Latest news with #Wreden
Yahoo
14-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Kotaku Weekend Guide: 3 Great Games Keeping Us Grounded
Next week is a big one. Assassin's Creed Shadows launches on the heels of new reporting that Ubisoft is looking to spin off the franchise into a standalone company backed by Chinese conglomerate NetEase. The 2025 Game Developers Conference kicks off in San Francisco with talks from people behind some of the biggest hits and blockbusters. And the first day of spring officially arrives less than two weeks ahead of the Nintendo Direct for the Switch 2, which some analysts think will cost over $400 and ship in June. Before all that arrives, we'll be taking a breath this weekend and spending time with these great games, which range from new indies to older gems. Play it on: Xbox Series X/S, PC Goal: Take down Boss_Wallducker. I like boomer shooters just fine, but Mullet Madjack has me hooked in a way other games in the subgenre rarely have. Originally released last year on PC, the arcade FPS roguelite just hit Xbox Game Pass this week and is scratching my 3D Hotline Miami itch (happy 10-year anniversary to that game's sequel, by the way). While the shooting is snappy and the weapon upgrades are neat, it's the hyper-stylized art and fun level design that's kept me entranced. The premise is simple enough—save a minor internet celebrity from robber baron robots in a futuristic world that feels like The Matrix huffing neon glitter glue—but it's a perfectly alienated fit for the sicko event horizon our online culture currently finds itself sucked into. Never has a game met the moment with a vibe so pure (and engagingly deranged). — Ethan Gach Play it on: PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PC Goal: Brew a decent cup of tea. I'm excited to try Wanderstop, the new game about, as its Steam page puts it, 'change and tea,' for a few reasons. One is that it's the first game from Ivy Road, a studio founded by Davey Wreden. Wreden previously created The Stanley Parable and The Beginner's Guide, both highly original games that were fully committed to their own distinctive visions. On the surface, in the trailers that I've seen, Wanderstop looks like it could be a fairly conventional 'cozy game,' another chill, low-key release in which you soak up the pleasant vibes while running a business of some kind—in this case, a tea shop. However, given Wreden's involvement, I suspect there's more to Wanderstop than that, and that sooner or later the game's gonna throw me a curveball. Which is what I want! I want to be surprised, caught off guard, to have my expectations undermined. The other reason I'm excited is that I've seen the game receive a pretty wide range of critical reactions, from lukewarm praise to enthusiastic raves. (I haven't read these reviews yet because I want to go into the game knowing as little as possible, but it's clear to me that there's a good assortment of opinions on it out there.) I believe that most games should receive a much wider range of critical reactions than they do, but given that mainstream game criticism sadly still tends overwhelmingly toward consensus, when a game does receive a decent spread of critical responses I tend to sit up and take notice, because it inevitably means that the game is doing something interesting. It doesn't mean that I'll love it; it just means that even if I don't like it, I'll probably at least think it failed in an interesting way, and I'd typically much rather play a game that tries something distinctive and doesn't quite come together than a game that plays it safe and succeeds. Of course, it's also possible that I will end up loving Wanderstop. I intend to find out one way or the other this weekend. But right now, this moment before I've even started it, is sometimes one of the best parts: to be on the cusp of beginning a new game, and not having any clue of just what to expect. — Carolyn Petit Play it on: 3DS Goal: Remember where everything is in Kalos Pokémon's sixth generation has always been a weird one for me. I love the lore of the Kalos region and the Mega Evolutions battle gimmick, but despite that, I've never gone back to the 3DS games after all these years. With Pokémon Legends: Z-A coming out this year, however, it feels like the right time to return to my old copy of Pokémon Y and refresh myself on what came before. Game Freak was definitely still getting used to making games in 3D with X and Y, and as a result, a lot of the visual character the Pokémon had exuded in earlier games was drained from them in favor of mostly pretty lifeless 3D models. Back when the games came out, it still felt like a huge deal to finally see Pokémon in 3D on a handheld, but despite this visual shift, X and Y were a breaking point for me as I finally grew tired of the original Pokémon formula. Today, Pokémon Y is a relic of a bygone era in a series that has started to think outside the box in recent years, which makes it kinda quaint to go back to after games like Legends: Arceus and Scarlet/Violet have taken some pretty big leaps. That said, the simplicity of old Pokémon still has its charms. If I'm going back to reacquaint myself with Kalos, I'd rather not have something dense and cumbersome. It's fine! It's pleasant! I can't complain too much about hanging out with my Raichu in a place we haven't visited in a decade. — Kenneth Shepard For the latest news, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.
