[REVIEW] Proteus

Blaine Arcade

(PC [REVIEWED])

When reviewing Proteus, we have to make the point score mean something more than the quality of the game.  We have to put ourselves on the game’s level by setting aside our goals, and thinking outside the box, but without stressing anybody out.

Proteus is a new Indie darling from Ed Key and David Kanaga that tasks you with… nothing.  The player is simply dropped near an island.  The island is randomly generated each time and brought to life with extremely blocky, yet very natural pixelated models.  It will always surprise me how games (like Proteus and Superbrothers: Sword and Sworcery EP) can manage to make their own art styles using so few pixels.  The island is a beautiful and tranquil place with its own weather patterns (the rain clouds in particular look softer than most dormitory beds).

Think of your player’s feet as a pair of inexperienced hands touching a grand piano for the first time.  The island is an instrument that allows you to generate your own music with your position.  Standing near certain animals will cause them to scurry away with plinking and plunking footsteps and hops; descending into the forest will usually fill the simple wind-like tune of the mountains with birdsong and falling leaves.

After an in-game day (about ten-fifteen minutes it seems), a circle of lights will form and invite you in.  The closer you stand to the circle, the faster time passes.  You can see an entire day complete with sunrise, sunset, light rain, and a starry night in a matter of seconds.  Once you’re finally in the circle’s center, everything will go white and transport you to… nowhere new.  Something is different, though.  The season has changed.

All in all you get to explore the island four times with different music, plants, and animals.  The cycles of the world play out before you.  Then, when the time is right, which only the game knows, it will take you bodily into the sky and return you to the main menu.  Whatever wisdom you may have gained there, you cannot use.

This is why a traditional score won’t be very effective on Proteus.  Whereas the other exploration games of recent memory (Journey and The Unfinished Swan) had known goals from the beginning, Proteus is little more than a magical hike.  The game requires you to change your expectations and when you do, you won’t be disappointed.  It’s the kind of thing that melts the day’s stress away and lets you go to sleep. It’s the kind of thing that should have a federal grant so poor urban school children experience the wholesome culture of it at least once in their lives.

Criticism will bounce off Proteus like acorns off a snoozing turtle’s shell.  So the only thing that I can say about it is that the ten dollar price tag may be a bit much.  While I enjoyed it wholeheartedly, the sheer minimalism of it makes me think you may want to wait until it drops down to five.  Please keep in mind that while I did not give this game a perfect score, that is merely because it is so non-traditional that it doesn’t quite fit into the hole it’s supposed to.  The missing points are merely a representation of the strangeness you might feel when realizing that this game is just… not quite what you know.