GoldenEye legend couldn't play Flower

By Wesley Yin-Poole Published 1 November, 2010

Because it was "so emotionally provoking".

Martin Hollis, creator of N64 classic GoldenEye 007, had to stop playing PS3-exclusive Flower because he found the experience too emotional.

Hollis, founder of Cambridge developer Zoonami, tried to play thatgamecompany's experimental downloadable title but had to put the controller down after experiencing an "upwelling".

"One of the interesting things about Flower was I couldn't play it because it was so emotionally provoking," Hollis told Eurogamer at the Nottingham GameCity festival last week.

"I couldn't play it properly because as soon as I controlled it I felt an upwelling and I had to put it down.

"That's an achievement."

Hollis was chatting to Eurogamer about the infamous games as art debate. Hollis argued that games are art if they leave a lasting impression on the player.

"Another example is Shadow of the Colossus, which I haven't played, because I've seen enough about it to know I wouldn't enjoy the feeling of killing those beasts," Hollis said.

"And yet still it's a part of me now, that game, even though I've made a considered decision not to play it.

"Again, an interesting achievement."

In the 2009 PSN game Flower players assume control of a gust of wind that blows petals around various lush 3D environments.

Hollis struggled to explain his feelings towards the game.

"There's something so magical that I'm not going to be able to explain that," he offered. "Getting analytical, I like the idea of holism and all of nature and humanity being a part of one whole.

"I don't see myself as a tree-hugging hippy, but nevertheless in another life I could have been.

"There's something very moving to me and the way the petals came together to be you, you suddenly leapt to the conclusion that that was you. That was unique and that was very moving."

Hollis, who has worked in the videogame industry for over 19 years, was head of software at famed UK studio Rare.

He was the director and producer of the critically acclaimed GoldenEye 007 and Perfect Dark, although he left Rare before Perfect Dark was released to work as a consultant on the Nintendo GameCube.

His last game was 2009 WiiWare title Bonsai Barber.

Picture of Wesley.

About Wesley Yin-Poole

Wesley is Eurogamer's news editor. He likes news, interviews, and more news. He also likes Street Fighter more than anyone can get him to shut up about it.

Read more articles from Wesley by visiting the Wesley Yin-Poole archive page.

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Comments (43) Latest comment 2 years ago

Comments for this article are now closed, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • tossetaz #1 2 years ago

    Crybaby!

  • Pedrolot #2 2 years ago

    Flower is amazing for a game as simple as this.

  • Gearskin #3 2 years ago

    I feel nothing. Does this make me a bad person?

  • M_of_the_sys #4 2 years ago

    See a psychiatrist.

    Edit: Aimed at Hollis, not Gearskin. Perhaps both.
    Edited by M_of_the_sys at 01/11/10 @ 10:07

  • VandelayIndustries #5 2 years ago

    Man up Hollis! See it through to the end, it's worth it :)

  • rivuzu #6 2 years ago

    What a pansy.

  • Plewt #7 2 years ago

    More like pretentious.

    Edit: Hollis, not the game.
    Edited by Plewt at 01/11/10 @ 10:20

  • rojjer #8 2 years ago

    I got bored with it. Does it get better?

  • fizzyfish #9 2 years ago

    When I started to read this, I was actually prepared to stick up for him in the comments, expecting people to be too harsh on him... until I got to the part where I learned he wouldn't even try SotC. Now I just want to shake some sense into him. Put your emotions aside, Martin, you're missing out, damnit!

  • jonbwfc #10 2 years ago

    hippy.

  • Moz #11 2 years ago

    Man up Hollis! See it through to the end, it's worth it :)

    Is that such a good idea? I found the later levels a little upsetting, if he's struggled with the first couple of levels the later stuff course him to have a nervous breakdown.

    However would agree with him the game does provoke a lot of emotion which is no bad thing and for me that's what separates good games from great games (MP games excluded), if a games doesn't suck you in enough to be sad when a main character dies or happy when things work out then either the games failed or your an emotionless crettin

  • Ryze #12 2 years ago

    The big girl.

  • Dolly #13 2 years ago

    There are lots of songs & films that I'm sure most of us feel a deep connection to, due to events occuring in our present/past lives. I think it's pretty cool that a game has achieved this same response from him.

  • FogHeart #14 2 years ago

    If the beginning of the game makes him misty-eyed, the completion of the game will make him cry buckets. Hell, I will admit it put a lump in my throat. Part of it is the medium, you know? Like, live action 'tearjerkers' are boring bullshit, but watching Nemo get 'found' will do it for me.

  • dadrester #15 2 years ago

    I got bored with it. Does it get better?

    yeah. last chapter is great. it's odd. doesn't really do much different, but makes you feel really triumphant.

  • Stuz359 #16 2 years ago

    What a puff!

    /Blackadder reference

  • smithdown #17 2 years ago

    An emotional response is what these games are designed to provoke. Man the fuck up and deal with it instead of running away.

  • Pulsar_t #18 2 years ago

    @jonbwfc
    How original.

  • jonsaan #19 2 years ago

    The guy obviously has issues. There is nothing emotional about Flower. Other than the frustration I felt at not being able to turn in a small circle very well which caused me to miss the last flower in a run or similar.

  • Nemesis #20 2 years ago

    Get him to Man Lab.

  • StolenGlory #21 2 years ago

    Shit dev can't play/understand a decent game.

    What's new?

