Phantasmagoria: A Puzzle of Flesh
Encyclopedia
Phantasmagoria: A Puzzle of Flesh, also known as Phantasmagoria 2 and released as Phantasmagoria II: Fatal Obsessions in some European countries, is a full motion video based game released in 1996
by Sierra Entertainment
. Though technically a sequel to Roberta Williams'
1995 game Phantasmagoria, Puzzle of Flesh shares no connections with its predecessor in plot nor characters, as Sierra initially intended the Phantasmagoria title to be a horror anthology
, with each installment of a different story and style. While not a commercial success, A Puzzle of Flesh, like its predecessor Phantasmagoria, is remembered for its controversial violent and sexual content, which led the game to being heavily censored
or banned outright in several European and Oceanic
countries.
. However, the player quickly learns that nothing in this game's environment is what it may appear to be.
Curtis has been released from a mental institution one year prior to the game's events, and has regular visits with a therapist. His mental health
problems largely stem from having an abusive
mother who committed suicide
and a father who, before he died, was working on a top secret
project at Wyntech, the same company where Curtis is currently employed. Recently Curtis has been seeing and hearing strange things that might be hallucinations or something more horrific.
One day, Bob, an unpleasant and backstabbing coworker is brutally murdered in Curtis' cubicle. Though Bob was generally disliked, Curtis has expressed the desire to kill him, which leads him to suspect that he may have murdered him in a psychotic break.
While Curtis is dating a female office coworker Jocelyn, he also becomes involved with a more liberated woman, Therese who introduces him to the local S&M fetish
scene. His best friend Trevor is an openly homosexual man, and Curtis himself admits to his therapist he is likely bisexual, claiming to be attracted to Trevor.
After Curtis' superior Tom is murdered as well; Curtis suspects his boss, Paul Allen Warner (who had threatened Tom the previous day) to have murdered him and possibly Bob as well. As the number of deaths and hallucinations keeps increasing he eventually discovers this is all connected to "Project Threshold", the project his father had worked on. Decades prior, Wyntech had discovered a rift leading to "Dimension X" in the basement of their building and sought to use it for monetary gain, performing experiments using mental patients supplied by the corrupt Dr Merrick, a doctor at the asylum where Craig was committed. At one point, Warner even used the then pre-pubescent Craig as a subject, without his father's permission. The project was eventually shut down when the military showed no interest but was recently reactivated when Warner discovered the inhabitants of Dimension X could synthesize any chemical desired at the cost of some components and a couple of "human specimens". Warner planned on sacrificing several people in exchange for a highly addictive antidepressant/weight loss drug, which would then be released on the market, causing the Earth's population to become hopelessly addicted on the product and making Wyntech the most powerful corporation on Earth.
When Curtis confronts Warner over this, the latter is suddenly knocked out by a horrifying humanoid creature that introduces itself as a "manifestation" of the real Curtis Craig. It turns out that the Curtis that came out of the rift is in fact an alien duplicate while the real Curtis was trapped on Dimension X and became hideously mutated as a result. The real Curtis was responsible for the murders and hallucinations with the purpose of driving the duplicate Curtis insane so that he could take over his body. The duplicate Curtis escapes the manifestation through the Dimension X portal, kills the real Curtis and returns to Earth. Jocelyn suddenly appears revealing that (somehow) she knows the truth and that she loves him. However, a message from the inhabitants of Dimension X is heard asking Curtis to return since he doesn't belong on Earth. The player then has the choice between two endings: either Curtis chooses to leave, in which case he spends one last day with Jocelyn before departing or he chooses to remain on Earth. If the player chooses the latter, we see Curtis and Jocelyn talking happily in a restaurant while the camera focus on Curtis' hand beneath the table which morphs into a grotesque blob before changing back. A post-credits scene shows the still-living severed head of Warner suspended in the air in Dimension X.
are here; as Curtis the player travels to various locations, interact with the often strange and eccentric
people in his life, and collects items and solves puzzles.
A Puzzle of Fleshs gameplay features a standard point-and-click
interface, played from a third-person perspective: the cursor, when waved over an object or area that can be manipulated, will highlight, and clicking it will initiate a live-action clip that furthers the game along. Inventory
is stored along the bottom of the screen and a simple click-and-drag command will cause inventory items to interact with other objects.
