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The Quiet Sleep

#1
This is one of the darndest things I've seen in a while.

As near as I can make it out, The Quiet Sleep is a simulation of a human mind, in the form of a sort of tower defense game, in which by building a personality you manage your emotional states well enough to "handle various life situations, including talking to people, finding a job and trying to overthrow a local government."

The creator's Web site for this game is here. And his YouTube page is here. You can also find this game on Steam in Early Access.

Here's a representative development video: [youtube]https://youtu.be/OPLfJm7VQ8w[/youtube] .

I discovered this one through a Gamasutra blog written by its creator, Nikhil Murthy, in which he argues in defense of "lifelike games." Here's part of that piece, which I think was written in response to a lot of questions about what the heck The Quiet Sleep is actually about:
A fair part of the reaction to The Quiet Sleep comes not from the game itself, but from the idea of the game. It feels unnatural to a lot of people to have a game that attempts to model someone's mind and personality with systems. Using the mind as a setting or theme as Psychonauts and even Inside Out have done doesn't feel wrong in the same way The Quiet Sleep does to many people and this is probably because they get to feel less descriptive of thinking as a whole. They use the way we think as a setting and so get the feelings of novelty and of seeing something familiar through a new lens that The Quiet Sleep banks heavily on without needing to detail a full system like The Quiet Sleep did and so without the unpleasantness of its core statement.

The Quiet Sleep is a statement on the way that people behave and it feels wrong because it seems wrong to make a statement on human relationships and experiences with the limited expressiveness of a game system.
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Re: The Quiet Sleep

#2
Just to prove that I do read the threads you make for obscure games, Flat, I thought I'd post in one of them for a change.

All I can say is, as games go, it sounds pretty weird to me.

I do remember that you have a knack for convincing me to try the unusual. I'm not sure but I think you may have been instrumental in my purchase of Goat Simulator and to my astonishment I had great fun with it. :angel:
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Re: The Quiet Sleep

#3
It sounds pretty odd to me as well, Victor. If I were to design a game meant to simulate a human personality, I don't think it would ever occur to me to base the mechanics on tower defense games!

Still, I like to support experimentation in game design. That's how we got Wing Commander, which begat Privateer, which begat Freelancer. ;) So I think I'll keep an eye on this one.

And I'm glad you also enjoyed Goat Simulator. It feels liberating to forget for a moment about all the Game structure stuff and just fling yourself around the world causing maximum mayhem. :D

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