PaigeFTW: Swipe Right for ‘Reigns’
Insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results, right? It’s a conceit well utilized in Reigns, a simple adventure game with a very clever gimmick.
You take on the role as king — an entire dynasty of kings, cursed by the devil to die or be deposed, over and over, until someone masters the art of leadership and tricks the villain at his own game. You are thus presented with an unending stream of issues from a motley crew of advisers, and are forced to balance the competing interests of people, church, military and treasury. If any one of those pillars gets too strong (or too weak), it’s a grisly game over.
Each dilemma is presented as a choice — swipe left for yes, right for no. It’s the Tinder of adventure games. I even downloaded it onto my phone for the verisimilitude of it all. Should I let the church start a crusade? Swipe left. Should I follow my dog into the woods? Swipe right. Should I marry the princess of a foreign land? Swipe left.
The trick is to learn, over time, which decisions lead to which results. Eventually, you manage to unlock new routes, as well as the key to outsmarting the devil and breaking his curse. Not that I’ve gotten there yet. I’m on my 45th king, and still with many objectives unfulfilled.
I find that, very strangely, I’m wrestling with my conscience more than I should. Even if history tells me that, for the greater good, I must make a bloody example of the children who mocked my kingly name, I cannot. I keep making the same choices and dying the same way, over and over and over.
Call it insanity — or the curse of the devil. Whatever it is, I keep playing.
Reigns is available on Android, iOS and PC ($2.99).
