Review Rundown: The One That’s Shaken, Not Stirred
Two shots of Denver, two shots of VR, a spritz of LA and serve with an online back. We’re drinking this week people. Six reviews.
This week we see the stirrings of spooky season thanks to some ghostly cocktails in Denver, get our VR narrative on, dive into a “keepsake game,” and do the whole literary adaptation thing.
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Field Guide to Memory — Jeeyon Shim and Shing Yin Khor
$30; Online, self-directed; Ongoing
(Disclosure: sometime NoPro correspondent Jessica Lachenal was a guest writer for this game.)
The creators of Field Guide to Memory describe it as a “keepsake game” and a “connected path game.” If those terms don’t sound familiar to you, it’s because they’re genres coined specifically to describe this solo-journaling-as-LARP game with tabletop elements.
In this unusual and beautiful experience, your mentor — the beloved cryptid researcher Dr. Elizabeth Lee — has been finally declared dead. It’s been five years since she went in search of the elusive pronghorned desert rat and went missing. You, as her mentee, must carry on her legacy. You will do so by creating your own character and writing down field notes (as an accomplished cryptozoologist yourself) as well as your responses to the non-player characters in the game, including Dr. Lee’s last employer, a suspicious institute who keeps stonewalling your requests for her archives.
All Field Guide to Memory players end up with an artifact (the “keepsake”) that contains all of the journal entries, drawings, and more that they create. While all players receive the same set of prompts, they will play as different characters, creating different memories of Dr. Lee and making different choices. You can see many of their original creations under the hashtag #FieldGuideToMemory (the “connected path” part; note: shared images may contain spoilers). Originally, the experience unfolded one day at a time via email; new players can purchase a PDF available on Itch. The self-directed version can be played at a pace of your choosing and lasts just under three weeks if you choose to play daily.
What starts as a mystery gradually evolves into something else, but to say much more would be to rob future players of discovering Field Guide to Memory’s charm. I will say that the missives that land in your mailbox each day are well designed. There were more than a few days where I was on the edge of my seat, wondering what would happen next. The writing prompts are evocative, providing white space for players to fill in their own blanks, but constrained enough not to feel overwhelming. And the inclusion of lovingly designed in-game epherma helps to create a vibrant world where it seems possible for dedicated scientists to discover something truly new. Perhaps even the pronghorned desert rat.
— Kathryn Yu, Executive Editor
Gatsby: An Immersive Illumination — Chapter 1: East Egg
Loose Change / 2cents Theatre
$20; Hollywood Fringe Festival; through Aug 28th
In any other timeline I’d spend the next few paragraphs talking about how good — if not quite great — this show is. This, of course, is the dumbest timeline, so we’re going to have to do a bit more than that.
Let’s start by saying: it’s pretty clear this work was conceived and planned back when everything looked rosy for California’s reopening, and the Hollywood Fringe Festival had pivoted into a happy hybrid format. Heck: we didn’t even have a mask mandate here — four weeks ago? Five? Who knows. We’ve always been at war with Eurasia. No. Wait. That’s Orwell, not Fitzgerald.
Now there’s always a “Why this? Why now?” question when it comes to pulling up something like Gatsby from the canon. Everyone who didn’t skip that week in high school knows the story — and there’s always a good chance you’ve seen one of the film versions. Also possibly in high school. Luckily 2Cents has an answer, and that is embodied by the antagonist of the story Tom Buchanan who, you probably have forgotten, is a racist douchebag. It’s a casual cruelty born out of extreme privilege and once actor Colin Willkie is on the scene the production seethes and pops with a “I could strangle that guy” energy. It’s a great performance and I hope no one tries to strangle that guy. It is all cribbed from the novel and it all works all too well almost 100 years later.
I won’t tip too much of the show’s hand, but the company does some dramaturgically smart things to sharpen this thread to a needlepoint. It’s all uncomfortable, but wisely so.
However there’s another part that isn’t wisely uncomfortable, if untouched food is any measurement.
The whole thing is framed as Nick Carraway, narrator of the novel, being invited over for dinner. The audience, roughly a dozen of us, are Nick. And there is food, laid out at a large table that the assembled gather around indoors on the stage. Of the group I was with I’d say maybe a third partook. I was not one of them. It’s one of those elements that a month and a half go would have read as “this is fine” and now reads as — well like I said. Most of us didn’t eat. The company is wasting money on that food at this point.
There are other things that work: the audience is broken into chunks, and even given different takeaways that are seem to promise unlocking scenes in future chapters. There are other things that don’t: the opening monologue from our narrator, Nick, goes on longer than you’d want and there was a missed opportunity in the staging to make it clear that he was us and we were him. Instead that bit was very performative.
There’s truly good work being done here, but if this Gatsby is to be Great, some pivoting and fine tuning needs to happen. I hope they put the effort in, I’d like to see where this goes.
— Noah Nelson, Founder and Publisher
The Hangman At Home — Michelle and Uri Kranot
Festival Circuit; VR
Michelle and Uri Kranot’s We Are At Home made its debut at the Tribeca Film Festival’s Immersive section this year, and while I didn’t get to see it I did get to see its companion piece, The Hangman at Home, and I’ve been meaning to write about it.
Both are based on Carl Sandburg’s poem “The Hangman at Home,” from the collection “Smoke & Steel” (1922), with the namesake piece being an animated film that unfolds around you in a series of rooms. There isn’t much in the way of narrative agency here, you trigger the animated sequences in various ways, but nevertheless the Kranot’s manage an uncanny trick. The entire time I felt like the two-dimensional characters could see me. I wasn’t in their consciousness the entire time, no, but at key points on vignettes that would discover me.
