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An orange-rimmed circle hangs in a black, spherical space, its contours momentarily described by neon-blue hatch lines that pulse in the dark. Hold two thumbs to the screen and light streaks between them, joining up to create a throbbing beam that bisects the darkness. The monolithic lettering 'MENU' appears.Dropchord is not like the other Double Fine games. Indeed, it appears that this curio from the San Franciscan game studio best known for Psychonauts, Sesame Street and Brütal Legend is a chance for the staff to take a break from all that difficult stuff like characterisation, humour and narrative puzzle design.
These are characteristics by which the studio - and its luminary founder, Tim Schafer - have become known. They are also some of the hardest things to get right in video games. With 2014's Broken Age looming, burdened as it is by the expectations of a successful, multi-million-dollar Kickstarter campaign, small wonder DoubleFine has retreated for a moment into an abstract mobile game - also available on Ouya and for the Leap Motion controller for PC and Mac (see sidebar, below) - which features no characters, no one-liners and a thumping soundtrack to drown out all that peripheral noise.
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