Thoughts on I am Level 1.0

Allow me to introduce you to one of my recent favorites on Kongregate as of late. And a big part of this is due to Indiegames.com bringing it to my attention.

Welcome to I am Level v 1.0. The game is an odd mixture of pinball and Metroid,  The map is a fairly good size and each room. The point of the game is simple: tilt each room and move the springs to help the ball pick up stars (sometimes they look like tea cups)  while helping the ball avoid various obstacles. And I love it!

How many games put you in control of the actual level? Usually, games put the player in control of a protagonist of some sort who has to conquer the perils of the environment. Sometimes it is man-made (buildings and opponents), it might be a product of how the area was formed (such as the Tibetan levels in Tomb Raider and Uncharted 2), while the rest of the time it is a mixture of those two elements. In fact, the overwhelming majority of games give the impression that it is the character/avatar (whichever term you prefer) that is the agent of change.

What this is a reference to is the concept of  lotus of control. This psychology term refers to how a person views the world. Is the person the master of one’s own fate, or does the person believe that fate controls it all and that fighting is pointless?

In terms of the game, the ball has no control over anything. The ball is just there for the ride, or so it seems. Yet the ball will go through all of the challenges ahead of him/her/sie because that’s where the ball needs to go. Sometimes past challenges are repeated for what seems like for fun, other times the challenges need to be repeated because neither the player nor the ball have fully mastered the challenges presented to them.

This also brings in the concept of responsibility. Who does it belong to? Does it belong to fate or does it belong to the Level or to the ball? Or is it a mixture of all those thoughts? The player answers this question by playing. It is not the ball’s responsibility to conquer each challenge, it is the Level’s.  Whether you want to interpret such a concept as something spiritual (i.e. “higher power”), the natural world, or even as fellow human beings is up to you. For a game that says up front that it is not about seeking some level of understanding of any kind, there’s a little kernel of wisdom underneath its neo-8-bit glow.

You can play the game here: http://www.kongregate.com/games/SmilingBag/i-am-level-v1-0

Game Over