Braid

[Monthenor]

Braid is a new game that came out on the Xbox Live Arcade this week. It is, frankly, terrifying and Important. It's best you just download the demo and experience it for yourself. The only review I can endorse at this moment is Tycho's...it's too important to not be spoiled in any fashion for what this game will do to you.

It joins the exalted ranks of Ico and Shadow of the Colossus as a game that I am dreading playing, a deep down dread that my little player avatar can only come to a poor end.

[Jennifer Diane Reitz]

Braid is, well FUCKING AMAZING. It is awesome sauce, kiddos.

Don't be misled by what at first seems Prince Of Persia Sands Of Time meets Parody Of Mario. It is more than that. Much more.

Braid is not just a game. It is a treatise on causality itself, and it is not to be missed. Yeah, it's short. So was Portal. Short doesn't mean bad. Sometimes it means nothing is wasted, including your time and excitement. Sometimes it means quality over pointless length. This is one of those times.

You got Xbox 360? Just get it. Just buy the damn thing. It. Is. Worth. It.

But I am not going to tell you one damn thing more about it. No spoilers. And do NOT ever read a single 'how to' or solution guide. Just suck it up and do it on your own. Anything less, and you definitely will cheat yourself of wonder. Trust me, every damn thing can be solved, every damn thing can be done. The only thing broken is your perception in Braid.

Braid teaches you to reexamine causality itself. Of course that will be hard sometimes.

But it's worth it.

[Monthenor]

I just finished it. I think I'm going to go lie down or perhaps have an entire bottle of gin.

Nothing can prepare you.

[draque]

I'm going to add my opinion to the pile... the game is wonderful. Not terribly long, but very well thought out and enormously rewarding.

[Alfador]

I am going to do my best to avoid spoilers, as I have no intention of buying an XBox 360 in the foreseeable future, and the PC release is "To Be Announced 2008," which means I'll probably have to wait till next August for it. It's okay though, I'll have Spore to keep me company, and also Wrath of the Lich King. With Wii Fit also taking up an hour of each day for half an hour's worth of exercises (hearing bings from Steam Chat causes me to become momentarily distracted), and Team Fortress 2 providing endless amusement (when I tire of setting things on fire, I can make things explode, or build things for other people to burn or make explode), I have more game than I will use up for a long time.

[Jordan the Jovial]

I was reading about the development and design of this not long ago, via the link to it at http://tale-of-tales.com

[draque]

Ok... here's something from the end of the game that I'm going to write in all white text. If you haven't finished it yet, don't read.

Does anyone know what's up with the ladder in the castle at the end and the cloud next to it? Everything in the game is placed so deliberately... I just have trouble believing that would be an accident or have no purpose. I have all the stars and got to see the princess explode, but it feels like there's something else to the game that I'm missing...

[Monthenor]

(ending spoiler question)

I don't think anybody knows, but if I were the developer I'd place that one useless thing right at the end and amuse myself with the Internet speculation. There's also some discussion that exactly one of the level icons is missing from the castle blocks, and that the cloud seems to be on the exact same level as the time-out platform in the previous screen.

Of course, it may just be another slow cloud like the Cloud Bridge, one measured in weeks rather than hours. That would also be suitably devious.

[OtakuMan]

If I had more money and MS Points to spare, I'd get it. Trouble is, I'd REALLY like to see it go down to 800 MS Points first. Or win more MS Points. One or the other.

~Otaku-Man

[Ashes]

If I had more money and MS Points to spare, I'd get it. Trouble is, I'd REALLY like to see it go down to 800 MS Points first. Or win more MS Points. One or the other.

You can win MS points!? From games or contests or what?

Anyway, I don't even have a 360, so it'd cost me like $300 just to play Braid. Is Braid worth $300?

[Monthenor]

If I had more money and MS Points to spare, I'd get it. Trouble is, I'd REALLY like to see it go down to 800 MS Points first. Or win more MS Points. One or the other.

~Otaku-Man

This game is totally worth supporting. I'm aligned with Tycho (and apparently the Puzzle Pirates guy) on this matter: I have already spent more money on worse games. Like the $20 I spent on Roboforge, a game that I played with exactly once. I still support the concept, I just couldn't get into it.

Aside from any discussions about length or "worth" or "importance", if the demo appealed to you at all then Braid is a game you will enjoy for its entire duration.

For Draque and other star-buddies:

I had already been accidentally spoiled for what happens when you collect the eighth star, but actually seeing it was still a gut punch. I get way too attached to pixels, I think.

[draque]

stuff

Agreed. It was really creepy seeing suspicions confirmed the first time I beat the game and saw the last level play in reverse. I'm just wondering if the end screen with the cloud and castle was left purposely misleading and won't lead to any other secrets. It could be a last little cliffhanger to a game that refuses to reveal all its secrets. Part of me likes that idea, but another part wants to be able to catalog and analyze every bit of the plot and circumstances. ^^()

EDIT: removed spoiler text from quote box. ^^()

[Ashes]

White spoiler text in pink quote boxes doesn't work.

White spoiler text in pink quote boxes doesn't work.
White spoiler text in pink quote boxes doesn't work.

[OtakuMan]

DAMMIT, I read the plot analysis off of GameFaqs and now my mind is tripping balls! Worse, I played the demo, and I want to play the rest of the game so I can get the whole story and experience it for myself. Until then my mind is going to be a landmine trying to figure out all the ins and outs of Braid with an analytical technique this side of conspiracy theorists.

DAMN THAT'S A GOOD GAME!

~Otaku-Man

[Monthenor]

I'm just wondering if the end screen with the cloud and castle was left purposely misleading and won't lead to any other secrets. It could be a last little cliffhanger to a game that refuses to reveal all its secrets. Part of me likes that idea, but another part wants to be able to catalog and analyze every bit of the plot and circumstances. ^^()

I actually hope it is completely useless, but given the construction of the rest of the game I doubt it is. As wonderful as it would be to have the Diablo Chat Gem inside Braid...

Given that it's in a game about the dangers of obsession, I eagerly await the "final cloud" theories to come to fruition on my internets. Maybe six months from now Blow will reveal that it records how long each player stood on it, and some lonely nut with too much time and electricity will conquer the leaderboards.

[draque]

Towards the end, that became pretty clear, yes. The quote "We're all sons of bitches now" is what made me initially initially notice the connection. I have to wonder if it was supposed to be a metaphor for the creation of the bomb though, or just using the bomb as a parallel for the destructive nature of unhealthy relationships.

[Wizard CaT]

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/videos/ ... /203-Braid

[strange_person]

[Alfador]

Oh good, looks like the PC version is coming out in a couple of months. Yay!

[Plasman]

That's nice! It looks like it'll also (may)be coming out on PS3, but I'll have to wait until I go through puberty all over again before I'll play it on a Wii...