A recently released game has been attracting attention on Japanese social media for allowing the player to actually crash the game.
The game in question is While Waiting, which released in February for the PC and Nintendo Switch. As the name implies, this quirky title puts you in various everyday scenarios where you usually need to wait. For example, waiting for your computer to start up or waiting to cross the street. Although you do actually need to wait to finish each scenario, the comic-book style game encourages you perform actions instead of waiting, often resulting in surreal and unexpected consequences (like the ability to go inside the TV when waiting for an annoying commercial to end).
In the game within a game within a game scenario shown in the tweet above, you can start punching the screen (in-game, we should note! Not your actual screen), which not only makes animated cracks to appear but soon causes your game to crash. No worries though, as this allows you to cross off another item on your in-game checklist.
While some commentors were concerned that the game deliberately crashing would put a strain on their hardware or cause save data corruption, others swooped in to reassure that a deliberately programmed “fake” error like this would not cause such harm.
Fourth wall breaking tricks can easily make players feel unnerved. The writer of this article was uncomfortably reminded of when the in-game action of uploading a virus to the Arsenal Gear in Metal Gear Solid 2 started to make the actual game act weird, giving you fake “Fission Mailed” game over screens and much more. While Waiting is an accessible indie puzzle game (even cats and plants can play, according to the trailer), which should appeal to those who like surreal, fourth-wall breaking elements in their games.
While Waiting is available now on Nintendo Switch and PC (Steam).
