Quality-Time-Killer: Hummingbird Mind
Distraction. Daydreams. Idle thoughts. Household tasks. Hummingbird Mind.
Cardboard Computer’s latest game hit browsers everywhere just a few days ago. Called Hummingbird Mind, the game is a semi-cyclical piece of interactive fiction that takes place on a sunny summer afternoon. Unable to concentrate on work, the player is presented with different distractions to pursue, displayed in a sort of choose-your-own-adventure style multiple-choice format.
Each of Hummingbird Mind’s scenes is represented visually by static, pixelated artwork, which is sure to press the nostalgia buttons of anyone who’s ever played classic text-based adventure games. The graphical style is perfect for this particular interactive story, because, like the elegantly-written text, it serves as a springboard for the player’s imagination. With so many games that ask us to just shut our brains off while we play, Hummingbird Mind’s different approach is quite refreshing.
The deftly-written script is another shining example of developer Jake Elliott’s excellent word-smithing skills. Despite the game’s relaxed and meandering pace of the story, there are still puzzles to solve and an end-game resolution to discover. The game plays quite differently from Jake Elliott’s previous action-based games like “I Can Hold My Breath Forever” and “Beulah and the Hundred Birds,” though the exploration-based design ethos that makes those titles so great is also present in Hummingbird Mind.
I don’t really have anything negative to say about Hummingbird Mind. It’s a short, free experience that I’d recommend that everyone check out. That said, there is an underlying irony to Hummingbird Mind. The game’s title (as shown in the official trailer) is from a quote by Hypertext creator, Ted Nelson, in which he used the term “Hummingbird Mind” as an alternative (and more poetic) way to describe attention deficit disorder. However, while the game’s story and the actions available to the player speak very well to the “daydreaming” and “distraction” motifs, real-world attention-deficit gamers may have a hard time staying focused, due to its static retro visuals and text-based gameplay.
For everyone else, Hummingbird Mind is a beautiful and relaxing escape that really should be experienced.
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