Proteus (video game)

Areas such as this memorial cause different sounds to play when players are walking near or through them.

In Proteus, the player explores an island from a first-person perspective. The island is drawn in a pixel art style and consists of hills, trees, structures, and animals such as frogs and rabbits; the layout of these elements is different each time the game is played.[1][2][3] The focus of the game is on exploration rather than interaction, as there is no narrative and the player is given no instructions on how to proceed.[4] Possible interactions are limited—for example, animals may run away when the player comes too close.[5] The game's soundtrack varies depending on the player's movements and location; it may fall silent when the player is at the top of a hill and become sonically dense as they travel down it. The soundtrack layers additional sounds and notes when the player nears objects and animals in the world.[6] Many objects on the island are rendered as two dimensional sprites, contrasting with the three-dimensional landscape.[7]

When the game begins, the player is situated away from the island and must move across an ocean to reach it.[6] Upon arrival, players are free to explore the whole island during the initial season of spring. During the night, the player can enter a designated area to advance time to the next season, exploring each until the end of winter, after which the game ends. The landscape changes with the season—for example, trees shed their leaves in autumn.[3][8] The player can capture a screenshot via a "save a postcard" feature, through which they can save and load their progress.[3]

In addition to the base gameplay elements, the PlayStation Vita version allows the player to directly affect the environment with the console's rear touch panel and to generate islands based on the current date and location in the real world.[9][10]

The island's visuals change with the seasons, such as orange/brown leaves during autumn.

British game designer Ed Key began work on Proteus in 2008 during his evenings and weekends, though the game only neared its final form when David Kanaga joined development in 2010.[11][12] Key originally envisioned the game as a procedural role-playing game in the same vein as The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion, in which the player would visit towns and complete quests. Realizing the extent of the work that would be needed for such a game, the developers decided to instead make something "nontraditional and nonviolent".[13] The first technology developed for the game was the landscape generator, for which Key was inspired by walking in the village of Avebury, England. While he knew he wanted to make an exploration game, Proteus went through a variety of early iterations as Key explored different gameplay ideas.[7]

Key developed Proteus using a game engine written in the C# programming language.[14] He found the game's visual style early in development, with the impressionistic tree design being one of the first he settled on. Art Deco and the work of Paul Nash have been cited as "big influences".[7] After Kanaga joined the development team as its audio composer, the game's music and sound mechanics were refined through testing a wide range of ideas, including allowing players to create their own music within the game. This idea was ultimately cut because Key and Kanaga felt it would detract from the game's exploratory emphasis and instead turn it into a creative tool.[15] During development, and after the game's release, the developers expressed interest in allowing player-created mods of the game; some have since been created by the community.[12][14][16]

Proteus was released on 30 January 2013 for Windows and OS X, and on 8 April of the same year for Linux.[17][18] When pre-orders opened in 2012, an Artifact Edition was also available—a version which included a boxed copy of the game containing artwork, the soundtrack, and notes on the game's development.[19] Key apologised when the Artifact Edition had not yet shipped at the end of its release year, and offered to refund customers upon request.[20] The edition became available for purchase in July 2016.[21]

Around the time of the game's release, Curve Studios approached the developers to port the game for release on PlayStation 3 and Vita.[22][23] These versions of the game use Curve Studio's own game engine.[24] Sony requested that new features be added to the game, though Key said that the company never attempted to steer the direction of the development of these features. Key added location and date-based world generation and a method for changing the world's color using the Vita's rear touchpad.[25][26] He stated that the location- and date-specific world generation feature may come to the game's other versions in the future.[25] The PlayStation 3 and Vita versions were released on 29 October 2013.[27]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Proteus.

• Official website