Blueberry Garden Demo Impression

 

Back during GDC 2009 Independent Games Festival, I read about Blueberry Garden for the first time. Developed by Erik Svedang, the game displayed an open exploration theme that didn’t underline to players the objective of the game. Blueberry garden is available on Steam for USD$5 and a demo is also available.

 

According to its creator:

 

Blueberry Garden is a short experimental game about curiosity and exploration. You take on the role of a creature investigating a mysterious world to find out what is going on there. It’s probably not very much like anything you’ve played before but I hope you will find it enjoyable!

 

The demo includes a small portion of the game plus little tutorial bits about the movement and interactive bits. It never explains the objective and ‘playing’ the game involves figuring things out or just plain exploration of the level.

The character you play looks like a bird creature and the level looks like a Salvador Dali painting. The art style is very pleasing and clean. The music is subtle and only kicks in at certain portion(a piano piece).

 

In Blueberry Garden, you traverse the level by walking or flying(there is a limit to how high you can fly). There are objects that you can pick up and fruits that fall from trees that you can eat. Each fruit you eat bestows a certain special power that isn’t really obvious in the beginning.

Some give you a bubble that allows you to go under water, some allows you to fly higher and some even morphs the level(raises the ground  underneath you). You will pieces of items(and even other life forms) littered around the level. Exactly what their use is entirely up to discover.

 

It has to be  noted that demo level fills up with water over time so you probably have move quick. The demo is a very small piece that blocks access to certain regions that you cant go to severely limiting its enjoyability.

There are some unnatural like animation(when the character fall on a steep area) and issues with collision detection. But overall the physics of the level is well done.

 

Blue Garden is a short experimental experience that at the price of USD $5 is decent value depending on whether you like the experience of the game.

 

Try the demo out yourself here.