Due to the large amount of graphic violence and sexual content, A Puzzle of Flesh came with password-enabled parental controls
that thoroughly edited out the game's offensive content.
A Puzzle of Flesh also has a large number of comedic Easter eggs
, which the player can achieve on a point system, although, due to some of the complex key commands one must perform to enable them, most of them are impossible to access without outside help. These Easter eggs range from simple sight gags
and messages to minigame
s and hidden videos.
, who had previously served as a writer on the Roberta Williams games King's Quest VII and The Dagger of Amon Ra
, was selected to take on the task of writing and designing the sequel to Williams' Phantasmagoria. While the first installment was a supernatural horror
in the tradition of The Shining
and the works of Stephen King
, Shannon redeveloped the series into a more modern, urban setting and utilized a psychological horror
approach with science fiction
undertones; Shannon has said the game was influenced by such authors as Edgar Allan Poe
and Shirley Jackson
, and was influenced visually by Seven
. Some reviewers have also noted a slight plot similarity to the film Jacob's Ladder
.
While Phantasmagoria was shot with live actors super-imposed in bluescreen
backgrounds, A Puzzle of Flesh was filmed entirely on set and on location, not unlike a regular feature film (although the game's final scenes, in the Alien World, were shot on bluescreen). Filming took place in and around Seattle, Washington from February to September of 1996. Shot on Digital Betacam, nearly four and a half hours of video was shot, from a script over 200 pages long. The entire budget for A Puzzle of Flesh was roughly around four million dollars.
For a while, Sierra was planning Phantasmagoria 3, and had asked Roberta Williams to return as its lead designer. However, after the commercial disappointment of A Puzzle of Flesh, along with the decline of the adventure game genre and interactive movie
s, the project never materialized.
Matthew Jensen and edited by Wes Plate. The cast was as follows:
Additionally, actress V. Joy Lee, who played "Harriet" in the first Phantasmagoria, returns in the sequel as "The Ratwoman", a mental patient. Lorelei Shannon makes two cameos
, as a mental patient and a gas mask
ed patron at an S&M club, and director
Hoyos makes an appearance as yet another mental patient.
scene, A Puzzle of Flesh was considerably more explicit: sexuality plays a major part in the game's plot, which includes four intense sex scenes featuring bare breasts, bondage
, sadomasochism, public sex and offscreen oral sex
. Various death scenes include graphic images of gore, including disembowelment
and exsanguination
, and A Puzzle of Flesh was also rated harshly for strong language, including two uses of the word "fuck
", which in 1996 was a rare occurrence in video games.
One notable aspect of the sexual aspect of the game was the bisexuality
of Curtis Craig, making A Puzzle of Flesh one of the few computer games to feature a playable character with such a sexual orientation. One of the characters in the game, Curtis' best friend Trevor, is openly gay, and it is later revealed Curtis harbors feelings for him, leading to a thwarted (and long foreshadowed) kiss between the two late in the game (the explicit sexual scenes are reserved for male-female encounters only). Several reviews have praised A Puzzle of Fleshs treatment of a homosexual character (and his relationship with heterosexual characters), portraying him in an earnest and natural way, while most video games at the time still depicted gay characters as over-the-top stereotypes. (see: LGBT characters in video games)
Due to its amount of sex and violence, A Puzzle of Flesh was heavily censored in most European countries and banned in Singapore
and Australia
, although a re-cut version was eventually made available in the latter. In the United States, the game was given an RSAC Rating Level 4 (of 4) for its sexual content and a Level 3 for its violence and language.
user rating of 3.7 out of 5.
GameSpot
gave a harsh review, giving A Puzzle of Flesh a 3.7 out of 10 rating, calling it clichéd
and absurd, summarizing "As the credits rolled, all I felt was regret - regret that I had spent a good chunk of my life in this ugly world, with annoying, unappealing characters and their silly problems". Game Revolution
's review was similar, calling the game "a predictable, dissatisfying mess".
Response within the adventure game
community was a bit more positive, with likewise criticism pointed at the gameplay and structure, though more praise was given to the game's storyline. The adventure-based gaming site Adventure Gamers
gave 'A Puzzle of Flesh' a rating of 2.5 out of 5, finding flaws in both its story and cinematic production, but noting that those looking for light entertainment will have "a hell of a lot of fun". Similar sites, such as Adventure Classic Gaming, called the plot "intriguing and well executed", though its gameplay "falls short to qualify as a mediocre adventure game". Just Adventure was a bit kinder in a way, saying that "it's trashy, it's tacky, it's badly acted, it's badly cast, it's ugly, and it's short. Also, like Phantasmagoria, it's a lot of fun", and "It’s a guilty pleasure
, but a pleasure nonetheless", likening it to watching a good B movie
.
