Recompile
PC
Blacks and reds coagulate into a trash polka conglomerate of data. You, The Program, are a virus injected into a computer to end the post-apocalyptic war raging outside the machine, and begin as the most basic version of yourself: an orange blur of perpetually recompiling code, destined to manipulate the otherwise intangible by platforming your way through the anomalous spheres of the Mainframe.
Recompile designer Phi Dinh tells us that this unique world was born from memories of childhood curiosity. “Growing up, my dad always encouraged me to mess around with computers,” he explains. “Kept me off the streets, I guess.” By age 11, Dinh had developed a keen interest in games and had taught himself MS-DOS commands and basic programming. Around this time he also began engaging with the texts that would eventually inspire Recompile, becoming fascinated by the books of Iain M Banks, which introduced him to the symbiotic relationship between humanity and AI, and ’80s science fiction films such as Tron, which instigated his pondering about “what it might look like inside a computerised fictional virtual world.”
This is no mere Tron homage, however. Instead, it falls in line with the contemporary trend for low-poly visuals. This phenomenon, usually rooted in the desire to achieve timelessness in the age of realism that outgrows itself at an exponential rate, has become widespread in recent years, but Recompile’s version is not like the others. Its procedurally generated levels are composed of some ethereal material that’s at once aciculate and fluid. It’s striking, singular stuff.
In terms of genre, Recompile’s tight platforming and gradual introduction of new weapons and abilities suggest it’s a Metroidvania, but that’s only true up to a point. It eschews linearity for a branching narrative, which is split into multiple strands passively influenced by your playstyle. There are five personality types, all of which beget different endgame scenarios based on your actions. If you relentlessly murder your digital adversaries, you’re marked as aggressive, and the ethereal blue volcano suspended high in the virtual sky turns a fiery crimson. Recompile’s AI, the Hypervisor, constantly monitors your behaviour and “can dynamically open and close entire environments and even adjust the game difficulty,” Dinh says. “That volcano turning red? It’s angry at you for killing its inhabitants and will change its personality to retaliate appropriately.”
Recompile is set in a future where scarcity has led major powers to vie for resources. Courtesy of a humanitarian activist group, you were designed to put an end to the war by creating a technological singularity in the computer system, conceiving the first-ever sapient AI in the process. “The subsequent events intertwine with the outside, human narrative,” Dinh explains. “We use this as an allegory for the decisions we must make today that will determine the future of our Earth and, more importantly, its inhabitants: our children, our grandchildren and beyond.”
One of the most intriguing things about Recompile is the way in which you can exploit the environment around you. Nothing is hard-coded, so its circuitry can be cleverly manipulated. These structures function like conventional logic gates, and Dinh points out that the way you can override and disable them makes Recompile particularly suited to speedrunners. “I wanted to build a world that incorporated a programming language, not just in theme, but in function too,” he says.
“I discovered and fell in love with the beauty and elegance of logic gates, where programming languages and even entire computers can be built from a small set of simple symbols. This kind of systemic level design not only allows for exploits and sequence breaking, but actively encourages it. We want players to invent their own solutions to problems, not just discover them. When we show the game at events and conventions, we’re constantly amazed at some of the ingenious ways players get around our puzzles.”
“I discovered and fell in love with the beauty and elegance of logic gates”