FEZ is an extremely well-known game in the indie-scene. The game won several awards over the years before it was even released. It was also featured in Indie Game: The Movie before release alongside Super Meat Boy and Braid.
FEZ is a two-dimensional game based in a three-dimensional world allowing the player to spin the level. It’s hard to explain without seeing it in action so watch the video below to get an idea of how the game functions.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWUU0vvWLRo
The game is as beautiful as it is brilliant my intention is to break it down piece by piece so you, as a consumer, may understand what makes this game so enthralling.
Let’s begin with the tutorial.
The designers of this game clearly have the intent from the beginning to put you in to the role of the character you’re playing. As the character is learning more about the world they inhabit you, as the player, are learning mechanics that enforce the character’s progression. As the character discovers that his world is three-dimensional you also discover this and you learn to manipulate the world as such.
When you first start the game you’re introduced to a beautifully crafted two-dimensional town that you live in. Once you discover that cubes exist and that there’s a third dimension the game reboots itself and you’re reintroduced to this town all over again, but in three dimensions.
The game seems simple enough – three-dimensions played two at a time. However because two-dimensional and three-dimensional games are so defined in their ways FEZ appears to break those boundaries and offer up an entirely new direction with the medium. Like I would imagine discovering the world is in fact not flat the player is able to discover that the game’s world is in fact not flat either.