1996 in video gaming
-Notable releases:*January 29 — Duke Nukem 3D, successor to the simple side-scrolling originals, and a genre-redefining title for first person shooters....
by Sierra Entertainment
Sierra Entertainment
Sierra Entertainment Inc. was an American video-game developer and publisher founded in 1979 as On-Line Systems by Ken and Roberta Williams...
. Though technically a sequel to Roberta Williams'
Roberta Williams
Roberta Williams is an American video game designer. She is most famous for her pioneering work in graphical adventure games, particularly the King's Quest series.-Career:...
1995 game Phantasmagoria, Puzzle of Flesh shares no connections with its predecessor in plot nor characters, as Sierra initially intended the Phantasmagoria title to be a horror anthology
Anthology
An anthology is a collection of literary works chosen by the compiler. It may be a collection of poems, short stories, plays, songs, or excerpts...
, with each installment of a different story and style. While not a commercial success, A Puzzle of Flesh, like its predecessor Phantasmagoria, is remembered for its controversial violent and sexual content, which led the game to being heavily censored
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
or banned outright in several European and Oceanic
Oceania
Oceania is a region centered on the islands of the tropical Pacific Ocean. Conceptions of what constitutes Oceania range from the coral atolls and volcanic islands of the South Pacific to the entire insular region between Asia and the Americas, including Australasia and the Malay Archipelago...
countries.
Plot
In the game the player controls Curtis Craig, an introverted 26-year old man who, on the surface, seems to be living a mundane life, while working at a pharmaceutical companyPharmaceutical company
The pharmaceutical industry develops, produces, and markets drugs licensed for use as medications. Pharmaceutical companies are allowed to deal in generic and/or brand medications and medical devices...
. However, the player quickly learns that nothing in this game's environment is what it may appear to be.
Curtis has been released from a mental institution one year prior to the game's events, and has regular visits with a therapist. His mental health
Mental health
Mental health describes either a level of cognitive or emotional well-being or an absence of a mental disorder. From perspectives of the discipline of positive psychology or holism mental health may include an individual's ability to enjoy life and procure a balance between life activities and...
problems largely stem from having an abusive
Child abuse
Child abuse is the physical, sexual, emotional mistreatment, or neglect of a child. In the United States, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the Department of Children And Families define child maltreatment as any act or series of acts of commission or omission by a parent or...
mother who committed suicide
Suicide
Suicide is the act of intentionally causing one's own death. Suicide is often committed out of despair or attributed to some underlying mental disorder, such as depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, alcoholism, or drug abuse...
and a father who, before he died, was working on a top secret
Top Secret
Top Secret generally refers to the highest acknowledged level of classified information.Top Secret may also refer to:- Film and television :* Top Secret , a British comedy directed by Mario Zampi...
project at Wyntech, the same company where Curtis is currently employed. Recently Curtis has been seeing and hearing strange things that might be hallucinations or something more horrific.
One day, Bob, an unpleasant and backstabbing coworker is brutally murdered in Curtis' cubicle. Though Bob was generally disliked, Curtis has expressed the desire to kill him, which leads him to suspect that he may have murdered him in a psychotic break.
While Curtis is dating a female office coworker Jocelyn, he also becomes involved with a more liberated woman, Therese who introduces him to the local S&M fetish
Sexual fetishism
Sexual fetishism, or erotic fetishism, is the sexual arousal a person receives from a physical object, or from a specific situation. The object or situation of interest is called the fetish, the person a fetishist who has a fetish for that object/situation. Sexual fetishism may be regarded, e.g...
scene. His best friend Trevor is an openly homosexual man, and Curtis himself admits to his therapist he is likely bisexual, claiming to be attracted to Trevor.
