Developed by Sugon Studio, the official transplanted mobile game of “Listening to Picture Language”, a Ghibli narrative puzzle game with 4000+ reviews on the Steam platform, 97% positive reviews, and a high TapTap score of 9.7, will be officially launched on June 12, 2024. .
It is understood that “Listen to the Picture Language” focuses on an emotional experience that touches people’s hearts. Many players commented, “After completing the game, it felt like watching a movie without lines, but it seemed to be full of lines everywhere, and I couldn’t stop talking.”
This game has been released on Steam, Epic and other platforms and has received rave reviews from players. It won the Best Visual Effects Award in the 2021 indiePlay China Independent Game Competition, the Silver Award & Best Visual Style in the 2021 GWB Tencent Independent Game Competition, and the NYX AWARDS 2021 Best Independent Game and many other awards.
At the same time, it has also received tap experience and sincere recommendations from big up owners such as Bilibili Xiaoyao Sanren and Lao E. People can’t help but wonder: How can a short-process independent game receive such praise? What is the charm of Ghibli-style games that can make tens of thousands of people cry?
Distinctive art style
I believe that anyone who has watched Hayao Miyazaki’s movies will find it difficult not to be attracted and exclaim: Ghibli!
The warm and fresh style of painting, the brave and determined protagonist, and the endlessly memorable storyline are the classic impressions of Hayao Miyazaki and Ghibli that the public has, and these coincide with what “Listening to Pictures” wants to express. The team’s original intention is to tell a story about two painters’ sincere feelings and time memories, and such a gentle story also hopes to be presented through a warm art style.
“The works of the world-famous Ghibli have the greatest influence on our style. In addition to the beautiful visuals displayed in his works, the warm atmosphere of the story and the protagonist who never gives up are also our source of inspiration and our goal.”
The team has also made preliminary attempts in this aspect. Judging from the massive evaluation feedback, the painting style and the tone of the story complement each other and the effect is quite good.
In order to closely adhere to the theme of “painting”, the scenes in the game have also been carefully designed. Whether it is the hand-painted paintings scattered indoors by the artist or the outdoor wilderness scenes in the later period, they all have the texture of oil paintings full of literary and artistic flavor, giving people a beautiful Visual enjoyment.
Actual game scene: painting room
Actual game scene: Lavender flower sea
Immersive experience brought by high-quality audio and video
In line with the principle of meticulous creation, the production team also concentrated its creative energy on audio and video, which is the focus of atmosphere rendering and immersion creation.
In order to let the music better express emotions, the team designed different original music according to the storyline of each chapter. From the light and joy at the beginning, to the slower music rhythm that implies sadness, to the gentle confiding of the truth in the end, you can The music itself has become a footnote to the game. This is also reflected in the sound effects. Whether it is the sound of the breeze, the faint chirping of birds, the friction of the brush during painting, the smearing of paint, etc., it makes people feel as if they have traveled through dimensions and are in the game scene. middle.
The integration of puzzle solving and plot tells stories in another way
The main storyline of “Listen to the Paintings” is that players need to collect clues, solve puzzles, find missing paints and fill in the paintings.
As a puzzle game, the puzzle design of “Listen to the Picture Language” is generally light, with moderate difficulty and moderate puzzle solving time. It essentially serves to advance the plot. The creative team did not fail to carefully design the puzzles in the early stages, but in order to allow players to fully immerse themselves in the plot itself, the team finally eliminated the essentials in the puzzle design, retaining only the puzzle parts that were closely related to the main story line.
Interestingly, the process of solving the puzzle is actually closely related to the way the plot is told.
After entering the game, you will find that you are the protagonist with some “amnesia” attributes, and there is no pressure to assume the identity. At this time, the player will observe the story through the “first-person perspective” and come into contact with various characters scattered in the plot. Based on these clues, we can make reasonable guesses about the whole story. When the experience reaches a certain stage, I believe that many people, like the author, will be sure of winning!
But I never thought that there were foreshadowings under the clues, but people always tend to believe what they want to believe, which also laid the groundwork for the later reversal.
When the truth that is completely different from the expected plot unfolds in front of you, and when the causes and consequences are actually reasonable after careful consideration, the player is equivalent to receiving an emotional impact without any precautions, and the player has already been in the plot animation, story With the cooperation of shaping and music atmosphere, part of the emotional accumulation was completed, and the truth obtained at this time was like a fuse, directly detonating the stacked emotions, and finally made people break their defenses and burst into tears.
Overall, “Listening to Picture Language” is indeed more like an interactive movie, but because it is a carrier form of a game, it has an additional layer of experience perspective compared to a movie. Before the truth is revealed, we are witnesses and guessers of the story related to “my” self; when the truth is revealed, we complete a change of perspective and become bystanders and witnesses, witnessing the existence and existence of a beautiful relationship. die.
Unique emotional shaping
Everyone may have a different understanding of the theme of the story, but I still want to talk about the most common one – love.
This feeling can be recalled later, but it was already at a loss.
In everyone’s life, there may be someone who once illuminated you but in the end could only be placed in a corner of your heart.
The story of “Listening to the Picture Language” is like this. They met by chance and had the bud of emotion, but due to their respective goals and pursuits, they eventually drifted apart. Everyone did the right thing, but in the end it was a relationship that ended in nothing.
Probably, liking HE is the nature and pursuit of human beings, but life is not a fairy tale after all. There are too many helplessness in the real world, and regrets may happen at any time. I used to wonder: why not choose a reasonable, warm and beautiful ending as the ending.
Until I saw the relevant interview, the creative team mentioned a key element when talking about the creative concept-honesty.
“An honest creative concept and sincerely telling a story based on “reality” can easily resonate with players and affect the emotions brought about by everyone’s own experience.” In the game platform, players are left with I believe the emotional remarks below, either with emotion or reminiscence, have proven this.
“Dear Amber, the sunflower that was painted for you but not given away, I hope you can see it on a sunny day in the future.”
The official mobile game version of “Listening to Picture Language” has been opened for pre-order on all major platforms and will be officially launched at 12:00 on June 12. As a one-time payment buyout game, the mobile game “Listen to the Word” is priced at 18 yuan across all platforms, with a discounted price of 12 yuan for the first month. Interested players can go to major platforms to make reservations.
