Ceremony of Innocence
The Paradox
Ceremony of Innocence contains very little of the elements that is supposed to make a great CD ROM. It has no actual puzzles. There isn't an elaborate computer-rendered virtual world to run around in. You're not on a mission. You don't assume a character. The characters that are there, you never see.
There is definitely a story, (after all, it was based on the Griffin and Sabine trilogy by Nick Bantock) but your actions have no influence on how the story plays out. You don't interact with anyone. There are no "alternate endings". You don't gather anything, blow up anything, solve anything, communicate with anyone, so that rules out any comparison to almost any popular computer game out there, from Doom to Riven to Obsidian to [insert any other game you can think of here.]
Oh, and by the way, just in case you thought CoI was cut exclusive for the Gabriel fan, there's no Peter, either.
So why is Ceremony of Innocence one of most satisfying CD ROM experiences out there on the software market?
From the beginning where you're greeted with swelling classical music, followed by a reading of "The Second Coming" by W. B. Yeates, it's easy to have the pretentiousness alarm on the verge of going off. But fear not...while during a few introductory scenes, it looks more like an art film than a CD ROM, it's easy to see that it's an extremely well done art film, and one that's accessible and entertaining, too.
Wait a Minute Mr. Postman...
While Ceremony of Innocence is essentially a linear story (might as well read a book, right?), it's the way that the story is told is what makes it unique. The characters Griffin Moss and Sabine Stroheim reveal their hopes, fears, and passions solely through letters and postcards. That's one of CoI's most satisfying elements: you get the sneaky satisfaction of going through someone else's private mail.
And what exotic mail this is...
On the letters where Griffin and Sabine tell much of their lives, there is great detail taken to get the players's interest even when the player is just sitting, watching and listening. When Sabine is talking about her island homeland, script flies in from the outside to land on the parchment, with ambient ocean sounds in the background. When Griffin expresses his bitter experience of attending art school, key words burn in the foreground while drawings he made there come into view.
The story is well balanced...it has a certain X-Files paranormal element in it, and yet the characters seem real enough for the whole experience to sound completely plausible. There's a lot of human psychology going on, but the good news is that it avoids psychobabble and pretentious psychological dogma.
The Art of Interactivity
Even though the letters, movies and narrations are well done, it would still be boring if there wasn't *something* for the player to do. So CoI provides the rich artwork of the postcards and envelopes for you to tinker with.
The way you get to interact with this cards is different from the usual point, click and find. Not giving away too much in surprises, throughout CoI, your cursor gets imprisoned, washed, chased, bonked, whacked, clobbered and eaten. In return, you get to poke, prod, and whack a few people and objects yourself (playing with a postcard entitled "Man Descending a Staircase" is a real hoot!). Sometimes your cursor becomes an animal or some abstract doodle. In a few places, your pointer plunges into the abyss.
One of the nicest details about this cursor interactivity is the use of sounds...depending where you click your cursor, you hear what you might expect to hear if you were poking an object for real.
The Voices
When you're not having a surreal visual experience with your mouse, there's a lot being read to you. They definitely got the right voices for the job.
Isabella Rossellini's charming accent could make the Manhattan phone listings sound intriguing. Paul McGann does an excellent job at sounding like a man who's about to go over the edge of sanity. Ben Kingsley only has a small role here, but he gives Rosellini and McGann a run for the money in the cute accent category.
Oh No, It's That Relationship Thing Again
Remember in that review of Eve where we sorta kinda bitched and moaned that it was a little lacking in getting the message across about the relationship between men and women? To be fair, Eve had different goals than Ceremony, but Ceremony is able to do what Eve didn't simply by showing us the lives of Griffin and Sabine.
Of course, this is no ordinary relationship, but still many can relate to the feelings expressed by G & S. It certainly helps that it has such interesting characters for the player to focus upon.
Griffin is the typical repressed Englishman, and yet he's also a neurotic artist. Toss in a disturbing childhood and and an empty social life and we have a character that would make most psychologists drool like Pavlov's dogs.
Sabine is calm, wise and much like a guardian angel. She represents womanly earthiness and intuitiveness, and remains cool even when Griffin rants and obsesses.
Don't want to give too much of the story and characters, so let's leave it at that. Let's just say that in the end, you get the satisfying feeling of having read a good book...one that inspires the imagination.