Coil

Coil is an experimental independent game that was created by Edmund McMillen and Florian Himsl with a soundtrack by John Erik Kaada. The creation of Coil birthed from McMillen's desire to try new ways to blend story into games.

The gameplay of Coil is simple: when the game starts off, there is a screen of text that relays the first bit of story in the game. To pass the screen, the player must swirl the mouse in the direction of the arrows that spin on the screen. When the screen is dismissed, a game scene will show up, and the player is expected to complete some minor task, such as moving across the screen or eating all of the pellets. The player is given no guidance or directions and is instead tasked with figuring out what is expected of them before they can complete it. After the task is completed, another story screen appears and this cycle is repeated about ten times until you beat the game.

In a deleted scene from Indie Game: The Movie, which can be found in The Basement Collection, McMillen says that the game was successful at getting a response from the community, but the story that he tried to convey was mixed up in people's own take-away from the game. Overall, McMillen considers the game a failure since he didn't achieve what he set out to do when he made the game.