Atoi & Iota show yet more reckless disregard for rainforests.
On paper, this one’s an open-and-shut case. Media Molecule fills a meeting room full of mind-bogglingly well-crafted origami, talks excitedly in endearing Blue Peter tones about its new project, then releases it and we all love it. We’ve seen it all before. No, literally, we’ve seen it all before: in this case the game generating the excited chatter is Tearaway.
Okay, Tearaway Unfolded. The Guildford Studio’s first foray into PlayStation 4 presents the unique challenge of translating the thoughtful and imaginative PS Vita controls onto DualShock 4. As with those poetic foreign words with no English equivalent (go on, Google ‘Kummerspeck’), there’s no obvious way to translate the ‘popping your fingers through the screen’ mechanic using the Vita’s rear touchpad to a DualShock.
So Media Molecule isn’t doing that. Instead, it’s inventing brand new mechanics, looking for fresh ways for you to interact. That’s how squirrel-throwing was created. It’s the most imaginative addition on show, and it starts by picking up one of the skittery critters with Iota/Atoi and throwing it towards yourself, the player, on the other side of the screen. The squirrel bursts through the screen, and a sound cue from the controller itself lets you know he’s now in there. Next you take aim at an object in the game using the controller’s gyroscope and swipe the touchpad back in the direction of the telly to launch it at whichever piece of virtual paper you wish to perforate.
The gyro also combines with your controller’s lightbar to let you shine a light into the game world, again reinforcing the illusion that the TV screen is just a piece of glass separating you from another, particularly flammable, universe. You use the light to speed up the growth of plants in dark areas, and as they grow they create new routes to progress.
A simpler addition is the power to create a gust of wind with a swipe of your touchpad, but what’s interesting about the new controls is that the game’s (redesigned) puzzles require you to combine your god powers more; throwing a squirrel at something and using a gust of wind to direct it there, say.
In fact, the word ‘redesigned’ bears repeating. Media Molecule’s Rex Crowle aims for Unfolded to be, “the definitive version of that environment,” and as such it’s grown in size by 50%, populated now by more characters and hidden sections. If you don’t own a PS Vita or simply never got round to playing Tearaway on its original platform, this should be a vital release on your calendar. For PS Vita veterans (Vitarans?) it’s slightly less of a pressing engagement, but still worth checking out for, if nothing else, the ability to kidnap virtual vermin.
Format PS4
ETA 2015
Pub SONY
Dev Media Molecule