either. In all honesty, while I know a lot of people have given Proteus very high praise, I think in comparison to these games Proteus just doesn’t have much meat on its bones, and so fails to stack up to them. The game provides some wonder and delight as you move around its island marvelling at all the little discoveries you make, but at least the first three quarters of the game feel rather shallow. It may utilise the same simple mechanics as the aforementioned games, but those other games use their simple mechanics as a means to explore something deeper.

The Stanley Parable boils itself down to mainly being “Choose a door”, but this is what lets it explore the concept of choice in games in the clearest and purest way. Dear Esther just lets you walk around an island, but at the same time an explicit story is being told, the environment is bound to the emotional state of the protagonist, and the island is even established fairly early on as a metaphor for the protagonist himself. Gone Home has you simply wander around a house, but uses the objects and writing that house’s residents have placed there as a means to explore that family and where they’ve gone in their lives. In Proteus you’re walking around this space, but there’s little context, meaning, or depth beyond anything you find apart from “this is kind of cool and fun”, and not that there’s anything wrong with that in itself, but I think it leaves the game feeling a bit lacking in places, especially because of the deliberately low detail of its graphics, and because it was released in a year when we also saw hits like The Stanley Parable and Gone Home. You can try to build your own story out of the few landmarks you find around the island, but even then the game gives you few pieces with which to do so and there’s little thematic consistency between them and the rest of the world. Then there’s the issue that the game costs £7 for something that’s about 45 minutes with little replay value, and the fact that the season-changing mechanic isn’t entirely obvious and requires you repeatedly and slowly returning to the same point on the island without any kind of map. None of this makes me fully dislike the game, but it does make it difficult for me to see it as a truly great game.

All this being said, there was one thing that really struck me playing back through Proteus that I didn’t feel as much the first time, and I don’t think it’s been given enough credit for. A lot of people seem to have looked upon Proteus as a light, lively, and relaxing game, and for the majority of its time it is, but again, Proteus very much has “nature” as one of its driving themes, and nature isn’t just about life and vibrancy, it can be brutal, and eventually all things must die. You start to see a hint of where the game is going during its autumn section as the trees begin to shed their leaves, the animals across the island become fewer, and the buzzing insects of summer now lay dying on the ground, but in many ways the island is still pretty and pleasant to explore. Then you see the change to winter and it’s a big shift.

In this last quarter of the game most of the trees are gnarled and bare, the clouds hang low in the sky, snow has buried the grass, there’s not a living animal in sight, and the sound takes on a ghostly edge. Eventually even you have to leave the island, with your drifting off into the sky indicating that perhaps your time was up too. Proteus doesn’t paint its winter as an entirely grim thing, there are still some slightly playful synths here and there, a chance to briefly peek at the sun if you can get above the clouds, and some areas bathed in an orange-pink sunset, but the game leaves you with the reminder that all animals and plants are mortal and that all things eventually meet their end. The ability to then start the game over from scratch with a new procedurally-generated environment creates a kind of "circle of life" story for the island. This is one of the things I will remember most about Proteus. Thanks for reading.