![]() Outer Wilds, despite its meticulously crafted solar system and emphasis on mystery, exploration, translation, and big existential questions, frustrated me with its final few hours in the run-up to the epilogue. The Forgotten City has so far been my favorite game of the year, but even so I grew tired of its time loops towards the end of my eight hours or so with the game. It stands to reason that, if that number is higher than the player’s general tolerance for repeating a task, they will get bored.Īnecdotal as it may be, this bears out in my experience. The problem for time loop games is that, even in the case of a flawless playthrough, there is a minimum number of loops the player has to repeat to get to the ending. Different people get bored by different things at different rates, so attrition when doing repetitive tasks will vary from person to person. However, as we might also expect, too much repetition leads to boredom. The psychologist and economist Daniel Kahneman in his bestseller Thinking, Fast and Slow notes that repetition brings a feeling of familiarity and comfort. The trouble is that repetition is a double-edged sword. A time loop attempts to solve this problem by building repetition into the narrative restarting the game becomes part of both the gameplay and the story. If the game has a linear narrative, where the protagonist is ultimately trying to get from A to B, then these gameplay interruptions to the narrative might feel jarring. Most players will inevitably screw up their run through a game, necessitating a reload, respawn, or restart. Time loop games also come closer than more linear titles to solving the perennial problem of ludonarrative dissonance, or the possible tension between the gameplay and the narrative. Indeed, as Returnal demonstrates, time loops and roguelikes may complement each other. It may also be linked to the popularity of roguelikes - games where the player goes back to the start of the game after dying instead of respawning at a checkpoint or loading an earlier save. A repeating loop makes for a longer experience with fewer assets. One reason for this popularity is no doubt due to economies of scale. Deathloop, Twelve Minutes, The Forgotten City, Returnal, Outer Wilds, Minit - to name only a few relatively recent or upcoming titles - all feature time loops. ![]() Games based on time loops, where the protagonist is caught in a repeating cycle of events, are having something of a moment.
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