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    Sleep Is Death

    Game » consists of 2 releases. Released Apr 16, 2010

    A story-telling PC game for two players by game designer Jason Rohrer, creator of Passage.

    An hour with vidiot.

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    Dolphin_Butter

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    Edited By Dolphin_Butter

    I’ve never really talked to vidiot, and only recognized him by his NES cartridge user icon on GB; nevertheless, he was courageous enough to take the reins as the controller in our recent session of Sleep is Death. Courageous, for the interface was absolutely daunting despite the game being only 3 MB of data. All I had to do was sit back, relax and play the game he set before me. Since vidiot was in charge of changing scenarios in turns of 30 seconds, it’d only be natural to cut him some slack. I don’t play that way, so I persisted in trying to break the narrative I thought he was going for. However, he and I quickly found that resisting any semblance of sanity was the best route to go, and we came away with some very humorous results.

    The picture gallery below is a scene ripped out of the middle (I am the character with suspenders), if you like what you see, you can find the rest of it here.

    Needless to say, the story went in a wild direction; resulting in attempted pixelated rape, teleportation, penis discussion and suicide. It was certainly immature and haphazard, but it's quite unlike anything I've seen from a game this side of the Postal series. What surprised me the most was how most of the content was conceived and imagined by two people who are far away from each in both distance and personality. Sure, the game boils down to nothing but a glorified role-playing chat room, but the constraints--and the ability to possibly break those--are what made the game truly enjoyable. I wasn't able to rape the poor lady lying on the ground, but such is life as a character in Sleep is Death (or at least vidiot's version of it).
     
    Personally, I came away from the game with a smile on my face and, for future posterity, a record of the events that I linked to above. Despite a soured taste toward independently-developed games, Sleep is Death left me with complacency; during my session with vidiot, the interface, aged graphics and lo-fi music never cropped up as an issue. The game gave me the satisfaction of a "create, play and share" title that LittleBigPlanet failed to deliver. Even as someone with very little control over the proceedings, I felt intimately involved with the creation of a story.
     
    I recommend everyone to try it out at least once; it's definitely an experience worth having. Also, pester vidiot or Symphony for their story, it's way more hilarious.
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    Dolphin_Butter

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    #1  Edited By Dolphin_Butter

    I’ve never really talked to vidiot, and only recognized him by his NES cartridge user icon on GB; nevertheless, he was courageous enough to take the reins as the controller in our recent session of Sleep is Death. Courageous, for the interface was absolutely daunting despite the game being only 3 MB of data. All I had to do was sit back, relax and play the game he set before me. Since vidiot was in charge of changing scenarios in turns of 30 seconds, it’d only be natural to cut him some slack. I don’t play that way, so I persisted in trying to break the narrative I thought he was going for. However, he and I quickly found that resisting any semblance of sanity was the best route to go, and we came away with some very humorous results.

    The picture gallery below is a scene ripped out of the middle (I am the character with suspenders), if you like what you see, you can find the rest of it here.

    Needless to say, the story went in a wild direction; resulting in attempted pixelated rape, teleportation, penis discussion and suicide. It was certainly immature and haphazard, but it's quite unlike anything I've seen from a game this side of the Postal series. What surprised me the most was how most of the content was conceived and imagined by two people who are far away from each in both distance and personality. Sure, the game boils down to nothing but a glorified role-playing chat room, but the constraints--and the ability to possibly break those--are what made the game truly enjoyable. I wasn't able to rape the poor lady lying on the ground, but such is life as a character in Sleep is Death (or at least vidiot's version of it).
     
    Personally, I came away from the game with a smile on my face and, for future posterity, a record of the events that I linked to above. Despite a soured taste toward independently-developed games, Sleep is Death left me with complacency; during my session with vidiot, the interface, aged graphics and lo-fi music never cropped up as an issue. The game gave me the satisfaction of a "create, play and share" title that LittleBigPlanet failed to deliver. Even as someone with very little control over the proceedings, I felt intimately involved with the creation of a story.
     
    I recommend everyone to try it out at least once; it's definitely an experience worth having. Also, pester vidiot or Symphony for their story, it's way more hilarious.
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    vidiot

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    #2  Edited By vidiot

    Look, it's a thread with my name on it.
     
    I am very excited about the future of Sleep is Death. The interface at first is ludicrously difficult, this session in particular was done after about watching the first ten minute tutorial video. Even then things didn't go quite as smoothly, character dialog boxes seemed to have minds of their own.  
     
    But I've enjoyed Sleep is Death far more than anything I've played with Little Big Planet, and I'm stoked to learn more about the program. High recommendation.

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    Symphony

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    #3  Edited By Symphony

    So that's where your mind likes to wander when you RP, eh, Sleepy?

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    Dolphin_Butter

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    #4  Edited By Dolphin_Butter
    @vidiot said:
    "Even then things didn't go quite as smoothly, character dialog boxes seemed to have minds of their own."
    Yeah, but it did result in talking penises.
     
    @Symphony said:
    " So that's where your mind likes to wander when you RP, eh, Sleepy? "
    My justification is that I'm an equal-opportunity role-player.
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    eroticfishcake

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    #5  Edited By eroticfishcake

    I actually came across this a while ago though I never looked too deeply into it. I'll take a look at it later. But that aside, good read. 
     
    @Symphony: So what's YOUR story, eh?

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    beargirl1

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    #6  Edited By beargirl1

    i'm kind of interested in this game now.. 

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    Brunchies

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    #7  Edited By Brunchies

    This looks like a pretty cool indie game, its the only game I head that lets you make a story about pixelated rape. 

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    Ace829

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    #8  Edited By Ace829

    Oooh I wanna play. Where can I get this for?

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    Symphony

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    #9  Edited By Symphony
    @eroticfishcake said:

    " I actually came across this a while ago though I never looked too deeply into it. I'll take a look at it later. But that aside, good read. 
     
    @Symphony: So what's YOUR story, eh? "

    MY story? Well I ended up breaking his story and causing him to pull a deus ex machina at the end where he made the bad guy explode even though I totally had things planned out as I was pretending to be a news reporter and I was going to clobber him over the head with a frying pan, but Vidiot would have none of that. Siiiigh. Oh and Abe Lincoln was in a prison cell underneath this bad guy's house. Also, imps own cars. Who knew?
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    AndrewJD

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    #10  Edited By AndrewJD

    This looks weirdly intriguing. Might have to give it a go meself.

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