Is a Walking Simulator's failure based less on gameplay and more on pretentiousness?

[dope_danny]

So i was talking with a friend who just picked up SOMA and beat it in one sitting. Given the nature of the game they wanted to talk about it which is understandable. It is a pretty mediocre crouch walk simulator just like Amnesia the Dark Descent but beyond that it uses the themes and ideas of 'The Philosophical Zombie' to tell a body horror version of the 'Ship of Theseus' debate. How much of the original can be removed and still be counted as the original object, is human consciousness the same as a human life, is killing a machine that 100% believes and acts like the mind of a human being murder and so on.
Not super deep or heady stuff but it is solid science fiction ideas that beyond the hit or miss experience leave you thinking about things afterwards.

Which got me thinking about Walking Simulators and how so often they cover a lack of gameplay with pretentiousness.

To explain Pretension is best described as "The act of creating an allusion of greater meaning or depth while in actuality signifying nothing" and i know anyone that has played a few walking simulators will already have some examples come to mind. For me my mind immediately goes to 'Everybodies Gone to the Rapture' and 'Amnesia: a Machine for Pigs". Both of which have excellent use of mise-en-scene, a stellar soundtrack on EGTTR's part and Machine for Pigs at least tried to use the thematics or the misuse of child labour in industrial revolution workhouses which is a rarity in videogames.
But these are videogames. Barely. Which lead to my line of thinking about what makes them worth playing. I use the term pretentious because for as pretty it looks and how great the soundtrack is Everybodies Gone to the Rapture is a truly pretentious game. It tells you nothing, it is not designed to make you think or leave a lasting impression. It is a ride. You strap in and follow the lights to see a series of 'its a tiny, tiny world' style set pieces before reaching a none conclusion that has no payoff beyond "you take what you want from it, it means whatever you want it to mean" which as a film grad who works in media i can only roll my eyes at a familiar one liner that is a lazy cop out excuse for pretentious artists that want to make an experience look deep but have no intention of any greater meaning or provoking independent thought beyond that.

This honestly makes me wonder if 'trying to make you think' is the real singular sign of a good or bad walking simulator. Not just ones i like even. Look at Gone Home. This had a lot of positive press purely for including a teen lesbian romance but actually look at the situation from the character you play as: After a year abroad you come home finding nobody was waiting for you. The house is empty and dark. You explore what should be the safest place in the world to you and find hidden passages and notes kept from other family members and learn that your family has imploded. Your mom is having an affair, your dad is a drunk and your sister has ran off to mexico with a now AWOL army brat. Thats fucking horrible. But it makes you think. What do you do? what did she do next? how does a family come back from that stuff? Its rocky storytelling that i personally think gets praise for the wrong reasons but it is telling you a complete story with context to make you think about it as the credits roll.
But think about every widely mediocre at best walking simulator and that seems to be the biggest trend: it didnt make you think, it was a ride. These are the ones that get forgotten in weeks. The ones that are neither a game nor a thought provoking exercise in vertical thinking. Something that is style without substance. Like a film students first year film using the same tropes as everyone that came before, daring the audience to ask what it means when there never was a meaning beyond wanting to appear as though there was to begin with.


I think walking simulators have their place. I also think mediocre developers use them as an easy way to produce pretentious crap under a faux guise of intelligent content. But looking back at the ones i have played i think lack of thought provoking questions in favour of pretentious filler is the singular make or break. Beyond even extreme quality nosedives like Firewatches infamous 'they ran out of money' sudden ending out of nowhere.

What do you think about them? what makes one a good experience and a bad one something worse?

[Post]

I think you're downplaying SOMA and Amnesia there to nearly hipster levels. That being said walking simulators are just like any other trend, once it gets popular enough there will be loads of horrible entries and it will make people jaded. It's easier to make them than it is to make other types of games and it attracts people who think they can tell a good story but are bad at making games.

They're as pretentious as any other indie game genre in my experience.

[eillas]

Okay, I think you were looking for a hack and slash game with some horror themes, not a horror game.

[Heathy]

I bought into the beta for escape from tarkov recently, open beta starts after xmas. that feels like a walking simulator at the moment, either that or a death match.

dayz worked as a walking simulator, you spent most of your time just running around that 25x25km map, the uncertainty made that game what it was you never knew when you might bump into someone. so you spent a lot of time running around looting hoping if you did bump into someone, you would see them first.

most shooters are too linear and obvious, your thrown into a map and no one leaves until one team wins. these first personal survival games have an element of persistence that isn't part of a conventional shooter. I liked dayz and I like tarkov, because of the full loss pvp, risk and reward. same reason why I liked eve online. Its nice if there is more things to do though, i prefer my running simulators to have game play to break up the running. I didn't care much for games that are just walking, with minor interaction, Amnesia was cool the first time i played but i didn't find it to be a fun game, just a good collection of scares and induced panic.

I don't really care much for pubg, thats another running simulator, its the same dayz battle royal but has no persistence so doesn't hold my attention. its just like all other shooters, throw everyone into the map, wait until there is a victor. all shooters are like this.

[Lotus Victoria]

Walking simulators are the bane of the horror gaming industry. I absolutely despise them - They're a poor excuse to add little to no gameplay to a game by saying that "you get to experience the story".

No. No and no and no and no. I'm sorry, but a lot of great games with great stories have gameplay as well - Half Life 2 is a first person shooter with a great story and amazing FPS gameplay. Deus Ex is a first person RPG with an amazing story and great RPG mechanics. Dear Esther? Is garbage.

I'm a big defender of gameplay in the gaming industry, because in the end, that's what the game industry is: a industry of GAMES, that you win or lose by PLAYING THE GAME. Yes, there are place for well told stories here, we got so many that I won't even start to give examples, but not having gameplay in your game because the "story matters more" it's like playing a card game that has no mechanics, but the "card lore" is good - it's a poor excuse for a lazy buck.

Just imagine reading a book, but to get to the next point in the story, we need to go to specific parts of your house to keep reading. Sounds bad? That's what walking simulators are.