Back to Bed is an example of a Kickstarter gone right. The developers asked for a meager 12,000 dollars, made 13, 000 and then instead of retiring on an island and forgetting the whole thing they formed a studio and actually made the game. I know, bizarre right?
Back to Bed is the story of Bob, a chronic narcoleptic who spends most of his time sleepwalking. You step into the shoes, er, paws, of Bob’s strange cat-like subconscious guardian, Subob. It’s Subob’s responsibility to ensure that the sleepwalking Bob doesn’t find himself a victim of one of the dream world’s many hazards. Numerous bad things can happen to Bob, he can simply tumble off the map, get woken up by a walking alarm clock, frightened by a dog, or even run over by a train. Needless to say, you’ve got your work cut out for you.
Gameplay is simple enough, Bob will be dropped into a level and immediately begin his long walk. Your interaction with Bob comes in the form of using objects strewn about the level to block his path. When Bob meets an impedance he will begin to turn clockwise until he’s able to continue walking straight. Your goal then is manipulate his walk through the level until he is safely back in his bed. A simple concept, but one that gets tricky fast.
Bob will need to navigate through 30 levels (60 if you count the nightmare iterations) in order to finally wake from his bizarre dream. This doesn’t actually amount to a whole lot of time. I was able to get the credits to roll in just over an hour of play. Not terrible for a $5.99 asking price, but not great either. Of course that count doesn’t include the game’s “nightmare mode”, these levels are re-treads of the originals but with the added challenge of forcing Bob to grab a key before he can complete the level. The levels are definitely more challenging, but aside from the key mechanic they don’t really show you anything you won’t have already seen in the core game.
The game does recommend using a controller right off the bat, and I can emphasize that a keyboard and mouse are really just going to be frustrating here. Despite the game’s puzzle nature Subob moves best when you’re using an analog stick to guide him. I was able to get through the opening sets of levels with a mouse and keyboard but as the difficulty ramped up and I was expected to pick up the pace I didn’t really have a choice but to fall back to a controller.
Aesthetically the game draws from a wide array of sources. The unique isometric display brings to mind the works of MC Escher and games inspired by him like this year’s Monument Valley. There’s also some clear nods to Salvador Dali and Andy Warhol. Whether or not it was intentional the game’s narrator feels like an homage to David Lynch’s Twin Peaks as the character speaks backwards and then is played forwards again. All these inspirations combine to form a cohesive and unsettling world that unfortunately lacks in variety. The game’s first half is dressed with its standard decor while the back half introduces a “seaside” theme with the sounds of Seagulls and giant fish boards for you to use as bridges, but there’s really not much that changes after that.
There was definitely a lot more opportunity to pull from contemporary art and create some unique and cool levels but instead the game’s design doesn’t venture any farther than the ocean. Music also starts to feel grating and repetitive, there’s a relatively small handful of tracks to hear and they seem to loop rather quickly.
While the design leaves something to be desired the game’s puzzles usually do hit the mark just right. I found myself scratching my head on a number of levels but I was never stuck so long that I became upset or had to resort to searching for a solution online.
Back To Bed has the core of a good puzzle game but ultimately lacks the variety and polish necessary to stand out in the genre. Games like Monument Valley offer a similar experience that runs longer, looks better, and is cheaper. This is the studio’s first title but it sounds like they’ve already begun work on a follow up. It will be interesting to see what they can accomplish with a little more experience and a little more time in the oven.
This game was reviewed using review code provided to us by the publisher.
