Unravel was one of the surprise reveals of E3 2015, and it certainly won our hearts. But don’t expect it to be just some “pretty movie” to watch because it’s all about mending a broken bond, which takes effort. In an interview with Polygon, Creative director Martin Sahlin of Coldwood Interactive said that he neither wants the game to be frustrating nor a walk in the park, but he does want to move players and make them smile.
It’s a matter of getting people stuck in the right places, rather than the wrong places. I want things to be easy to do, once you figure them out. The thing about difficulty for me is that since the game is very symbolic — it’s about reaching out, trying to mend a broken bond, you don’t really do that without effort. I think there has to be some level of effort into it. You have to work for it, in order for it to mean something. If it was just like watching a pretty movie, I think it wouldn’t connect with you in the same way. But it’s a balancing act, because you don’t want it to be frustrating.
If people don’t smile after playing it, if they aren’t moved, if they aren’t in some way touched by it, then I guess we didn’t do our jobs.
Unravel is different than Coldwood’s previous projects, which includes titles like Move Fitness and The Fight: Lights Out. According to Sahlin, working on something like Unravel is an “emotional investment” and it can be “quite draining.”
For me, it feels like I’m kind of done with that other type of game. It is also an emotional investment to do something like this. It can be quite draining as well as it is rewarding. It’s not like I’m against the other type of game, which is why that I think it’s important that both kinds exist. But working on this has been so very different from all the other stuff we’ve done before. It’s been so much better in so many ways.
Unravel is scheduled for release sometime in 2016 for the PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and PC.
Are our readers looking forward to it?
[Source: Polygon]
