Everything (2017)

In 2017 I was in my second year of university studying computer science. I was out of my depth, the coding was going straight over my head and mathematical equations were swirling around me - I was certain I would drop out.

Then 'Everything' came out on playstation 4. I was doing the usual routine of avoiding my project deadlines, doing the only thing that I knew I was good at, playing video games. That's when I launched the playstation store and saw that a game I had never heard of before had launched.

I clicked on it and watched the brief trailer where a recognisable voice read out philosophical extracts whilst animals and all sorts of things flew across the screen. What was going on? Were there enemies to fight? What was the end goal of the game? I was intrigued.

With my educational career choices seemingly crumbling around me I felt lower than I had ever felt before. 'Everything' spoke to me on a deeply personal level. Through the combination of Alan Watts' thought provoking narration and David O'Rileys genius gameplay mechanics 'Everything' gave me a sense of perspective.

Morphing from a bear, to a plant, to an insect, then a piece of bacteria, a single molecule, an atom, and eventually going full circle and appearing as particles colliding in space whilst Alan Watts says "Every minute little fruit fly or nat, or bacterium... I would go so far as to say is an event on which this whole cosmos depends upon" hits you hard.

It reinforced and reassured me of the idea that we're all a part of something. Ultimately there is no generic end goal or boss battle in the game. There is simply the concept that we're all connected and perspective is everything. Every living creature is valid and important, our paths cross and change course all for a reason. You can be whoever you want to be, only your imagination is the limit.

Suddenly my degree not working out wasn't such a big issue. It wasn't the be-all and end-all of my existence.

I really needed to be reminded of all that in 2017 and I have everything to thank for it.

"You can see yourself as existing only now, that's the only you there is... The alternative to that, logically, is to see yourself as everything."

This game was made by David O'Reilly, maker of the terrible pretentious asset flip Mountain. This is more of an actual game, it kinda reminded me of Meadow. You inhabit everything from animals to objects to atoms to galactic clusters. Roaming across the space you're in you discover and read thoughts, as well as a few bits of philosophical babbling. It's really rather impressive that you can smoothly go from sub-microscopic to nearly all-encompassing.

After about an hour you end up in "hell", a space with floating objects that think about their regrets. It's mildly engaging but ultimately quite pointless since the thoughts start re-appearing in other objects.

Not really worth the money, but if you got it for free on Epic and have 90 minutes to spare it's still kinda interesting.

When I was little my dad described me the video Powers of Ten by Charles and Ray Eames (this was before YouTube). Published in 1977, it's an attempt to experience the vastness of the cosmos and the microcosmos which I still love despite it's dated elements.

"Everything" is like a remake of powers of ten (although there is one already) with added interactivity and philosophical (verging on pseudo-philosophical mystical mumbo jumbo) commentary in the form of snippets of lectures from some Allan Watts guy, whom I'd never heard of.

What do you do in this game? You start as something and you can then go to bigger things or smaller things. I started as a bear and then I moved to some grass, then to a rock, and from there to dust particles, atoms, and so on. As each of these objects, you can "talk" to other objects, dance, move around and reproduce yourself. What are "you" in this case? Well, everything.

The thesis of the game is that everything is just one thing. The distinction between things is arbitrary and doesn't reflect anything meaningful. Atoms that today make up your body were once part of the crust of the Earth, and they will be part of a bear, grass, rocks and... everything. From the most basic building blocks of matter and energy (if there even is such a thing) to the biggest Galaxy, is just one thing, the cosmos.

I love this kind of sentiment because it is true at some level. The progress of science tells of the relentless dethroning of the human species. The numerous Copernican revolutions moved humankind from a special being chosen by god to be the centre of its creation, to just one more manifestation of the laws of the universe. In a very real, literal sense you, I, and every living thing around us are part of the same family. We are made of the same stuff as the stars we see at night and there's nothing fundamental that separates us.

"Everything" makes you feel that in your bones. And it's tremendously successful at it. If you play it right, with the right attitude, you start to feel the connection with everything.

However, I feel that "Everything" fails at a two crucial points.

First, while you can be a wale, a continent, a bird, a fox, a fish, a virus, a quark, a plank length, so on and so forth... you can't be a human. Humans do inhabit the world of the game (you can be a house, a fence, a stave church) and their civilisation develops over time, but they are nowhere to be seen. The effect of that omission is that, while you can feel the connection between all things, humans end up excluded, separated; as if humanity were some kind of extraneous entity that doesn't fit with the rest of the cosmos.

Secondly, there's no real interaction between things. You can "talk" with other things or move as a collective with similar stuff as you, but that's it. As a deer, you can't eat a plant; as a fox, you can't hunt a rabbit. This oversight not only creates a rather static and dull universe, but also misses another very important aspect of the contentedness of stuff.

Both problems could be blamed to the limited development bandwidth, but there are some hints that point to being deliberate. What little endgame is there, features an area filled with "corrupted" stuff and it's mostly modern objects, which suggest a philosophical position of modern humanity being disconnected from the rest of the universe -a position which, I believe, misses the point completely. What little interactions are there, are peaceful and harmonious -which, again, misses the point of how things are actually connected.

So, is this a game? Let me ask a different question, is this a zinkydoink? I loved playing "Everything". It's short, to the point, and it manages to successfully transmit a sense of oneness with the cosmos.

Rating: 7/10

Everything is definitely a neat "game." Many will say that it's more of an experience and that is true, so it should be approached like that. The core gameplay is ascending or descending to bigger or smaller things and just seeing the areas/environments from their perspective. You can go to space and hang out as galaxies, go down to atomic level, and everything in between. Be a bird, be a tree, be a wrench, be a train, etc, the point is that you can do all of those things. Dance, sing and spawn more of yourself.

So it's a nature simulator where you explore and listen to philosophical musings and jokes. It's good, there's no doubt that it accomplishes what it sets out to do on some level. It just doesn't click with me as some amazing, awe-inspiring thing. It's cool, I'm glad I played it, but I'm not seeing the meat here that some others are seeing. For all the relaxing music that it plays or the beings/objects that you can inhabit, I never felt compelled to actually experience all of them. Definitely check it out though.

Almost a year ago now, I replayed Katamari Damacy and left a review here on Grouvee which included this thought:

I rediscovered the joyous feeling of gradually, and through the actions you take, changing your perspective enormously from ground-level to practically supernatural. It's hard to describe how strangely moving that experience can be, and it's enormously gratifying to play.

Everything plays as if David O'Reilly was trying to make an entire game focused on that feeling specifically. Because of that, this game scratches an itch I didn't even know I had. I really loved it, and I'll be returning in the near future whenever I want to explore or relax.