“The Crimson Room” and “Façade”: A reaction
Chris Kairalla, September 2005

“The Crimson Room” and “Façade” share a common goal: make the player desperately want to escape from a room. “The crimson room” gives the player no instructions at all, and assumes that the player is computer and video game savvy enough to assume certain conventions. This is mostly a fair assumption, and any initial confusion that I had would probably make the creators smile with glee. It does a fairly good job of “training” the player by allowing the player to gather a couple of easy objects almost immediately. The game gets harder in a satisfying way, but the player soon feels like this is mostly just a fever-dream style Easter egg hunt. And that is the main weakness of this game: while most of the items can be found and used by using the logic that the game creates, some items are discovered by accident or my random clicking, and other objects are not found because they are too well hidden.
 For example, I ended up using a walkthough because I simply couldn’t figure out what to do next. The answer was to look behind the bed. The frustrating part was that I DID try to look behind the bed, many times. I just didn’t happen to click in EXACTLY the place that the game wanted. Also, I found a metal rod pretty early in the game but I didn’t know how until I read the walkthrough. Just clicking around randomly was enough to dislodge it from the curtain.
The game is indeed successful at creating a certain claustrophobia by limiting the amount of space the player can navigate. Also, the strong primary colors also add to the paranoia, as if the player’s consciousness is altered. The big, unforgivable problem with the game is that, at least the one time I played it, the combination was wrong. I went to the other website to receive the code (a really nice touch, I should add, although completely illogical,) and the numbers didn’t work! Very, VERY frustrating. But then, maybe that was the point.

“Façade” is, without a doubt, the most impressive thing I have ever seen on a computer. I’ve read plenty on the importance of this piece, but nothing compares to the experience. No other interactive game, story, anything, has moved me like Façade. Most games ask that you assume a character. This game wants you to be YOU. There is no comforting emotional distance. When Trip and Grace are arguing, I feel uncomfortable. I want to help, and then, just like in real life, I want to leave. I want to get the hell out of there because I don’t want to get dragged into this. But wait- this isn’t real, right? Clearly the graphics don’t look real, although the creators wisely realized that emotionally resonant cartoon characters are much better than a bad attempt at photorealism. What is real is the audio. Trip and Grace call to me by name, and their reactions to me are filled with uncomfortable, yet completely realistic, pauses and false starts. Their voices follow their bodies, so that if Grace is insulting Trip from across the room, her voice sounds like it’s across the room. If Trip is standing to my right, his voice comes predominantly from the right speaker. I could be wrong, but it even sounded like their was reverb on their voices when they stood farther away.
I played this piece twice. Normally, when I play a video game or use some interactive device, I spend a little bit of time getting acquainted with the logic of the piece. In other words, “This button does this, and if I move the mouse, this happens.” With Façade, I quickly felt like I was blowing it pretty quickly. Since I didn’t understand what was going on, I quickly upset Grace and I felt like I was the cause of the fighting. I truly felt terrible. The usual emotional detachment was gone. I tried to patch things up, but soon Trip was telling me to leave. I was devastated.
Fortunately, I could play again and this time I would make things right. I walked right into that room and confidently tried to console trip while comforting Grace. These two were getting back together, dammit. Things seemed fine, but then the game took on a mind of its own. Grace and Trip got too wrapped up in their argument to pay attention to me. Finally, Trip asks me a question that is going to upset one of them regardless of my answer. This is when I left. I made a straight line for the elevator while Trip kept calling to me to come back.
This interactive piece have been compared to “Who’s afraid of Virginia Woolf”, and I can see the similarities. But this is much more than a play. It’s more like a dream.