Gris - Game Review

Honesty is shown when empathy is gained without dialogue. Gris achieves similar to what a lot of anime achieves in films and in tv series by offering to the viewer or, in this case, the user, a main protagonist that can create a sense of intrigue through stillness that many realistic 3-D characters in games cannot. In a way, she embodies the anime prototype where in most cases a setting in an anime series has backgrounds that feel mostly stagnant and a character in focus is highly active. Their is some nostalgia here to a Studio Ghibli film by integrating digital and hand-drawn animation similar to Miyazaki's first attempt with this in Princess Mononoke. Their is certainly that "Ma" that exists in Gris here as well. (japanese word meaning the emotion existing between action) As a gamer, you're curious about it's animation style beyond the softness of it's melancholic reds and blacks. The 100% hand drawn aesthetic adds to a glitch-in-the-system effect that has one feel she is either a part of this world coping or that she is simply not and detached with her feelings of sorrow. Going through these eccentric stages in order to cope, everything but mostly her in the entirety of the game is digital. She isn't your typical, side-scrolling protagonist like Mario and Sonic. Seemingly damaged. Frail. Unlikely heroism is addressed through implication as opposed to being too opaque and pretentious i.e. Mario has to scream out loud each time a giant mushroom attacks him. In this game, it doesn’t reveal that she can literally get hurt; that is, she is already hurt and damaged from start to finish. A minimal flatness informs a journey that feels hypothetically psychological as this has been informed many times before in movies and tv shows that have found success in emphasizing on the centralization of one character's suffering. Gamers feel her strength in embracing this sorrow without any dialogue to define it; or rather, this is what the gamer might be intuiting from afar. There are no cast of characters to support this solo act, which, I think adds a really nice touch in creating her as the main focal point. Ambiguity is implied through simplicity which, I think makes Gris stand alone as one of the most impressive achievements this genre has to offer. An impressive gaming score that feels obsessively researched in it's attempt to flawlessly synchronize with the animation and that truly puts it on an unprecedented level. Gris is that lone beast in a crowd that refuses to follow trend by remaining fiercely original through it's artistry and sensitivity of the user.




Read my review on Steam:
https://steamcommunity.com/id/DarkMysticElf/recommended/683320/

Steam:
Dark Mystic Elf
https://steamcommunity.com/id/DarkMysticElf