Gross Games about Flesh and Stuff
Jacob Geller・20 minutes read
Perfect Vermin is a game centered around smashing objects with a hammer in a surreal office filled with furniture made of meat, drawing inspiration from Cao Hui's art. The game's narrative and themes, reminiscent of Videodrome, explore violence and disconnection, culminating in a twist where the player is diagnosed with cancer, offering layers of subtext and metaphors for interpretation.
Insights
- Perfect Vermin, released in 2020, offers a surreal gameplay experience where the player smashes objects that reveal grotesque meat, drawing inspiration from artist Cao Hui's dissected objects to explore themes of violence and biological transgression.
- How Fish is Made, a 2022 narrative-driven horror game, presents players with choices symbolized by fish moving up or down, delving into themes of uncertainty, pain, and shared struggles through unsettling visuals and ambiguous outcomes, challenging conventional notions of decision-making and mortality.
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Recent questions
What is Perfect Vermin about?
A game where players smash objects with a hammer.
How does Perfect Vermin end?
With a twist where the player is diagnosed with cancer.
What is the gameplay of How Fish is Made like?
Narrative-driven horror game controlling a sardine in an industrial setting.
What themes does How Fish is Made explore?
Living with uncertainty and the universal experience of pain.
What is a standout scene in How Fish is Made?
A conversation with a parasite that has eaten a sea bass's tongue.
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Summary
00:00
"Perfect Vermin: Hammer, Meat, and Surrealism"
- Perfect Vermin, a game released in 2020, begins with a subversion where the player smashes a door with a hammer instead of opening it conventionally.
- The game revolves around smashing objects with a hammer, providing a satisfying experience as things break apart realistically.
- The office in Perfect Vermin is filled with furniture that turns out to be meat, adding a grotesque twist to the gameplay.
- The game takes inspiration from artist Cao Hui's work, which involves dissecting everyday objects to reveal realistic viscera.
- Perfect Vermin's gameplay involves finding and crushing "vermin" in various levels, with the environment becoming increasingly surreal and challenging.
- The game's tone and themes are compared to David Cronenberg's Videodrome, both exploring biological transgression and violence.
- Perfect Vermin and Videodrome share parallels in their themes of violence and disconnection from reality, with both works delving into grotesque imagery.
- The game's ending reveals a twist where the player is diagnosed with cancer, shedding light on the game's themes of destruction and mutation.
- The narrative of Perfect Vermin is open to interpretation, with layers of subtext and metaphors that can be analyzed in various ways.
- How Fish is Made, released by Swedish students in 2022, is a narrative-driven horror game where the player controls a sardine in an industrial setting.
13:42
"Fish Game: Life's Uncertainty and Choices"
- The game presents a choice between up or down, symbolizing good and bad places, with each fish making a decision that cannot be reversed.
- A significant moment in the game reveals that 199 fish have chosen up, while 474 have chosen down, adding complexity to the decision-making process.
- The game's design features a mix of mechanical and anatomical elements, with unsettling visuals like pulsating lotus seed pods and fish caught in gears.
- A standout scene involves a conversation with a parasite that has eaten a sea bass's tongue, leading to a bizarre musical number performance.
- The game explores themes of living with uncertainty and the universal experience of pain, offering no clear answers but emphasizing shared struggles.
- The ending of the game can lead to two vastly different outcomes, highlighting the ambiguity and complexity of the choices made throughout.
- The game challenges the idea of a practice run for life and death decisions, emphasizing that everyone faces uncertainty and struggles alone, together.
- Despite its short length, the game leaves a lasting impact due to its grotesque yet profound themes, prompting reflection on mortality and the unknown.