New York Times
12-03-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
A Burned-Out Designer Tried to Heal by Making a Cozy Game
Nothing moves quickly in Wanderstop. To make a single cup of tea in the new video game is a meditative ritual of deliberate steps. The recovering hero, Alta, has to forage for tea leaves, dry out those leaves, plant seeds for fruit to flavor the tea, water those seeds, watch the plant grow, harvest the fruit individually, and then, with a fantastical apparatus the player traverses using rolling ladders, heat up the water, drain it into a brewing pot, throw the ingredients in one by one, go to a shelf of bespoke mugs, select one, place it under a tap and — finally — pour. There is recognition for doing so without spilling a single drop but no punishment if it is not perfect. It is not that kind of game. Davey Wreden, the 36-year-old writer and director of Wanderstop, has not released a stand-alone game in a decade. He burned out after commercial success with The Stanley Parable (2013), an absurd meditation on cubicle life and choice that has been cited as an inspiration for the TV show 'Severance,' and artistic acclaim with the game's follow-up. Wanderstop was supposed to be different from those mind-bending works, a calming experience set at a woodland tea shop. It did not end up that way. 'I started out trying to make this game in a way that it wasn't going to be a complex story about me and my life, and I failed to do that,' Wreden said. 'The more that I began having Alta speak the words in my own head, the more compelling it got.' The Stanley Parable was intended as a job application but became a career. In the 2000s, the dream gig for cerebral gamers was at Valve, a studio known for games like Portal and the Half-Life series that paired innovative gameplay with witty but affecting writing. Landing a job at Valve was the only goal for Wreden, who grew up in Sacramento and always wanted to make video games. When he started working on The Stanley Parable in his junior year at the University of Southern California, it was not a full game but rather a mod formed out of the building blocks of Valve's game engine. It was set in an office because he used some assets from Half-Life's research facility. Stanley's job is to follow instructions and push buttons. But one day, as a genteel British narrator notes, something peculiar happens. The orders disappear, as do his co-workers. The player explores the empty office to find answers, but encounters choices to abide by the path announced by the narrator or to divert from it instead. The alternatives lead to branching endings: Stanley can find freedom, be blown up or lose his mind. After working over Skype with a teenage level designer, William Pugh, to create an aesthetic, Wreden released the full version of The Stanley Parable in October 2013. Its offbeat writing made it a hit with critics and players. But Wreden now describes those days, which should have been a triumph, as an indistinguishable brown mush. The Stanley Parable existed, Wreden later said at a public talk, because he felt like Stanley: completely alone. He said it came from a 'Look at me!' desperation. But being looked at did not help. In a comic he drew after receiving industry accolades, Wreden compared winning awards for his art to being given the sun: 'No matter how you dress it up, the gift is ultimately intangible, distant, trying to hold onto it will kill you.' Six months after the game was released, Wreden started therapy. To relax, he took months of drawing lessons, repeatedly sketching woodland scenes that he later channeled into Wanderstop. Cozy games like Animal Crossing and Stardew Valley, with their cute environments and achievable tasks like delivering gifts and farming, became escapist havens during stressful times like the coronavirus pandemic. But the pull of productivity still trickles in. Crops, fruits and fish are sold for gold. Daily cycles keep players running around to complete tasks before nightfall. Wanderstop subverts many of those mechanics. Although the game is set in a shop, no money changes hands. Even the tutorial urges players to slow down: When they grab a watering can before the tool is introduced, they are gently scolded for rushing ahead. Alta can give each cup of tea to another character or drink it herself; each flavor prompts a different reflection. There are no sudden fourth-wall turns or meta depths, as some fans speculated because of Wreden's earlier work — only sincere emotion. 