Game EXP: Alveole (PC)

 

Alveole
Systems: Windows, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 & 5
Release Date: April 9, 2021
Publisher: North Lab
Developers: Emil Ismaylov & Denis Petrov
Time Spent: 40 Minutes
First Four Minutes

I picked up Alveole shortly after playing PULMO because I was hoping to enjoy another art game from the same developers, and this one was… different.  Different than what I was expecting, different in its gameplay mechanics, different in its message, and different stylistically in almost every way possible.  Except there was the animated black outlined figure that was also used in PULMO.  Everything that I'm going to write is going to be bare bones compared to other Game EXP articles, because, almost the less that's said about the mechanics of Alveole, the better, but we'll scratch just the surface.

Alveole is a minimalist game.  When you start, there's an exhalation of breath as the essence or spirit of your figure falls into the character lying in the middle of an all-white screen.  The screen then becomes populated with seemingly random images, all around your black-outlined figure, who is standing in what looks like a one-ton human hamster wheel.  The game is controlled by making your character jump or deciding not to jump as they run on the wheel.  Periodically, a trapezoidal obstruction appears that you can either jump over or stumble through.  What any of this means is up to the player to decipher.  A lot of the objects on the screen, though, are dynamic, so again, it's up to the player to try to recognize the cause and effect of something happening.

Because Alveole is a puzzle game, it's up to the player to figure out what all of the images surrounding the player mean, what the mechanics mean, and how jumping or not jumping affects the game.  As you play, you collect pictures that populate the middle third of the screen.  Once you have collected all sixteen pictures, the "game" is over.  And I say "game" not as a derogatory statement against Alveole, but because it feels more like an interactive art exhibit with gameplay and puzzle elements.  The biggest downside is that oftentimes, the player will be rewarded with a snapshot that they've completed one of the "tasks," but there is no immediate inclination to decipher what the player did to specifically earn that picture.  It's also a memory game, to try and remember which image that used to be above the player is now gone.

The whole "game" took me about 40 minutes, usually playing for 3-5 minutes at a time, though you could easily finish it in a single sitting if you're in the right mindset.  I can't really say that there is much replay value, maybe apart from watching someone else play and maybe giving hints when asked for to unlock some of the more potentially obscure puzzles; here's looking at you, Adventurer.

~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
Instrumental

Game EXP: PULMO (NS)

[Disclaimer:  I received a review key for PULMO through Keymailer, a third-party company that connects publishers and developers with content creators.  The game key was given without promise or expectation of a positive review, only that it be played, and content be created.  Unless otherwise noted, all content in the following article is from my own playthrough of this game.] 

PULMO
Release Date: September 27, 2025
Systems: Windows, Nintendo Switch
Publisher: Sometimes You
Developers: Emil Ismaylov, & Denis Petrov
Time Spent: 1-1.9 Hours
Highlight Videos on YouTube

PULMO is an art game in the purest sense of the definition that Roger Ebert would shake his head at.  It's also a game about death, isolation, trauma, grief, hope, and as many interpretations as you could get from anyone playing.  But because it's art, it can also be perceived in any way you want.  Someone can tell you that you shouldn't feel a sense of wonder and awe while looking at any element of Hieronymous Bosch's The Garden of Earthly Delights, and they would be wrong.  Someone can tell you that you shouldn't feel a sense of sadness while gazing into the eye of the Mona Lisa, and again, they would be wrong.  PULMO is a vehicle to play through an interpretation of various emotions that a lot of us go through during our lives, but how we express those emotions and how we interpret them can be an indivudualized experience.  Such was the case for me with PULMO.  

PULMO is a collection of about 10 semi-interactable title cards, followed by 10 playable scenes or vignettes, interconnected by 11 short animated sequences in a similar vein to the game.  Each scene is titled (in the scene selection) with names such as "Ego," "Border," "Pressure," and "Thesus."  Each of the animated sequences is also titled in the menu: "Diversity," Smallness," Uncertainty," and Insignificance."  These are the only kinds of hints the player receives as far as what each scene and animated sequence might be about, but as they're only viewable after you've completed the respective scene/animation, there is no influence on what the player's interpretation during the game.  And since the game could be played in a single sitting, I would be hard pressed for someone to constantly play a scene, exit back to the main menu to look at the Scene Selection or Memories section to be directed on how they think they should feel according to the titles.

I think I finished PULMO in two sittings in a single day, spending just over an hour from beginning to end.  Two scenes took me a silly amount of time.  In one scene, you have your featureless character with an umbrella out while it's raining, and after a few seconds, it starts raining bodies.  Your task is to walk down the screen and avoid the bodies as they rocket towards the ground.  You are given some warning as a shadow grows on the ground where they're going to land, so all you have to do is avoid the plummeting bodies.  This second, embarrassingly, took me 24 minutes.  After the handful of attempts, I thought maybe I was supposed to stand still, but that wasn't it.  I also thought maybe you could make it by taking a straight line down, but that wasn't it.  Turns out it was just good old-fashioned serpentine.  There's another section that took me 17 minutes to find a hidden and winding path in a large body of obscuring water.  So if you're a better gamer than I am, you could probably complete PULMO in about 30 minutes.

PULMO feels like it's the kind of game that would be perfect for a video game club.  A bunch of people play the game from start to finish, and then discuss it over your preferred beverage of choice.  I would 100% discuss this game further over a couple of drinks and a Switch to pull up reference material if I knew anyone else who has played it.*

~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
And You Can Speak Your Mind

MIDI Week Singles: "Maybe You'll Kill (Everybody Does)" - PULMO (NS)

 

"Maybe You'll Kill (Everybody Does)" from PULMO on Windows, Xbox Series S/X, PlayStation 4 & 5, Nintendo Switch 1 & 2 (2025)
Composers: Artem (archivariouss) Chubarkov, Areniy Shadrin
Album: PULMO Music
Label: Self/Steam
Publisher: North Lab
Developer: Emil Ismaylov, Denis Petrov

There are a lot of layers to the game PULMO, and having this song played over a typical game of "figure out the order to select the things" is a brilliant use of this original song.  Like a lot of the scenes in PULMO, you have to figure out what the puzzle or mechanic is to proceed to the next scene.  The puzzle/mechanic here is that you have to select the correct order of the nine people to continue through.  If you mess up the order, the puzzle resets.  This is where PULMO excels.  When you select a particular person, there is a brief flash with spikes emanating out of their body, and then they sit down in a crouched position.  If you guessed the incorrect order, that fallen person immediately stands back up.  The likelihood that you guess the correct order for all nine people, while not impossible, is highly unlikely.  Then, remembering who is number one, and who is number two, and who is number three, etc, can easily trip up the player.  So you're now forced to select/hurt these figures over and over again, because that's the only way to get through the puzzle.

With all of that in mind, you then have the lyrics:

There will be a day when you hurt someone

You will never know

There will be a day when you kill somebody

Though,

Everybody does

The combination of those lyrics, along with the mini-game of needing to select/hurt people to continue on with the rest of the game, created a very strange feeling for me.  I knew what I needed to do, but was what I was doing killing the other nine figures on the screen?  Maybe these figures are just facets of myself that I'm killing off.  That's what I love about PULMO (more on Friday), that because this game is art, there can be multiple interpretations. Unless the developers explicitly say what one of the puzzles is about or if the music in combination with that puzzle alters the meaning, then it can be how you interpret it.

~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
If This Day Be Our Last

P.S.  I also wanted to mention that on the official soundtrack, the song actually ends at 1:24, but partly because of the likelihood that the player will figure out the puzzle in that time, you're more likely to hear the song loop, so that's what I did here.