By Kieron Gillen on January 9th, 2009 at 3:10 pm.
This is one I played over the break, but didn’t have a chance to write up until now. I waved it in Walker’s direction, suspecting it’d prompt one of his posts about how it’s a game which made him cry over the sheer beauty of it all like the Monkey-Wrench puzzle in Monkey Island 2 (Or something). Except… no. The job’s down to me. The wonderfully evocatively titled I Fell In Love With The Majesty Of Colours is a short narrative adventure with multiple endings and a real dream-like sense of play. Some short thoughts beneath the cut.
And I do mean short thoughts. You could write reams about it, but it’s a game where much of the joy is in making those discoveries of what you’re meant to be doing. The initial leap is actually the “hardest” step in the game – but it’s also the most quietly magical, really capturing the sense of a slumbering leviathan becoming self aware. And I can’t think of a more lovely – and precious and other words beginning with “p” title – than “I Fell In Love With The Majesty Of Colours”. I mean, yeah. We all did.
It’s also about an awesome squid. What’s not to love?
09/01/2009 at 15:20 solipsistnation says:
Oh yes. Fantastic and dreamlike, for sure. Even just reading the title again brings back the sense of wonder I felt doing the first thing which I won’t spoil for anyone. Lots of fun to be had just trying stuff and seeing what you can do…
09/01/2009 at 15:34 Pags says:
I actually played this last month and thought it was exactly the kind of thing I’d expect to see on RPS. It’s a good’un, and I’m a sucker for branching choices.
09/01/2009 at 15:49 dartt says:
A juicy looking treat. I shall indulge in this when I get home this evening!
09/01/2009 at 15:53 phuzz says:
Entroducing by DJ Shadow goes nicely over the top of this :)
(post by the dev discussing the creative process here)
09/01/2009 at 16:07 The Hammer says:
Just gave it a shot. Was indeed lovely and dreamlike. My only complaint was the strange obstacle of not being able to lift the child to the helicopter straight away. I realize that it was done so it’d be more of a challenge to succeed, but it still had me confused.
Lovely sound, considering it’s a flash game, and the visuals were just right. Nice and optimistic, if you play it as a “goody”.
09/01/2009 at 16:09 phuzz says:
the edit function decided to fill my comment with %22′s :(
now it is working again, ignore this
09/01/2009 at 16:22 Hoernchen says:
Ahem, a “slumbering leviathan” becoming “self aware” ? p-word ? The slumbering p-word, rising, ready to ejac*mumble* err… nevermind. I guess I’m gonna go tickle my “Majesty Of Colours”.
09/01/2009 at 16:48 Dzamir says:
I can’t find the “D” finale. Can someone help me? :D
09/01/2009 at 16:48 houseinrlyeh says:
“Profound”, “pure”, “perfect”, “philosophical”…
09/01/2009 at 16:49 Scott Kevill says:
I’m more interested in Majesty 2, which is what I thought this was going to about, at first glance. :)
09/01/2009 at 16:50 Xercies says:
This is just…wonderful.
Though The helicopter didn’t come near me so the kid died… :(
09/01/2009 at 16:54 Kieron Gillen says:
Scott: Next week. I have alpha code.
KG
09/01/2009 at 16:56 Eamo says:
I thought it was crap.
09/01/2009 at 17:02 Xercies says:
It gets annoying that if you do something “wrong” you have to go all the way back at the beginning. I’ve seen the opening loads of times now…its not that great for multiple play throughs.
09/01/2009 at 17:14 The Poisoned Sponge says:
Well I posted about it when you told me about it, so there :P
09/01/2009 at 17:30 duel90 says:
@Xercies – you cant do anything wrong, thats the beauty of it. You just unlock the different endings
09/01/2009 at 17:47 Martin says:
Quite lovely indeed.
09/01/2009 at 17:58 Gap Gen says:
I haven’t saved the kid either. If you even put it in the water, the sharks win.
I preferred the setup of the one about the moon; it opens itself to experimentation more than this, I think. It’s a nice idea, though.
09/01/2009 at 18:09 Kieron Gillen says:
GapGen: Think of what you could move instead of the kid.
KG
09/01/2009 at 18:12 Kast says:
Short and sweet. Saving the kid took some time until I realised the helicopter pilot was afraid of my tentacle (you’d be amazed how often I hear that).
09/01/2009 at 18:15 Scott Kevill says:
KG: Awesome. Staying tuned.
09/01/2009 at 19:14 Calabi says:
That is cool, I managed to get all but one ending.
09/01/2009 at 19:24 Ian says:
Hm.
Can’t get the C ending. Quite splendid though, it makes me happy.
09/01/2009 at 19:31 Helm says:
I really liked this. The writing was good and the way it left you to realize your ‘verb list’ by yourself was also well actualized. Gentle and human, I really like the motive for this sort of art. The actual pixel art could have been treated more expertly but perhaps more literal renderings would have hurt the effect.
Who else helped the fishermen and the kid and so on on their first play instead of drowning stuff?
09/01/2009 at 19:36 AndrewC says:
Dude, if I had seen that tentacle back when graphics like that were the norm it would have blown my tiny mind.
I was very bad the first go round. Then super nice. Trying to get the middle ones then seemed a bit mathematical rather than human.
09/01/2009 at 19:37 Ian says:
@Helm: First run through I saved everything and helped the fishermen.
Any clues for ending C? I realise I’m probably missing something very obvious.
09/01/2009 at 19:44 FernandoDANTE says:
I couldn’t get ending C.
09/01/2009 at 19:55 MadTinkerer says:
You get the D ending by dying. I haven’t figured out the C ending. To save the kid, you need to keep the sharks away long enough for the helicopter to pick up the kid (and don’t drown the kid unless you’re going for ending D or E).
