Is Thirty Flights of Loving the best five-minute game since Gravity Bone?

Posted by on August 22, 2012 in Games

If you’re interested in level design, theme parks and casinos are great teachers.

Brendon Chung’s commentary mode in Thirty Flights of Loving includes comments like the above quote, a slower look at some of the game’s dizzying edits, and even deleted scenes, such as an earlier incarnation of Anita’s sharpshooter skill that didn’t fit the character. That picture up there tells you all you need to know about Anita, except for the part about her being a confectioner. Don’t worry, it all makes as much sense as it needs to.

Thirty Flights of Loving is Chung’s sequel to Gravity Bone. These aren’t games, and they’re not even stories. They’re snatches of interactive imagery stitched together in the Quake engine, more a series of feelings and images than anything else, cinematic poems about adventure, love, and betrayal. Thirty Flights of Loving is currently available on Steam and it includes Gravity Bone.

  • Ginger Yellow

    Yay. I loved Gravity Bone so much, I was actually disappointed when I found out about Flotilla. I wanted more Gravity Bone, dammit! And now it’s here.

  • Mercanis

    Gravity Bone is really something special. I’m not much of a Flotilla fan, and I haven’t yet tried AZS, but a Gravity Bone sequel sounds sublime.

  • Peter Michelsen

    I really, really want a full-length version of Flotilla, it’s just a mix of all the things I love. Combat Mission, Homeworld, Master of Orion II. We should clone Chung about 50 times over, and just give him (well, them) all our money. Why haven’t we done that already?

  • Juan Pablo Bouquet

    Why is Flotilla not “full-lenght”? I always thought it was a very elegant game that needed nothing more.

  • Dylan

    I have to ask, Tom…if it’s not a game, why refer to it as such in the title?

  • tomchick

    Because “cinematic poem about adventure, love, and betrayal” is too long for the headline!

  • AWalt

    Thirty Flights of Loving is not better than Gravity Bone. I mean really, how can anything be better than the last 90 seconds of Gravity Bone? But I think it’s more inventive and ambitious than its predecessor (if not as powerful, except for a single magnificent split-second sensation), and I absolutely adore every single aspect of both games.

    I’m torn between bright-eyed wishing for more such games more often and just savouring the rare occasions on which something this brilliant and totally out of the blue comes along. I think this is why these two games – Gravity Bone and Thirty Flights of Loving – are so special: there’s simply nothing else out there like them…

    … But if you know of something else like them, please do share! :)

  • tomchick

    Well put, Mr. Walt. Out of curiosity, what’s the split-second sensation you’re talking about? A specific moment in the game?

  • Dylan

    Fair enough!

  • AWalt

    Yep. I didn’t want to mention it initially (’cause spoilers and all) but I figure anyone who’s interested has already done it by now.

    It’s that moment right before “The End” where you’re in the car escaping the airport, then flash to being on the back of the bike being driven by Anita on the way to the wedding reception. Those cuts from a near death experience flashback to seemingly crashing head on into a truck to being thrown into the credits gallery was a huge “Oh shit!” moment for me. I was just stunned and blown away by how well it was done. I think it was still being able to control my perspective that made it really effective and powerful, which is just enough to feel like I’m playing the game, even though I had basically no control whatsoever. The whole game just had a wonderful sense of immediacy to it.

    Bah, I’m gushing now. *ahem* Thirty Flights of Loving is a quite good game. Yes… Quite good indeed…

  • Peter Michelsen

    Maybe the term was poorly chosen, but it obviously refers to the actual time you can spend with the game. I’ve done several playthroughs as well, and I loved that, but I still keep thinking of the game it could be if it was fleshed out more, both in the “story” and in the actual mechanics. For all its charms, it’s still a small game.

  • Ginger Yellow

    OK, having played it now, I’m ever so slightly disappointed. I still like it a lot, but I definitely preferred Gravity Bone. Maybe I’m looking at GB with rose tinted spectacles, but for all its mechanical simplicity, it made sense that it was presented as a game. There was a greater degree of interactivity and problem solving, and it was in some sense toying with games and their tropes and your expectations as a gamer. Whereas with Thirty Flights of Loving, I’m not sure it wouldn’t have worked just as well, if not better, as an animated short film. The only thing that would probably have not worked so well is the broken stairs bit.