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In video games the act of creation and the act of destruction are usually closely allied. In Minecraft one button builds and another breaks. So too in the plastic blockbusters of the LEGO series, where a mini-figure's flailing arm can smash a car, house or space-rocket into a shower of bricks, then follow up with mystical wave that rebuilds the debris into a new object, for new purpose. In Sim City et al you must clear and level the land before laying your first road or power plant. In Tetris you build a wall to destroy a wall to build a wall again. In first person shooters, you remove foes in order to gain ground. In Prune, an elegant, loose puzzle game for iOS made by former Call of Duty designer Joel McDonald, destruction and growth are more closely allied than ever. Here, like the tender, patient gardener, you must snip the branches of a sapling as it shoots from the ground in order to encourage healthy growth elsewhere on the plant and, eventually, flowering.
You begin with a small, light-starved patch of glowing ground. An upward swipe of the finger will pull a silhouetted shoot from the soil. The process, once begun, cannot be stopped. Branches begin to sprout, twist and elongate in random yet predictable ways. Soon growth slows, quickened again only when you snip off a branch, an act that replenishes the plant's store of energy, and redirects growth into its remaining limbs. In this way you can shape and lure the tree, drawing it in a specific direction toward a life-giving ray of light. Touch the light and the relieved branch will begin to flower. Harvest enough petals and the stage is complete.
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