After Curtis' superior Tom is murdered as well; Curtis suspects his boss, Paul Allen Warner (who had threatened Tom the previous day) to have murdered him and possibly Bob as well. As the number of deaths and hallucinations keeps increasing he eventually discovers this is all connected to "Project Threshold", the project his father had worked on. Decades prior, Wyntech had discovered a rift leading to "Dimension X" in the basement of their building and sought to use it for monetary gain, performing experiments using mental patients supplied by the corrupt Dr Merrick, a doctor at the asylum where Craig was committed. At one point, Warner even used the then pre-pubescent Craig as a subject, without his father's permission. The project was eventually shut down when the military showed no interest but was recently reactivated when Warner discovered the inhabitants of Dimension X could synthesize any chemical desired at the cost of some components and a couple of "human specimens". Warner planned on sacrificing several people in exchange for a highly addictive antidepressant/weight loss drug, which would then be released on the market, causing the Earth's population to become hopelessly addicted on the product and making Wyntech the most powerful corporation on Earth.
When Curtis confronts Warner over this, the latter is suddenly knocked out by a horrifying humanoid creature that introduces itself as a "manifestation" of the real Curtis Craig. It turns out that the Curtis that came out of the rift is in fact an alien duplicate while the real Curtis was trapped on Dimension X and became hideously mutated as a result. The real Curtis was responsible for the murders and hallucinations with the purpose of driving the duplicate Curtis insane so that he could take over his body. The duplicate Curtis escapes the manifestation through the Dimension X portal, kills the real Curtis and returns to Earth. Jocelyn suddenly appears revealing that (somehow) she knows the truth and that she loves him. However, a message from the inhabitants of Dimension X is heard asking Curtis to return since he doesn't belong on Earth. The player then has the choice between two endings: either Curtis chooses to leave, in which case he spends one last day with Jocelyn before departing or he chooses to remain on Earth. If the player chooses the latter, we see Curtis and Jocelyn talking happily in a restaurant while the camera focus on Curtis' hand beneath the table which morphs into a grotesque blob before changing back. A post-credits scene shows the still-living severed head of Warner suspended in the air in Dimension X.
Gameplay
The basic aspects of an adventure gameAdventure game
An adventure game is a video game in which the player assumes the role of protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and puzzle-solving instead of physical challenge. The genre's focus on story allows it to draw heavily from other narrative-based media such as literature and film,...
are here; as Curtis the player travels to various locations, interact with the often strange and eccentric
Eccentricity (behavior)
In popular usage, eccentricity refers to unusual or odd behavior on the part of an individual. This behavior would typically be perceived as unusual or unnecessary, without being demonstrably maladaptive...
people in his life, and collects items and solves puzzles.
A Puzzle of Fleshs gameplay features a standard point-and-click
Point-and-click
Point-and-click is the action of a computer user moving a cursor to a certain location on a screen and then pressing a mouse button, usually the left button , or other pointing device...
interface, played from a third-person perspective: the cursor, when waved over an object or area that can be manipulated, will highlight, and clicking it will initiate a live-action clip that furthers the game along. Inventory
Inventory
Inventory means a list compiled for some formal purpose, such as the details of an estate going to probate, or the contents of a house let furnished. This remains the prime meaning in British English...
is stored along the bottom of the screen and a simple click-and-drag command will cause inventory items to interact with other objects.
Due to the large amount of graphic violence and sexual content, A Puzzle of Flesh came with password-enabled parental controls
Parental controls
Parental controls are features which may be included in digital television services, computer and video games, mobile phones and computer software...
that thoroughly edited out the game's offensive content.
A Puzzle of Flesh also has a large number of comedic Easter eggs
Easter egg (media)
Image:Carl Oswald Rostosky - Zwei Kaninchen und ein Igel 1861.jpg|250px|thumb|right|Example of Easter egg hidden within imagerect 467 383 539 434 desc none...
, which the player can achieve on a point system, although, due to some of the complex key commands one must perform to enable them, most of them are impossible to access without outside help. These Easter eggs range from simple sight gags
Visual gag
In comedy, a visual gag or sight gag is anything which conveys its humor visually, often without words being used at all.There are numerous examples in cinema history of directors who based most of the humour in their films on visual gags, even to the point of using no or minimal dialogue...
and messages to minigame
Minigame
A minigame is a short video game often contained within another video game. A minigame is always smaller or more simplistic than the game in which it is contained. Minigames are sometimes also offered separately for free to promote the main game...
s and hidden videos.
Production
Lorelei ShannonLorelei Shannon
Lorelei Shannon is an American writer of horror and computer games.Shannon is the author of a number of books and short stories. Her work has been listed in The Supernatural Index: A Listing of Fantasy, Supernatural, Occult, Weird, and Horror Anthologies, by Mike Ashley and William G. Contento...
