Have Courage, Have Rage
Rising is a survival game in 8bit pixel art which will ultimately comprise multiple episodes, each one being autonomous and depicting a unique story, through the game, a la Another World (Eric Chahi). Set in nature, inspired by various trips in Brazil, Africa, India, France, Japan or Turkey, each episode will tell the quest for life of a living form on earth or beyond.
Episode #1 : Hungry Lizard
Play a lizard aiming to survive in a dangerous natural world. The lizard can eat butterflies and worms but has to prevent parrots’ attacks. He can hide, stop his movements and choose to eat his prey at the most precise moment. A satiety bar forces him to consistently eat preys. You only use the directional pad of the keyboard to navigate through the map, but the physic is precise and the lizard can move freely and stick on walls or trees to find the ideal path for his quest. It’s a cruel world and each action has to be chosen within the right moment of significance. Dedicate yourself entirely to sacrificing the flux of time for the right moment.
Hungry Lizard is a haiku
Life consists of rare, isolated moments of the greatest significance, and of innumerably many intervals, during which at best the silhouettes of those moments hover about us. Hungry Lizard consciously evokes the presence by the absence, with its pixel art graphics and sound design elegantly blended into a Zen, minimal and spatial floating world.
Truth lies in one single moment
Hungry Lizard is an arcade game and must be played as such. You can play Hungry Lizard slowly, and actually make a better score in staying in the first zone. You can optimize each movement. You don’t need to see the ending even though the game has a beautiful one. The concept is to continue playing, short or long runs, few or many points, the beauty is there nonetheless. You will eventually die. You can restart the game or let it run for itself and take a breath, enjoy the graphics, the music, the physic, because it runs for itself marvelously. Each death is different and demands a moment of recollection and contemplation. Time is therefore dedicated to seeing and experiencing.
What is essential is the isolated moment and not what comes before and after.
In Hungry Lizard, it feels like we are seeing the world for the first time. Everything is so beautiful all at once. From so many angles.