'That stuff was nothing,' Wreden said of the twists in his previous games. 'Trusting in small moments of humanity to be actually compelling narratively? That's hard,' he said, using an expletive. Balancing the charm of the tea shop with Alta's struggle was a challenge for Wreden, who said writing the character felt at times like mining his own diary entries. His follow-up to The Stanley Parable, The Beginner's Guide (2015), centers on a game designer named Davey, voiced by Wreden, whose friendship with another game designer, Coda, deteriorates after Davey oversteps boundaries with his work. Players speculated how autobiographical the game was, leading Wreden to clarify it was fiction. But it does have roots in the dissolution of relationships after The Stanley Parable. One of Coda's games is about cleaning a house ad infinitum, being asked to straighten up pillows and make up a bed over and over. Instead of monotony, it is a calming domestic scene. 'My place is just to see a bit of peace brought here,' says a figure seated at a table. Coda envisions it as a loop, but Davey edits the game to have an ending. (It was inspired, Wreden said, by a romantic relationship he regrets he could not let himself be happy in.) When Coda confronts Davey in the form of a video game, he directly quotes a former real-life friend of Wreden's: 'When I am around you I feel physically ill.' Davey responds through shaken narration: 'I'm starting to feel like I have a lot of work to do.' Wanderstop feels like a fulfillment of that work. Alta is an undefeated warrior who, one day, finally loses. Her sense of self is shaken and her sword becomes too heavy to lift. She runs through a forest to consult a master but passes out and awakens at a tea shop in a clearing. The man who tends to the shop, Boro, invites her to stay awhile as she recovers; Alta has to quiet every impulse to go faster. Alta was a silent protagonist in a mechanics-driven game until Wreden started having her voice his own fears and his belief that he could power through anything. Wreden and Karla Zimonja, Wanderstop's narrative lead, would dissect Alta's character on hourslong walks, trying to better understand her personality and motivations. She said it was a challenge meeting Wreden's standards for personal writing that did not feel forced; they fretted to make sure Boro's lines did not sound like rote motivational quotes. 'Part of my job, in the editorial capacity, was being like, 'That's it, you got it,'' she said. 'Everybody gets that feeling when you're making something and you're like, 'Is this actually garbage?'' Wanderstop is Wreden's most collaborative work yet and the first game from his studio, Ivy Road. Zimonja interviewed women who practice jiu-jitsu to inform Alta's arena career. Temitope Olujobi, the game's 3-D art director and environment lead, studied the sightlines in botanical gardens for the vistas that Alta contemplates with her tea. Daniel Rosenfeld, who created the ambient score in Minecraft, crafted shifts in music between the serene clearing and livelier tea shop. Yet Wreden's influence on Alta is still clear. In Wanderstop, absurd action novels about a detective named Dirk Warhard are delivered to the tea shop. The scholarly 'Chasing Bullets: A History and Critical Theory of the Dirk Warhard Novels' that arrives seems strange, until it mentions that the author went from crowd pleasers to stories of 'justice cannibalism.' When asked if he felt like a 'justice cannibal,' eating at himself to set something right through his protagonists, Wreden demurred and said Dirk Warhard was just a cool name. (One that shares his initials.) Healing, like tea making, is slow. After 10 years and a lot of therapy, Wreden said he felt more at peace. He spends time outside, riding his bike to the waterfront in Vancouver, British Columbia. Despite Wanderstop's peaceful theme, game development is a punishing job. Wreden, who has the luxury of not really needing to worry about money because of The Stanley Parable's success, plans to take some time off. He does not know how he will be involved in Ivy Road's next game, if at all. He is OK with that. 'It would be really freeing in a lot of ways to begin to release myself from the obligation and the expectation of churning out hit after hit,' Wreden said. 'Even if the obituary comes down for the greatness of my work, I'd like to be able to go to its funeral and grieve it, and then go home and have a cup of tea.'