, who had previously served as a writer on the Roberta Williams games King's Quest VII and The Dagger of Amon Ra
The Dagger of Amon Ra
Roberta Williams' Laura Bow in: The Dagger of Amon Ra is a computer game published by Sierra On-Line in 1992. The game is the second and final installment in the Laura Bow Mysteries line of adventure games, the first of which was The Colonel's Bequest...
, was selected to take on the task of writing and designing the sequel to Williams' Phantasmagoria. While the first installment was a supernatural horror
Supernatural fiction
Supernatural fiction is a literary genre exploiting or requiring as plot devices or themes some contradictions of the commonplace natural world and materialist assumptions about it....
in the tradition of The Shining
The Shining (novel)
The Shining is a 1977 horror novel by American author Stephen King. The title was inspired by the John Lennon song "Instant Karma!", which contained the line "We all shine on…". It was King's third published novel, and first hardback bestseller, and the success of the book firmly established King...
and the works of Stephen King
Stephen King
Stephen Edwin King is an American author of contemporary horror, suspense, science fiction and fantasy fiction. His books have sold more than 350 million copies and have been adapted into a number of feature films, television movies and comic books...
, Shannon redeveloped the series into a more modern, urban setting and utilized a psychological horror
Psychological horror
Psychological horror is a subgenre of horror fiction that relies on character fears, guilt, beliefs, eerie sound effects, relevant music and emotional instability to build tension and further the plot...
approach with science fiction
Science fiction
Science fiction is a genre of fiction dealing with imaginary but more or less plausible content such as future settings, futuristic science and technology, space travel, aliens, and paranormal abilities...
undertones; Shannon has said the game was influenced by such authors as Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe
Edgar Allan Poe was an American author, poet, editor and literary critic, considered part of the American Romantic Movement. Best known for his tales of mystery and the macabre, Poe was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story and is considered the inventor of the detective...
and Shirley Jackson
Shirley Jackson
Shirley Jackson was an American author. A popular writer in her time, her work has received increasing attention from literary critics in recent years...
, and was influenced visually by Seven
Seven (film)
Seven is a 1995 American thriller film, which also contains horror and neo-noir elements, directed by David Fincher and written by Andrew Kevin Walker. It was distributed by New Line Cinema and stars Brad Pitt, Morgan Freeman, Gwyneth Paltrow, R...
. Some reviewers have also noted a slight plot similarity to the film Jacob's Ladder
Jacob's Ladder (film)
Jacob's Ladder is a 1990 American psychological thriller/horror film directed by Adrian Lyne, based on a screenplay by Bruce Joel Rubin.-Plot:Jacob Singer is a U.S. soldier deployed in the Mekong Delta during the Vietnam War...
.
While Phantasmagoria was shot with live actors super-imposed in bluescreen
Chroma key
Chroma key compositing is a technique for compositing two images together. A color range in the top layer is made transparent, revealing another image behind. The chroma keying technique is commonly used in video production and post-production...
backgrounds, A Puzzle of Flesh was filmed entirely on set and on location, not unlike a regular feature film (although the game's final scenes, in the Alien World, were shot on bluescreen). Filming took place in and around Seattle, Washington from February to September of 1996. Shot on Digital Betacam, nearly four and a half hours of video was shot, from a script over 200 pages long. The entire budget for A Puzzle of Flesh was roughly around four million dollars.
For a while, Sierra was planning Phantasmagoria 3, and had asked Roberta Williams to return as its lead designer. However, after the commercial disappointment of A Puzzle of Flesh, along with the decline of the adventure game genre and interactive movie
Interactive movie
An interactive movie is a video game that features highly cinematic presentation and heavy use of scripting, often through the use of full-motion video of either animated or live-action footage.-Philosophy:...
s, the project never materialized.
Cast and crew
A Puzzle of Fleshs live action sequences were written by Lorelei Shannon, directed by Andy Hoyos, filmed by cinematographerCinematographer
A cinematographer is one photographing with a motion picture camera . The title is generally equivalent to director of photography , used to designate a chief over the camera and lighting crews working on a film, responsible for achieving artistic and technical decisions related to the image...
