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Peter Silk / KestrelPi

@kestrelpi.bsky.social

560 followers 410 following 2.1K posts

Community Support Manager @ Double Fine Sometimes Video Games Maker and Composer Little Scamp He/Him. This is a personal account with personal opinions and/or bad jokes.

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Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · Nov 21

Hi! If you're actually looking for support the best thing to do is first browse our Supportal at support.doublefine.com, where there are also links to contact us.

But if you're looking for silly, extremely low-effort posts, you've come to the right place.

The Double Fine Supportal

Hello and welcome to our Support site, the Double Fine Supportal! Simply browse by the game you need help for, or search to see if you can find help…

support.doublefine.com

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Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 10h

Is a selfie stick like one of those long cigarette holders or

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Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 23h

Just finished Baby Steps. Perfect game. Perfect ending. Perhaps one of my favourite games ever.

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

On the mountain analogy: I think in reality, no two people are ever climbing the same mountain. A pro mountain climber and a toddler are not really climbing the same mountain, even if they literally are. So as an ideal, it's unattainable. That said Baby Steps is a masterpiece and this piece is great

Kayin @kayin.moe · 7d

kayin.moe/baby-steps

Wasn't expecting to do a more full writeup but whatever, here's Baby Steps, talking about Hiking, Climbing, and Being a Fucking Loser.

Kayinworks - Game Journal: Baby Steps

I've been a pretty consistent fan of Bennett Foddy's work. I love Getting Over It to the point where I got a Gold Pot by accident, just by casually playing over and over again. I've even had the pleas...

kayin.moe

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

As someone with experience doing ESRB submissions for games, I desperately want to see the ESRB submission for Baby Steps.

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

No shame in it! The stairs are right there and obviously the sensible way up. I will say though, though I never was comfortable with that part, by the end I could do it more often than not.

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

Oh yeah, welcome to fucktown

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

Is it the bit that's really close to the stairs, like you could step onto them maybe?

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

Maybe I like Baby Steps (video game) for similar reasons to why I like Cardiacs (band). I think I'm drawn to things which are ostensibly challenging and abrasive but secretly very generous and lovable

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

I did, or at least to it's landmarks.

Awkward Ramp
Banana peel
Seagull
Weird colour rock
The bit before the cutscene that I like to call "fucktown"
Platform
Scary but easy planks
Horrible ledges
Deceptively slippery slope

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

Huh, really? I found that tricky but I did it second try. The ramp only got me once though, I misjudged it and second time did it very carefully. But there were a lot of falls in between.

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

I don't think I'll soon forget it, it's burned in. Banana peel, seagull, weird colour rock, the bit a little bit after that I like to call "fucktown", the mid-run reprieve, scary planks, the terrible very bad ledges and the deceptively slippery ramp.

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

To me it's only a hard choice the first time. It was an almost impossible route for me to take the stairs as a first choice. I would have done it as an absolute last resort, to see the rest of the game. Now I've done it my attitude is "yeah, stairs, obviously"

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

Maybe this is why I never got into those too!

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

Haha. I'm still going to climb the stairs though. I'm playing the game on stream to 2 different groups of friends so the other one is getting the stairs run now I'm afraid.

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

I guess really I'm saying that I did the Manbreaker and was determined to do it and did so happily. But if Silksong sometimes had stairs I'd sometimes take them, just to get to the bits I care about because to me those 15, 20 attempts are NOT what gets me to the dance in that game

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

Which is a stance I respect but I think also illuminates why these discussions about difficulty are so... Well, difficult. We have a similar reaction to Baby Steps but an opposite one to Silksong and it's not totally obvious unless you spend a lot of time thinking about it why that would be.

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

I've certainly spoken to a lot of people who relish the way Silksong does it and that's fine too. I just wish it didn't repel me as I like *so much about it*. But after I decided near the end of Act 2 to take a break, I feel so good about that decision I'm not sure I'll go back.

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

So I personally find its frustrations wear harder on my patience. Goes back to the Manbreaker I suppose: it's impossible to be mad at it because the stairs are right there. I can only be mad at my own pride. That said...

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

I find it hard to imagine a version of it that isn't like this. But Silksong is about so much more than its most frustrating moments. 70% of the time I'm having a blast with the environments and exploration, movement etc then 30% of the time I'm hitting a wall that got boring for me 15 attempts ago

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

I think for me there's perhaps another angle here which is that Baby Steps is almost entirely a game about challenge and why people make things difficult for themselves and what that means and I think also about the assumptions we make about people's motivations.

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

But I agree that both are very interesting games to think about when talking about challenge

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

Yeah it's very misunderstood like Getting Over It before it. I just think it makes the case for challenge far better than Silksong, because it explores the players' decisions in a really provocative way and is generous while Silksong engages in much more "f you for trying" type moments.

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

Or to put it another way, I think the Manbreaker is a far more honest and kind way to explore challenge in a game than the two instances of benches being trapped in Silksong at the end of tricky platforming and combat sequences. The former has something to say, the latter is all "ha ha gotcha"

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

Don't want to go over it too much by in my view Silksong is often pointlessly mean, and obtuse in communicating its difficulty to the player, while Baby Steps is hard but almost always straightforward with the player

Peter Silk / KestrelPi @kestrelpi.bsky.social · 1d

well I actually have my own problems with the way Silksong metes out difficulty and a lot of thoughts about why despite getting a lot of the way through it I have been way more annoyed by its design than Baby Steps