  • drumbaby #22 2 years ago

    Someone give this guy the Voight-Kampff test quick!

  • Widge #23 2 years ago

    This game wiz rubbish there wiz no multiplay or zombie horde mode and you cannot set the controls to cod default the colours hurted my eyes I do nor know where the game is set but it not USA or Russia

  • Dogzilla #24 2 years ago

    What a pile of cunt

  • andromeda #25 2 years ago

    Sounds like someone needs some http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0SWn8FPI...

  • GamesConnoisseur #26 2 years ago

    I enjoyed Flower and do certainly have a strong message but enough to make its unplayable? Nope its just Hollis all the way!! These people are too sensitive to watch the Andrex adverts.

  • pinchofsalt #27 2 years ago

    All this overdone admiration from Indie developers for each other's games is starting to become a little irritating.

  • 00.00.01 #28 2 years ago

    @Widge 01/11/10 @ 11:14
    Ghehe LMOA! Same here, Flower doesn't have any N00B-pawning shotty's and there's no cool emblems to unlock! No destructible environments too and the lack of something controversial like cross-breeding flowers.

  • Psychotext #29 2 years ago

    Hey Hollis, MTFU.

  • mingster #30 2 years ago

    pansy

  • Trigga_Tybalt #31 2 years ago

    Post deleted at 15:43:01 23-02-2012

  • darkmorgado #32 2 years ago

    I really enjoyed Flower, but I couldn't get past the irony of playing a game with an environmental message on a machine made by a company with a pretty bad environmental record such as this:

    "In 2000, Sony was ridiculed for a document entitled "NGO Strategy" that was leaked to the press. The document involved the company's surveillance of environmental activists in an attempt to plan how to counter their movements. It specifically mentioned environmental groups that were trying to pass laws that held electronics-producing companies responsible for the clean up of the toxic chemicals contained in their merchandise."

  • M_of_the_sys #33 2 years ago

    @darkmorgado

    I guess they've started to play ball since 2000.

  • callum9999 #34 2 years ago

    I played the demo and it just involved flying around picking up petals - how is that remotely emotional (assuming the rest of the game isn't radically different).

  • Doctor_What #35 2 years ago

    @callum9999 : Believe me, it is emotional. I don't know how or why, but it really is, especially over the course of the whole game. I had a great afternoon a few weeks ago playing through this again and I bloody loved it. There's such a feeling of uplifting triumph at the end - I don't think any other game has made me feel that in the same way before.

  • Freek #36 2 years ago

    It's a pretty game with a cool mechanic but it's just flowers blown around in the wind. Beatifull, yes.
    Emotionaly moving to the point where you are unable to even play the game? Uhhh, no, that's mental.

  • JayeM #37 2 years ago

    Should I just assume the people saying pansy are making a clever pun?

  • FuzzyDuck #38 2 years ago

    The only thing that upset me about it was the waste of bandwidth downloading the demo.

  • Ninou #39 2 years ago

    "That's an achievement."

    No. It's the PS3. It's a "Trophy".

  • RedSparrows #40 2 years ago

    ME GAMER ME SNEER AT THINGS HUR HUR

  • disappointed #41 2 years ago

    I've played the full thing and I just don't get it. It's a pretty animation but in gameplay terms, it's just Super Mario Bros. with all the pits filled in and the monsters removed. And the "environmental message" everyone goes on about just seems to be saying that wind turbines are good. There was no attempt to combine the elements of wind, the turbines, pylons, lights, flowers and landscape into anything resembling a game except in the most basic, scripted, push-the-switch-to-open-the-next-level way.

    I came into the game understanding the importance of plant life in the ecosystem and the dangers of environmental instability brought by industrialization. I came away from it feeling like the environmental movement was full of self-absorbed hippies who just think flowers are pretty and stuff, and that wind power will fix everything. Thoroughly depressing.

  • darth_paul #42 2 years ago

    isnt this the same bloke that gave interviews saying TV was dead and games were going to take tv over??? jumping the shark, anyone??? well, played flower, and please, Martin, get some rest. It wasn't certainly an emotional experience. Guess hes trying to hammer that games are superior than tv...
    Edited by darth_paul at 02/11/10 @ 10:58

  • gruiformes #43 2 years ago

    Met Hollis after a Games Eden quiz night in Cambridge. Firstly, he was dressed as James Bond and that was cool. Second, he was proper pissed which I think we can all agree is way manly.

    I pretty much respect everything he said in this interview. Flower is sick as fuck and deserves all the praise it gets. If he does not want to play SOTC or Flower then fine. Some people don't want to watch films like Waltz with Bashir or read books like The Handmaiden's Tale and that is also fine.

    Mr Hollis made a couple of pretty violent games. Then he clearly got re-sensitised, probably due to having kids (I don't have any but have seen it happen to friends). Now he gets an emotional response from stuff. This sounds good to me and his life is probably all the better for it.

    I don't usually post on Eurogamer and generally read the comments with a sense of what it must be like to jack off furiously at a particularly grotesque and Ballardesque motorway pile-up.

    Finally, I don't see the connection between killing highly unrealistic humanoids in GE or PD and killing really pretty looking fantastical beasts in SOTC. Killing a jagged looking russian woman in GE feels exhilarating but ultimately throw away and arcade-y. Killing a massive and majestic beast is a far more involving experience. It is not like you have to climb up Alec's body for 20 mins in order to stab him in the neck.