Rock, Paper, Shotgun

And now, in a feature I like to call Forbidden Discourse: The Oily Fruit of the Broken Heart, we present an interview with Ice-Pick Lodge CEO Nikolay Dybowskiy and all-purpose Ice Pick developer Aleksey “the LxR” Luchin. Ice-Pick are of course the Russian studio responsible for the award-winning Pathologic and The Void, two fascinating PC games.

I could give this chat an introduction about how the attitude that comes across in it gives me hope, but screw it. Instead I’ll just say that this interview proves just how much these guys are Doing It Right.
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[Following on from the first two parts, this is the grand finale of Quinns' evisceration of the game Walker described as "Oblivion with Cancer". As a compliment. Lots of spoilers, but you should read it anyway.]

Butchering Pathologic
Part III: The Soul

There are two themes that run through Pathologic like a couple of sharks lurking in a swimming pool. By themes I mean something that’s vital to the vision of the game yet is detached from the structure of the game proper- something like Half-Life 2’s Orwellian influence, or Beyond Good and Evil’s cartoon imagery. In the case of Half-Life 2, there’s nothing about City 17’s hi-tech tyranny that directly affects your running and gunning. Likewise in Beyond Good and Evil the fact that your hovercraft is repaired by walruses doesn’t make a difference when you’ve got a puzzle in front of you.

In the case of Pathologic, the two themes are meat and theater. And at least to my mind, they’re what propel the game from being interesting and brave to being beautiful. It’s an ugly, ugly beauty though.
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As kindly linked by one of Pathologic’s developers in our comments thread, here’s the latest trailer for Tension, Ice-Pick’s intriguing next game. Er – it may be a bit NSFW, depending on whether you sit near to anyone who objects to soft-focus polygon boobies.

The hook is battle via painting, rather than gunplay, using a gesture system apparently similar to Black & White – though it seems rather more expanded and based on a system of visible, physicsy results in Tension’s dreamlike world, rather than simple spell-casting. It’s a fascinating, and at times beautiful, trailer, even if it doesn’t tell us all that much about what we’ll be doing. There’s perhaps as much to scoff at as there is to coo at, but given Quinns’ epic wordgasm about Pathologic, it’s safe to say this is a game we’ll all be following with some interest.

I was going to say something like ‘artful eroticism’, until it got to the tree-humping and giant wood phallus bit at the end. Still, it seems more dignified than the Witcher’s boobie content, eh? Second trailer beneath the cut.
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[Following on from yesterday's installment, Quinns continues his examination of the award winning Russian obscurity Pathologic. Spoilers abound. Oh - and if all this has tempted you, it turns out it is available as a digital download from GamersGate.]

Butchering Pathologic
Part II: The Mind

In a single word, Pathologic is dark. And not “we’re going to make our sequel a darker, more adult experience” dark. Not ‘teen angst’ dark. Pathologic is an endlessly bleak game with an atmosphere that smothers all hope. It’s ‘pensioner breaking a leg in his bedsit and no one finding out until the smell starts to get unbearable’ dark.
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[Wandering RPS-associate Quinns went native in a Russian art-videogame called Pathologic and has been exciting us with rants about it ever since. It's an enthralling game that, when I reviewed it, felt compelled to give a mark in the low fifties ("This will be someone's favourite game of the year. That somebody almost certainly won't be you."). John gave it a 6/10 review which nevertheless left anyone with a soul desperate to play the thing. It's a brilliant game that the traditional reviewer has to condemn. This may, to some eyes, show a weakness in traditional reviews and reviewers. But there's always more than tradition. We're proud to be publishing Quintin's dissection over the next three days. Spoilers abound, but - c'mon! - you were never going to play it anyway. I consider this essential. Take it away, Quintin... - KG]

Okay.

…okay.

I’m going to explain, right now, why a Russian FPS/RPG called Pathologic is the single best and most important game that you’ve never played.
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