This strange sensation is one of the things we chase in immersive of every kind. Here it manifests as part of a roughly beautifully rendered world, one that feels like a paper craft stage come to life. It is one of the most striking uses of a aesthetic in VR narrative to date and a unique answer to the question “But why in VR?” that far too many productions fail to answer.
In short: this is one worth studying, in depth, to know how it produces its incredible emotional effects.
— Noah Nelson, Founder and Publisher
Plight of the Margo (Parts 1 and 2) — ConTRAPtions Escape Room
$84 per player for both parts; Fort Collins, CO; Ongoing
I have strong mixed emotions about this game. On the one hand, it’s gorgeously built and incredibly unique. On the other hand, it’s impossibly challenging and more frustrating than fun.
(Minor spoilers follow.)
The game, which won a Golden Lock Award from Room Escape Artist in 2019, takes place over two excruciating 90-minute halves. The setting is a spaceship — arguably the most authentic escape room spaceship set one might ever encounter — and a 2nd spaceship that we eventually dock with and board.
I played with two experienced escape room enthusiasts and one relatively novice player, and none of us ever felt like we had a true sense or understanding of what we were supposed to be doing. The mostly procedural tasks that we had to complete required the use of industrial grade hardware that we had no idea how to operate, let alone use to solve intricate puzzles.
Further complicating things were the utterly in-world lexicon, story elements, translated alien texts, and equipment placards. The game’s design allowed us access to too many sources of stimuli at one time, and then gave us little direction on where to go next. Connecting the dots in Plight of the Margo (i.e. figuring out what to do, and with what) is simultaneously the game’s biggest reward and greatest source of confusion.
And yet… the automated iris doors are so legit. The simulated outer space attack is jarring in all the right ways. There’s juuust enough gore to please a horror fan. And, bewildering as the hardware is, it fits perfectly into the world. The all-around uniqueness of the game makes me happy to have experienced it, yet it’s far from what I’d classify as any type of fun, even for moderate experienced and advanced escape room players.
— Danielle Look, Denver Correspondent
The Secret of Retropolis — Peanut Button
$12.99; VR (Oculus, Steam); Ongoing
Of all the oil joints in their robotic world, Ms. Montage had to walk into private investigator Philip’s office. Montage’s prized jewel, doubling as the powersource keeping her alive, has been stolen by her nefarious husband. In taking on the case, Philip ends up in a whole heap of trouble ranging from two-bit thugs to reminders of his partner’s death.
Hardboiled noir and point-and-click adventure fans are in for a treat with The Secret of Retropolis. In this hour-long VR experience, I’m wholly entranced from start to finish. While taking cues from a Raymond Chandler novel, Retropolis feels of its own, updating or modernizing genre troupes with refreshing or humorous takes.
But it’s Retropolis breathtaking visuals that make this experience a must try. Imagine Fritz Lang’s Metropolis but with a Futurama coloring style. Now, put those aesthetics into the hands of the three creator team core using Quill to create the experience. The result is a dynamic, highly stylized look with a stunningly rich level of detail. I continually pass the time simply looking around, mesmerized by the lively city and its denizens, soaking it all in.
Sadly Retropolis’ enchantment begins to wane when requiring audience interaction. I find myself at times clicking on everything to instigate a puzzle’s solution. The puzzles aren’t hard, rather being too subtle or minute in nature where connections can be overlooked and details lost in the experience’s gorgeous environments.
Additionally, Retropolis directs its audience to sit rather than stand, relying on the joystick to look around. If the goal is ensuring inclusivity, I’m all for it. But a level of immersion is lost, fuelled by the fact that most characters, including Philip, are typically standing.
Even with these issues, the love, time, and energy Peanut Button has poured into The Secret of Retropolis kept me enthralled until the case is closed.
— Patrick McLean, Chicago Curator
Spirits with Cocktails — Madame Zervanos’ Traveling Mystery Show
$45; Golden, CO; Through Aug 26
After assembling outside a local historic bar, the intimate audience of 20 was escorted into a back room to take our seats while cautiously staring at a cloaked table in the middle of the room. Our humorously endearing guide introduced himself as a longtime paranormal investigator and walked us through a series of warm-up activities that included a sage smudging, group chanting, and the opportunity for audience members to share stories of their own real-life paranormal experiences.
The first cocktail arrived quickly as baskets of beakers and bottles filled with colorful potions were delivered to each table. As we sipped our self-mixed libations, our host continued to entertain with historically accurate tales of local ghosts from the early 1860’s, including a detailed account of Cornelius Lynch, a miner who got into a tangle with a witch during the Colorado gold rush.
Four volunteers were called to sit at the table in the center of the room after it was revealed to contain personal items belonging to famous ghosts of Golden, CO. As we closed our eyes in an attempt to summon spirits, a loud BANG echoed through the room, which frightened one volunteer to the point that she nearly stormed out. But then, her demeanor changed and she began to regard our guide with hostility. The witch from Cornelius’ story had been summoned, and she was now inhabiting the woman’s body!
A second cocktail was delivered, this one to be mixed with a black elixir and stirred with a spoon of dry ice for dramatic effect. We met two additional ghosts and heard their stories, based on real events, told through more (seemingly unsuspecting) hosts in the audience. The evening climaxed with a light puzzle hunt and solving activity that got everyone out of their seats and engaging with one another, as well as the ghosts who’d come to visit.
— Danielle Look, Denver Correspondent
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