The puzzle-based video game OneShot uses novel gameplay mechanisms to engage the player. Many of these mechanisms involve the computer system itself; one of the very first things the game does is address the player by name, information it gathers not through the game itself but from the computer’s account name. For instance, the game never asked for my name but addressed me as Maddy, the name on my laptop account instead of my gaming username. The game accesses the player’s file manager to create encrypted documents that the user must decode and changes the desktop picture to leave a clue for another puzzle, among other things.
Unlike most games, the protagonist is not the same as the human player. Instead, the cat-like character Niko, controlled by the player, is a prophet who can talk to the god of a dying world, and the player is the god. The job of the player-god is to save Niko from the world they are trapped in, which is disintegrating around them. In the very beginning of the game, Niko sits down at a computer within the game and begins to receive messages through that computer from a second god, one that speaks to the player-god instead of Niko. The computer-god speaks through dialog boxes within the second screen but eventually begins to speak through the player’s computer instead.
The hypermediation in the game reminds the player that they are not making decisions for their own character’s life; the player-god has one shot to save someone else. This creates a sense of responsibility for Niko, who is just a lost child, and adds an emotional level to the otherwise intellectual game. It also enhances the questions about artificial intelligence and mortality within the game. Most of the characters are robots, but Niko was transported from another world and is therefore meant to be a fleshy being. The player must decide whether to save a coded, artificial world or a character who is one screen closer and from a world more similar to our own.