Matthew Jensen and edited by Wes Plate. The cast was as follows:
- Paul Morgan Stetler - Curtis Craig
- Monique ParentMonique ParentMonique Parent is an American actress who has appeared primarily in erotic thrillers and other softcore material.-Filmography:-External links:**...
- Jocilyn Rowan - Ragna Sigrun - Therese Banning
- Warren BurtonWarren BurtonWarren Burton is an American actor. During the late 1970s and throughout the 1980s, he was seen on several daytime soap operas. He played the role of Eddie Dorrance #3 on All My Children from 1978 to 1979 and won a Daytime Emmy for Outstanding Supporting Actor at the 1980 awards broadcast...
- Paul Allen Warner - Michael David Simms - Dr. Terrance Marek
- Regina Byrd Smith - Detective Allie Powell
- Paul Mitri - Trevor Barnes
- Don Berg - Bob Arnold
- Michael Taylor Donovan- Tom Ravell
Additionally, actress V. Joy Lee, who played "Harriet" in the first Phantasmagoria, returns in the sequel as "The Ratwoman", a mental patient. Lorelei Shannon makes two cameos
Cameo appearance
A cameo role or cameo appearance is a brief appearance of a known person in a work of the performing arts, such as plays, films, video games and television...
, as a mental patient and a gas mask
Gas mask
A gas mask is a mask put on over the face to protect the wearer from inhaling airborne pollutants and toxic gases. The mask forms a sealed cover over the nose and mouth, but may also cover the eyes and other vulnerable soft tissues of the face. Some gas masks are also respirators, though the word...
ed patron at an S&M club, and director
Film director
A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...
Hoyos makes an appearance as yet another mental patient.
Themes and censorship
Though Phantasmagoria was extremely controversial for its use of graphic violence and a simulated rapeRape
Rape is a type of sexual assault usually involving sexual intercourse, which is initiated by one or more persons against another person without that person's consent. The act may be carried out by physical force, coercion, abuse of authority or with a person who is incapable of valid consent. The...
scene, A Puzzle of Flesh was considerably more explicit: sexuality plays a major part in the game's plot, which includes four intense sex scenes featuring bare breasts, bondage
Bondage (sexual)
Bondage is the use of restraints for the sexual pleasure of the parties involved. It may be used in its own right, as in the case of rope bondage and breast bondage, or as part of sexual activity or BDSM activity.- Private bondage :...
, sadomasochism, public sex and offscreen oral sex
Oral sex
Oral sex is sexual activity involving the stimulation of the genitalia of a sex partner by the use of the mouth, tongue, teeth or throat. Cunnilingus refers to oral sex performed on females while fellatio refer to oral sex performed on males. Anilingus refers to oral stimulation of a person's anus...
. Various death scenes include graphic images of gore, including disembowelment
Disembowelment
Disembowelment is the removal of some or all of the organs of the gastrointestinal tract , usually through a horizontal incision made across the abdominal area. Disembowelment may result from an accident, but has also been used as a method of torture and execution...
and exsanguination
Exsanguination
Exsanguination is the fatal process of hypovolemia , to a degree sufficient enough to cause death. One does not have to lose literally all of one's blood to cause death...
, and A Puzzle of Flesh was also rated harshly for strong language, including two uses of the word "fuck
Fuck
"Fuck" is an English word that is generally considered obscene which, in its most literal meaning, refers to the act of sexual intercourse. By extension it may be used to negatively characterize anything that can be dismissed, disdained, defiled, or destroyed."Fuck" can be used as a verb, adverb,...
", which in 1996 was a rare occurrence in video games.
One notable aspect of the sexual aspect of the game was the bisexuality
Bisexuality
Bisexuality is sexual behavior or an orientation involving physical or romantic attraction to both males and females, especially with regard to men and women. It is one of the three main classifications of sexual orientation, along with a heterosexual and a homosexual orientation, all a part of the...
of Curtis Craig, making A Puzzle of Flesh one of the few computer games to feature a playable character with such a sexual orientation. One of the characters in the game, Curtis' best friend Trevor, is openly gay, and it is later revealed Curtis harbors feelings for him, leading to a thwarted (and long foreshadowed) kiss between the two late in the game (the explicit sexual scenes are reserved for male-female encounters only). Several reviews have praised A Puzzle of Fleshs treatment of a homosexual character (and his relationship with heterosexual characters), portraying him in an earnest and natural way, while most video games at the time still depicted gay characters as over-the-top stereotypes. (see: LGBT characters in video games)
Due to its amount of sex and violence, A Puzzle of Flesh was heavily censored in most European countries and banned in Singapore
Singapore
Singapore , officially the Republic of Singapore, is a Southeast Asian city-state off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, north of the equator. An island country made up of 63 islands, it is separated from Malaysia by the Straits of Johor to its north and from Indonesia's Riau Islands by the...
and Australia
Australia
Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...
