PlayStation-Exclusive Pavilion Explains Its “Fourth-Person” Gameplay

First revealed during the Tokyo Game Show last year, developer Visiontrick Media described Pavilion as a “fourth-person exploratory experience about guidance, influence and subliminal control.” Visiontrick previously said that means you don't control the main character himself, but rather the world around him, and that this “indirect control” is what it means by “fourth-person.”

In addition to releasing a new, extended trailer, Co-founder and Creative Director at Visiontrick Media, Henrik Flink, recently took to the PlayStation Blog to provide an only slightly less vague explanation of the three fundamental components that make up Pavilion’s puzzle design.

The first of the three components is the main character you can see running around in the trailer above. “His behaviors and personality need to be observed, understood and aided, for you both to traverse and progress in the game,” Flink said. The second component is the environment itself, with the layout of the surrounding world affecting the character’s traversal. The third component is the interactive objects that can be manipulated to affect both the environment and, indirectly, the main character.

“We’re also happy to see conversations about the fourth person term,” Flink said. “Though, the indirect steering is not solely the reason for us to use the term. Unfortunately we can’t go deeper into its meanings without spoiling certain parts of the experience that we’d rather have you experience while playing.”

So that’s still pretty confusing to me, but we’ll be able to get our hands on Pavilion and see what it’s all about ourselves when it comes out later this fall, exclusively for the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation Vita.

Emanuel Maiberg is a freelance writer. You can follow him on Twitter @emanuelmaiberg and Google+.
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