I dove in to the beta test of Eskil Steenberg's Love this weekend and found it disarming, unique and beautiful – but somewhat difficult to wrap my head around.
It's probably unfair to call Love a massively multiplayer game. Not because you won't be sharing a server with thousands, but because there are now dozens of expectations that go hand-in-hand with the MMO terminology. Love delivers on none of those things: There are no quests, no experience, no raids, no dungeons and no +1 magic swords.
Love is game about exploration. You find yourself in an impressionistic world, with everything rendered in paint-brush strokes. Steenberg turned the sound off for this part of the beta test, so when you're transported into the game, everything feels at arm's length even though you're looking at it from the first-person perspective. Its a disarming sensation at first, but one you get used to.
My first leaps into the game were a little frustrating. I kept drowning in water or falling into dark pits that I couldn't extricate myself from. It didn't help that I found myself in the game at nighttime. The darkness turns everything below your belt to a shimmering black murk. By pressing "2" and switching from my primary blaster weapon to a tool that highlights in-game items, I was able to feel my way around in the dark. Wherever I aimed my reticle, a glowing pink ring highlighted the thing I was looking at. Using this ring, I was able to feel my way out of many a dark corner.
This may not sound as fun as immediately killing a dragon or leveling up after completing a fetch quest. But the sheer novelty of Love's world kept me coming back. It was a place I wanted to explore and learn more about.
I felt like I needed a little guidance. There's a wiki already up. Information is sparse.
The most important advice around Love is to learn how the toolbar at the bottom of the screen works. Players have slots for four tools that they can find and use, tools that allow them to swim in the water or build certain items. Much of the game is about finding these things in the world and figuring out how to leverage them to your benefit.
But before you do any of this, I'd suggest following your nose. At the bottom of the screen is a horseshoe-shaped compass. It points towards the nearest settlement, a place of safety where you may find other players or, at the very least, things they've built or objects that they've found. The first thing you should do when playing Love is to follow that compass. The rounded end points towards civilization. What you do from there is up to you.
With Love, we've got a pristine world with its own complex set of rules, ripe for discovery. One of the downsides of playing a game like World of Warcraft is that everything's been done, every problem solved, every nook explored. In Love, nearly everything needs to be worked out. If you play Love now, you're doing the work of a pioneer.
If exploration, collaboration and problem solving are your bag then this game is for you. Because right now, there's no all-encompassing web site that spills every detail of the game. And that's pretty refreshing. But what's more refreshing is that there are no quests or hard-wired goals to chase. In Love, it seems that you've got to find your own fun.
Follow Steenberg on Twitter to grab the latest build of the Love beta. Steenberg's blog is a good source for more in-depth news and pointers from the designer.
Image courtesy Eskil Steenberg
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