, although a re-cut version was eventually made available in the latter. In the United States, the game was given an RSAC Rating Level 4 (of 4) for its sexual content and a Level 3 for its violence and language.
Reception
A Puzzle of Flesh received primarily negative reviews from mainstream game reviewers. Most negative criticism was targeted at the clumsy gameplay, short length, linear gameplay and the lack of interactivity caused by the large amount of FMV video footage. Reactions towards the game's plot and cinematic production was mixed, ranging from lukewarm to positive. A Puzzle of Flesh currently has a MobyGamesMobyGames
-Platforms not yet included:- Further reading :* Rusel DeMaria, Johnny L. Wilson, High Score!: The Illustrated History of Electronic Games, McGraw-Hill/Osborne Media; 2 edition , ISBN 0-07-223172-6...
user rating of 3.7 out of 5.
GameSpot
GameSpot
GameSpot is a video gaming website that provides news, reviews, previews, downloads, and other information. The site was launched in May 1, 1996 by Pete Deemer, Vince Broady and Jon Epstein. It was purchased by ZDNet, a brand which was later purchased by CNET Networks. CBS Interactive, which...
gave a harsh review, giving A Puzzle of Flesh a 3.7 out of 10 rating, calling it clichéd
Cliché
A cliché or cliche is an expression, idea, or element of an artistic work which has been overused to the point of losing its original meaning or effect, especially when at some earlier time it was considered meaningful or novel. In phraseology, the term has taken on a more technical meaning,...
and absurd, summarizing "As the credits rolled, all I felt was regret - regret that I had spent a good chunk of my life in this ugly world, with annoying, unappealing characters and their silly problems". Game Revolution
Game Revolution
Game Revolution or GR is a gaming website created in 1996. Based in Berkeley, California, the site includes reviews, previews, a gaming download area, cheats, and a merchandise store, as well as webcomics, screenshots, and videos...
's review was similar, calling the game "a predictable, dissatisfying mess".
Response within the adventure game
Adventure game
An adventure game is a video game in which the player assumes the role of protagonist in an interactive story driven by exploration and puzzle-solving instead of physical challenge. The genre's focus on story allows it to draw heavily from other narrative-based media such as literature and film,...
community was a bit more positive, with likewise criticism pointed at the gameplay and structure, though more praise was given to the game's storyline. The adventure-based gaming site Adventure Gamers
Adventure Gamers
Adventure Gamers is a computer game website created in 1998 dedicated to the genre of adventure games. It publishes reviews and previews of adventure games, as well as opinion articles and interviews with game designers....
gave 'A Puzzle of Flesh' a rating of 2.5 out of 5, finding flaws in both its story and cinematic production, but noting that those looking for light entertainment will have "a hell of a lot of fun". Similar sites, such as Adventure Classic Gaming, called the plot "intriguing and well executed", though its gameplay "falls short to qualify as a mediocre adventure game". Just Adventure was a bit kinder in a way, saying that "it's trashy, it's tacky, it's badly acted, it's badly cast, it's ugly, and it's short. Also, like Phantasmagoria, it's a lot of fun", and "It’s a guilty pleasure
Guilty pleasure
A guilty pleasure is something one enjoys and considers pleasurable despite feeling guilt for enjoying it. The "guilt" involved is sometimes simply fear of others discovering one's lowbrow or otherwise embarrassing tastes. Fashion, video games, music, movies, and junk food can be examples of...
, but a pleasure nonetheless", likening it to watching a good B movie
B movie
A B movie is a low-budget commercial motion picture that is not definitively an arthouse or pornographic film. In its original usage, during the Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified a film intended for distribution as the less-publicized, bottom half of a double feature....
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External links
- Official site (via Internet ArchiveInternet ArchiveThe Internet Archive is a non-profit digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It offers permanent storage and access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, music, moving images, and nearly 3 million public domain books. The Internet Archive...
) - 'A Puzzle of Flesh' at Moby Games