09/01/2009 at 20:13 Dinger says:
I must however wonder whether simple oversight or some sort of orthographical imperialist mania leads otherwise sane insulars to impose their quaint idiosyncrasies on titles of artwork (oh yes, I still haven’t phound a copy of the latest Fonogram.) Fortunately, we resourceful Americans offer in these cases a solution:Formula 4OU1.
09/01/2009 at 20:27 Gap Gen says:
KG: Yeah, I thought of moving the sharks, but I was distracted by clouds and shiny objects.
09/01/2009 at 20:29 Gap Gen says:
Dinger: Ironically, that link doesn’t work in the UK…
09/01/2009 at 20:33 Thomas Lawrence says:
Still can’t work out ending C. Got all the others.
09/01/2009 at 20:48 Martin says:
@Thomas: I had trouble with that as well. W/O spoiling too much I can say that the strange creatures makes two kind of angry noises…
09/01/2009 at 20:54 Crane says:
Got C.
I put the jetski-er back on his ride and let him leave.
I filled the fishermen’s boat up with fish, then drowned them both as they tried to leave. Then, I put three mines onto my own eyes when the soldiers came.
09/01/2009 at 20:57 Martin says:
Only one of those actions are required for C (depending on what other actions you take).
09/01/2009 at 21:01 Thomas Lawrence says:
Ah, got it. Weird there are two distinct endings for that.
09/01/2009 at 21:10 Rob says:
This is exactly what I come to RPS for. A lovely game, thanks for the tip.
09/01/2009 at 21:31 jonfitt says:
That was a lovely experience of wonder and discovery. I found ending C a little obtuse though as I thought I’d already done that.
I like the idea of playing the Other, without being forced to be violent.
09/01/2009 at 23:24 noexes says:
Really great Gamasultra post-mortum on The Majesty Of Colours where the developer pretty much admits everything that is wrong with it. I still love the game, but seriously, he could have toned down the text and made it more interactive, and he admits it right away. Now I love it more.
Weirdest thing: “As it is, I feel quite satisfied with how I did on sponsorship. The bid I finally accepted, from Kongregate.com, was for several thousand dollars. Once you add in advertising revenue and a secondary site-locked sponsorship, I earned over a hundred dollars for each hour I spent on the game.” I’m not sure he is allowed to be talking about this, but this is a lot higher than I expected.
09/01/2009 at 23:32 Pags says:
@noexes: being fairly familiar with trying to get Flash sponsorship myself, as well as seeing others try the same, I can say that the amount he received is not exactly the norm. On past games I’ve helped with, the most I’ve received is around $500 (that’s split evenly with the other person who did most of the hard work). To be honest, I’m surprised he actually received that much, being that it’s not a particularly long game nor does it have instant bang-bang-shooty-shooty appeal – while admittedly it does have torpedoes and mines, it’s not an action game, which sponsors tend to find infinitely more bankable.
10/01/2009 at 00:05 Trans says:
I played this on Newgrounds a couple weeks ago, and I’ve been waiting for it to show up on some major blog. Really is a good game, everything about is well done, I thought.
10/01/2009 at 02:23 The Unshaven says:
Great fun. People are talking about an easter egg if you get all five endings, but I can’t find it. Ideas?
10/01/2009 at 02:24 Hybrid says:
I played it a couple weeks ago. Thought it was pretty interesting and enjoyable.
10/01/2009 at 05:59 qrter says:
I’ll be the one to come out and say it – I Did Not Fall In Love With I Fell In Love With The Majesty Of Colours.
I played it, it just didn’t charm me. It wasn’t a wonderful experience of discovery, it didn’t feel like a dream.
Mind you, I don’t have anything negative to say about the game, there’s nothing really wrong, it all just feels a bit tepid, it just didn’t ‘click’ with me.
10/01/2009 at 06:11 Hmm-hmm. says:
Seemingly non-pretentious, simple, ingenious. Fun.
Thanks, RPS!
10/01/2009 at 07:38 Kommissar Nicko says:
It’s okay qrter, the Majesty did not appear to me either. I did all the endings, and *spoilerz* it was hollow, and empty to me.
10/01/2009 at 10:10 n3utr0n says:
My first play through I accidentally drowned the jet-ski guy, not seeing his air/life guage until it was too late. Then I was forced to defend myself as the soldiers and submarines came :( I just wanted a hug!
10/01/2009 at 15:37 mrrobsa says:
Aha! I was thinking about ‘I Wish I Were the Moon’ and whether this was the same guy.
It isn’t, although apparantly the creator of this, Gregory Weir, openly admits ‘…Moon’s influence on this game:
http://www.ludomancy.com/blog/
This was nice, but I didn’t find it to be half as nice as ‘…Moon’, and I didn’t feel compelled to replay more than once, having got what I assume was the ‘best’ ending first time round, ‘cos y’know, I’m a conscientious leviathan.
.
10/01/2009 at 21:32 A-Scale says:
I’m too afraid of tentacles/sea monsters to enjoy this game.
10/01/2009 at 21:45 HiphopHitler says:
I’m a little disappointed that I couldn’t attack the helicopter with the sharks, place the depth charging boaters onto the fishing boat, blow up the boat operators with their own mines “so that they’d know how it feels”, or give anyone a balloon.
I really wanted to give that kid all of the balloons and float him out of there.
Sound work was excellent though and the initial interaction is very cool and a sort of ambiguously symbolic kind of way.
Ending C is from mines. D is from torpedoes. I found it a bit strange that there was a distinction there.
12/01/2009 at 16:20 Jeremy says:
This game sort of strikes me more as art than entertainment. It has basic mechanics and isn’t necessarily full of “gameplay”, but you keep playing to get all the different endings. I certainly didn’t like it as a game, but it was a very interesting piece of art.