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Mask Quest is a deceptively gimmicky platformer where you must press A to breathe while avoiding the copsFrom increpare, creator of Stephen’s Sausage Roll
From increpare, creator of Stephen’s Sausage Roll
Image credit:increpare / undef
Image credit:increpare / undef
Out 17th October onSteam,Mask Questis a platform game in which you hold and release a button to refill your character’s lungs while dodging police batons, bullets, gas grenades and drones. Neglect to do so, and you’ll pop your clogs. It’s the kind of mechanical tomfoolery you’d associate withPeter Molydeux, but in this case, it’s all the fine work ofStephen’s Sausage Rolldeveloper increpare andQuadrantdeveloper undef. The developers have somehow gotten 50 levels out of this meme-ish premise, and it looks like quite an elaborate hop-and-bopper with some less-cheerful political overtones. Here’s the trailer.
Mask Quest Trailer (Out now on Steam - Windows/MacOS $9.99)Watch on YouTube
Mask Quest Trailer (Out now on Steam - Windows/MacOS $9.99)
So, those complexities. From what I can glean, the levels evolve beyond the initial “do what you do in most platformers + remember to inhale/exhale” conceit, with setups that make the breathing mechanic more feature than constraint. For example: you can breathe out to shunt away quadrotor drones before they knock you off ladders, and blow on sails to inflate them. There’s a bit where it looks like you’re expelling air to alter your mass and fall through surfaces. There’s also the prospect of hyperventilation, which seemingly requires you to preserve the rhythm of your respiration, however frenzied your surroundings: breathe too rapidly and you’ll empty out your carbon dioxide gauge.
As for the political overtones: 1) your objective is, as you’d guess, to find a mask, which is “sold out everywhere”. It feels like an allusion to “post”-pandemic politics and the expectation that clinically vulnerable people must now see to their own protection, without state support. And 2) your character is Black, your enemies all appear to be cops, and the breath mechanic may refer tothe murder of Eric Garner. I am likely reaching horribly with all this, or at best, lumpishly unearthing the subtext.
