I’m always a bit embarrassed when people start talking about their favourite bands because they passionately start wheeling out names like The Smiths and how they love that rare b-side they found in a charity shop while dressed in their favourite cardigan, and I’m like, yeah I liked that song by Puff Daddy when I was 14, and they look at me like I’ve just thrown up. I’m just not that musically cool. When people start talking indie, I shut up, which is why I thought a game celebrating the 80s British indie scene would be lost on me. But I was surprised.
Family
Developer: Tim SheinmanPublisher: Tim SheinmanPlatform: Played on PCAvailability: Out now on Itch for PC and Mac, playable either in-browser or downloadable
I very much like logic puzzles, you see, the ones where you fill in the blanks using a mind-squeezing process of elimination alongside the few clues you have. And that’s what you do here, in Family: you fill out the names of band members on a rock family tree using a variety of clues.
You can listen to the band’s music, either on demand or on a radio station in the background – coincidentally where one of the band members is being interviewed – and you can look at some album art and read band descriptions on the family tree. The most revealing clues, though, are given in written accounts like interviews, memos, memoirs and more. Yet because they’re so revealing they are rationed, unlocked bit-by-bit every time you correctly fill in five band members’ names. And that’s the loop: study the clues, fill in some names and hope to hit five, and then do it all again with those locked in place. It feels like a musical spin on Return of the Obra Dinn – sudoku with line-ups rather than nautical murder.
What I like about this logic puzzle approach is how it encourages you to poke around. You might be trying to choose between a male or female singer for a band, for instance, in which case listening to the song will put you straight. Sometimes even the album art will do. And in poking around you uncover the charm of Family. You read written accounts of low-key band requests for Wispa chocolate bars and Space Raider crisps, and read mag-style interviews about gifted but nightmare songwriters who people admire but absolutely can’t work with, and it all begins to build a picture of an unmistakable time and place.