The last generationA look back at 2013-2020, the age of PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.I did it many great stories for ours Last generation sum upbut tonight I want to zoom in a bit and talk about a specific game: Hohokum, also known as the most relaxing video game of the PS4 era.
Released in 2014 for the PS4 (but also for the PS3 and Vita), at first glance there is not much behind it! You are moving a large snake object through a floating landscape and sometimes you run into things and sometimes you fly through things. You never fight or talk or really do a lot of anything.
But for Hohokum These are not restrictions. You are a canvas.
It’s a game that understands the relationships between interaction, graphics and soundtrack to a terrifyingly perfect degree. Each is inspired and dependent on the other two to the point where it starts Hohokum is almost synaesthetic.
It’s just you, the music, Richard Hogg’s beautiful art, and some very smooth flight controls that gently vibrate each other all the time.
And yes, I’ve just used a lot of words to dance about that this is a very good game too when you’re damn high.
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I should say now that a disproportionate part of my love for this game comes from the soundtrack, as I’m a huge fan of Ghostly, the label that its artists (like Tycho) have awarded Hohokum. But there are a lot of games with songs that I like and none of them can hold the whole experience together like that Hohokum could.
Hohokumthat life began in 2008 As a tiny little indie project before it was signed by Sony years later, it’s also so representative of PlayStation’s excellent approach to smaller software of this past generation (and also for the future!). It didn’t all have to be a blockbuster, a systems vendor, or even a tentpole game for the PS4! Sometimes it was cool just to sign and support a little game, give it some space and then … add a ton of great international artists to the soundtrack to really take it to the next level.
If it succeeds, then great! Or if it just existed and made certain people happy, then great too! Hohokum Perhaps the PS4 didn’t define it, but it was part of a larger games-first ideology that was everywhere from small titles like this to an impeccable library of exclusive Sony first-party suppliers.
(Here is our original report from 2014!)
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