For Your (Wishlist): Fishbowl
Charming, colorful and poignant
Fishbowl is a slice of life, coming of age story told over a month. Video call loved ones, work from home, sort through puzzles to rediscover childhood memories, do care tasks and get to know yourself better, one day at a time. (From Steam)
Fishbowl is the debut project from imissmyfriends.studio, a duo based in Goa, India. They are Rhea Gupte and Prateek Saxena, who both “dreamed of making games and storytelling since we were little,” they write on their website. Rhea handles the writing and creative direction on Fishbowl, and Prateek the art, programming, and music. They’ve been working on the game for three years, two years part-time and one full-time, and have been learning game development along the way.
(I was floored, reading that after seeing the first trailer. I will never not be impressed with the talent people who create games have. Stories like theirs are why I love writing columns like this.)
I discovered Fishbowl in March, a few days before it was announced that the game was part of PlayStation’s India Hero Project. I kept an eye on it off and on, as I was absolutely chomping at the bit to play a demo, as I’d fallen in love with the charming and colorful visual style and their inspirations for the game.
The idea of Fishbowl is closely inspired by our mindset during the pandemic. Through this time, we were reflecting on our lives in isolation, what it meant to support our loved ones long distance, and to take care of ourselves. Fishbowl is a warm and cozy story about living in isolation, nurturing friendships and understanding grief.
COVID began a weird time in the world. I was working retail, my kiddo turned two in December 2020, my husband was mobilized to help with our state’s COVID response…It was a lot. But it was also this shared worldwide experience at the same time, and while you might not be 21 with a new job and fresh out of college, you’ll find yourself having more in common with Alo than you might think.
I had the opportunity to play Fishbowl’s demo for LudoNarraCon this year, and it didn’t disappoint. You step into Alo’s shoes, twenty-one years old and a college graduate. She’s moved away from her family and to the city for her job, she’s a junior video editor for a social media star and is still processing the loss of her beloved grandmother Jaja. The emotion is palpable when she receives a box in the mail from her mother, containing memories of home and those tied to her. The titular ‘fishbowl’ is one of those things. As you unpack the box, the mini-game reminds me of Unpacking, and that’s never a bad thing.
Work beckons next, so you grab a hard drive that you brought home from work and log onto your computer where you Zoom with a co-worker you haven’t been able to meet yet. She helps you work on a vlog, and this process is a mini-game where you need to match up clips to their correct track. (My first time with this flustered me a bit, but even with that poor performance, it didn’t hurt me with my co-worker.)
They mention that everyone will be working from home from then on, seemingly referring to the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic before signing off. After, I took some time to wander my apartment, but not before speaking to a friend, a teacher, who also mentioned that she’d be conducting her classes online. Alo’s apartment was a delight to explore, filled with items to interact with, from the fishbowl you got in the mail, to a toaster where you can make yourself a piece of toast, and your refrigerator, where you can treat yourself to some tasty leftovers.
You learn a lot about Alo through this exploration - it’s the biggest place she’s ever lived, she created a corner in her bedroom for relaxation but she hasn’t used it yet (#mood), and she’s seemingly going through a creative block, as evidenced by the crumpled papers around her desk. After showering and taking care of brushing her teeth (optional because the game allows you to do as little or as much self-care as you want), I settled in bed for the night and what followed was a poignant and relatable sequence for anyone who’s ever had that moment of regret or that moment of what if that you’ll never know the answer to.
It honestly took my breath away.
A release date has yet to be announced, but Fishbowl will be coming out on PC and PlayStation. The demo is still available as of publishing for both platforms.