Gravity Bone Review

After you descend in the elevator to the floor below, you enter the very strange world of Gravity Bone.  Developer Blendo Games created Gravity Bone as a short and simple standalone mod for the Quake II engine.  Only two levels make up the world of this first-person adventure title, so you’ll play through it all in less than 20 minutes.  Don’t, however, let its brevity fool you:  it conveys a charming, yet subtle narrative.  It’s an entirely weird story, true, but still quite worthwhile.

When the elevator doors open, you arrive at what appears to be a masquerade ball.  A rumpus melody of enthusiastic trumpets plays over a scene of partygoers chattering and waiters serving drinks.  You’re greeted by a sign of The Saturday Club that intuitively teaches you the controls within the context and diegesis of the game world.  Using very brief instructions from a small note you hold, you go about playing a peculiar game of espionage.

Use WASD to move, sir. Champagne?

As you carry out the instructions, the first detail you notice comes from the simplicity of the graphics and the game engine.  The people look like a makeshift combination of cubes.  They buzz with speech reminiscent of the adults in a Charlie Brown cartoon show.  The balcony of the party overlooks low-res Brazilian mountains and jungle pasted onto a cubic skybox.

It is the old Quake II engine after all, but what it lacks in technology, it more than makes up in art style.  The bright solid colors of the setting make the otherwise dull polygons brim with life and shimmering light bloom.  The blocky people have smug, but cute little faces.  And the security guards comically follow you with suspicious eyes as if part of some overall tongue-in-cheek spy joke.  Despite Gravity Bone’s cryptic story, every detail constructs a charming and plausible world.  Who cares about the logical leaps and plot assumptions?  Let me just enjoy this setting and play the adventure.

Don’t look at me…I’m as confused as you.

So let’s get to the mission then.  The adventure gameplay is just as simple and quirky as the presentation.  The note you hold from some obscure contracting company leads you to a hidden area with further instructions and items to carry out your mission.  For example, you will freeze locks with pressurized Freon and then break them with a ball-peen hammer to unlock doors.  The gameplay mainly serves to propel you through the spy story, even though you’re not quite sure what to make of what exactly you’re doing.

Perhaps the “need to know basis” of information lends itself to interpretation: the culmination of the life of your playable character as a spy has some significance.  Or simply the exciting scripted chase sequence and well-composed cinematic event at the end just lend themselves to enjoyable entertainment.  Either way, Gravity Bone is a fun pint-sized adventure with great direction and narrative that nearly overdoes itself with ostentatious presentation.  You couldn’t ask for more from such a tight-knit package.

Have 20 minutes of time to spare? Download Gravity Bone for free from Blendo Games.  Let the life of a spy flash before your eyes.  And hey, when it’s over, go ahead and play it again.