Orientalism: The Text Adventure
Orientalism: The Text Adventure
A lost soul wakes up in an endless desert. Shielding their eyes from the sun's malicious glare, they spy, on the horizon, grand libraries, dazzling palaces...
A text/combat adventure loosely inspired by Edward Said's work, Orientalism. Track your progress through the metaphysical realm of The Orient, where souls are trapped in limbo, dazzled by the powers of their own orientalist beliefs. Manage your health and the first-ever in-game 'orientalism' meter, which transforms your fantastical foes into unimaginably powerful and terrifying creatures as it increases.
In this game, there are many wordy passages. Boss fights will not always be fair, and may use strange mechanics. But if you persist, and pay attention, you might discover the truth of this world.
A game written and programmed as an extension of a class project, made with Twine.
Cover: The Snake Charmer by Jean-Léon Gérôme.
Comments
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Wow. I really have enjoyed this. Interestingly, I've defeated the fourth opponent, however it then puts me in a loop where the opponent appears again, with the same fight. Is this intentional?
Thank you for playing! I think that may be a bug, I didn't reset the internal variables upon completing the game, so I think it just locks you into the endgame. May fix it in the future.
I loved the experience. I'm a blind person, so being able to do battle with these characters and creatures was really interesting, thank you so, so much. Yes please, I hope you can fix the bug, as I'd like to find out what happens. I mean, if you have an idea what happens at the end or remember, you could write it here but wouldn't that spoil the ending for those who haven't played it all the way through? Also, I'm wondering, could you please sort of explain the concept of the game to me? I've enjoyed the battles, but I don't really know exactly what is happening. How is it based on the work, and what does the work describe? Thanks in advance.
The work is mostly describing the way in which idealized, sometimes erroneous myths about the Orient gain a presence and weight in the real world (influencing culture, policies, etc). And while there are a lot of harmful beliefs that arise out of early academic study of the East I believe the book is a call to reimagine the world above this dichotomy of East/West. This game idea kind of came to me and the result was me exploring these ideas in a game format.