Satire for the PC

Me: Welcome to the Love Interest Panel here at Satire for PC. Today, we have representatives from three major RPG companies – namely Black Isle/Obsidian, Bioware, and Bethsada. They will be answering a series of questions on love in games. How does it work? Does it work? How do we circumvent the cheese and/or skeeze factor?

( Interview below. Conclusion: None )

I'm jumping all over, am I right? However, I have a second installment of Baldur's Gate about ready to go. I just replayed Mass Effect and was reminded how sweet it was. Not so sweet I can't mock it, of course, but sweet.

( Mass Effect Introduction. With scrolling credits. )

I'm taking a break from The Path for a more plotted and more easily spoofable game. Enter that classic, endless, Baldur's Gate II.

( And it begins. )

[We return to the initial room and select Rose. She has a heart trailing off her name, so she must be a nice person. A dark-haired, long-haired person who is stroking a white bunny. Did you catch that? White bunny.]

Rose: Hello, I’m Rose. I represent a mature, thoughtful innocence. Why, borderline angelic for eleven. I am kind and helpful and full of a quiet love for everyone and everything.

Player: Okay, I choose you.

[Sorrowful choir again. Opening sequence again.]

( Rose's Excellent Journey )

[We begin in a red room with a white door and a huffing clack-clack of a train or at least machinery in the near-distance. Six girls here, positioned around a black table, some sitting, some standing, some on the floor. A ceiling fan rotates soundlessly overhead, throwing a shadow where the left wall meets the floor.]

[Robin is sitting near the one white chair in the room, playing with a white car. Please take notice of 'white chair' and 'white car,' because you're going to hear an awful lot about stuff that's white. It's symbolic, you see?]

[Hovering your cursor, a little yellow basket, over Robin brings up her name in scrawled yellow and enforces an overlay of both her washed out face and a bunch of random scratchy marks over the screen. Some are recognizable. Look fast! Eye! Cloud! Lips! Flower!]

Player: Hello, Robin. Ready to go?

Robin: Oh, sure, hi! I'm Robin. I'm nine! I represent absolute innocence. With my hood and naive demeanor, I probably best resemble what you think of when you think of Little Red Riding Hood! Thus, I'm a good starting character.

Player: Well, okay. I choose you.

[Angelic, but sorrowful choir aaahs. Robin flips up her hood.]

( And thus begins Robin's level. )

Perhaps we can start with a question: is it fair to satirize a slow-paced art-game from an independent company that may well have independent company level sales? To which I answer first that anything is fair in love, war, and lampoon and second that any exposure is good exposure.

Before we really begin, a short, if honest review. This is a small game with an artist's aesthetic over a gamer's. It may well be designed to frustrate and disturb you. It is both very thoughtful and more than a little self-important, which makes it difficult for me to keep my wicked hands off of it.

The plot, broadly: this is the story of Little Red Riding Hood as seen through the eyes of six Little Reds, of varying ages and personalities. I'll begin with the first, and youngest, the truly little Little Robin. Next post, next hour. For now, welcome.