Tag: story driven

Röki – Walking In A Winter Wonderland (With a troll):

Posted on by in Gaming

Back in October, which seems like it happened a decade ago, I was at EGX in London. After being lucky enough to get a Press Pass for the event, I spent quite a few hours scrolling through my emails, searching for games that I found interesting or ones that I thought deserved a little more love in the indie section. One such game was Röki, an adventure game that follows a young girl named Tove, who is trying to rescue her brother from the claws of the monster that kidnapped him.

In the short demo that I got to play, I was immediately immersed in a fairy-tale world. So, when the full version of the game was released on Steam a few days ago, I immediately threw myself into it. Over the course of a weekend, I completed each chapter of the story, trying my hardest to appreciate and discover every corner of my surroundings. Though I will say that spider is horrifying, I nearly threw my laptop across the room when I first saw it and the NOISES IT MADE WERE TERRIFYING OK.

Look at these gorgeous woods, it reminds me of the woods near where I was born.

Point and click adventures tend to be an experience of trial and error. For games with less well-thought out puzzles, it becomes a rage game, where you try combining anything and everything in a desperate attempt to progress the story. Röki, thankfully, has managed to avoid the puzzle pitfall. The puzzles were instinctive, cleverly interwoven into your interactions with the world. It didn’t feel like the plot was being held hostage until you finished collecting several shiny stones; it instead feels like a genuine obstacle standing between Tove and her brother.

From a technical standpoint, Röki is a masterpiece. Upon opening the game, you are greeted with sweeping vistas of a snowy mountain range. The forest stands out on the snowy background, managing to seem inviting and ominous at the same time. You’re greeted with icy lakes, towering trees, and crumbling castles – the likes of which we associate to the stories that we read to our kids at bedtime. These gorgeous landscapes are enhanced by the lighting engine that Röki implements. When you’re working with the sheer white snow of a mountain landscape like that of Tove’s home, it can be hard to make each explorable area unique enough to interest the player. In fact, arctic explorers must contend with a type of mirage, in which the snow makes it look like there is land on the horizon.

A lovely idyllic house, perfect for a fairy tale to take a dark turn.

Every aspect of Röki has an incredible amount of thought put into it, from the character designs, to the ambient sounds of the forest that you are exploring. The world of Röki is a living, breathing organism that deserves your utmost respect and from my time with the game, I am more than willing to give it that. Footprints will trail behind you in the snow, the wind blows through the trees, ravens will spook if you get too close. The birds sing and the trolls grumble as you walk past. It feels alive and bustling, yet you feel alone. Tove is on her own, in a world that she has only experienced in bed-time stories. Whenever I closed my eyes in Röki, every sound cue and background noise painted an elaborate picture of the world around Tove, a beautiful canvas forged through song.

Although beautiful, Röki is a remarkably dark game when you start to look below the surface. Littered across the forest are trolls that have been petrified by the sun, left frozen and alone until the end of time. A nearby church is filled with gravestones, that on closer inspection are those of children, taken at a young age and never recovered. A tortured soul who drowned in a lake now dwells there, dragging unfortunate souls to meet the same fate. Tove’s journey is not an easy one, it is more than a simple adventure to rescue her brother. It is about forgiveness, empathy, and hope where sometimes we find none.

LOOK AT THOSE MOUNTAINS AND FORESTS. SERIOUSLY. ITS SO PRETTY. SO SO PRETTY.

Personally, the plot hit close to home. It is a layered tale of loss and redemption, told through the eyes of a young girl who has been forced to grow up too quickly. Through exploring a magical forest, filled with whacky and wonderful creatures (plus a few of the more… deadly variety), you begin to uncover the story of a family in distress, whose dispute has had serious ramifications for the forest’s ecosystem and wellbeing. In her quest to rescue her brother and reunite with her father, Tove manages to piece back together the broken shards of a family of powerful beings – the Guardians of the forest.

If you don’t want any spoilers from the main story, then I’d recommend stepping away from this article now, purchasing the game on Steam, playing it through, eating a large amount of chocolate to recover emotionally and then come back to continue reading! I’m going to talk about a big spoiler from later in the game, because I feel it’s well worth talking about.

God I love mythology. And their gods. Ehehe.

So, SPOILERS AHEAD:

At the start of the game, your brother Lars, is taken by a monster through magic portal. Your father was last seen under a pile of rubble and wooden beams, begging you to take your brother and run.  Although not explicitly stated at the start of the game, its clear that Tove’s mother has died – as well as that the loss is recent. Since the loss of her mother, Tove has had to take on the role of caregiver in her household. From caring for her little brother, to stoking the fire, to cooking for the family, this little girl can do it all. Yet, she shouldn’t have to. Her father is deep in grief over the loss of his beloved wife, leaving Tove alone in her own grief and pain.

As the game progresses, you are tasked with waking the three guardians of the forest – the wolf, the stag, and the bear. You learn that there was a fourth guardian, the raven, but she was outcast into another dimension with her son, a result of her falling in love with a human. Each of the guardians were responsible for a season in the year, as well as working with one another to keep the forest in balance. When the family fell apart, so did the forest they protected. Now the raven, seeks her revenge.

Get thee back satan, THIS IS MY BEDROOM. MINE.

With each of the guardians you wake, Tove is forced to walk through memories that she tried so hard to suppress. These memories are about her mother – key days that they spent together and the days that followed her loss. Facing the past, is an incredibly difficult thing to do. Whenever I think back on the people that I’ve lost, the memories that I’ve desperately tried to forget, it brings a tightness to my chest and a pain to my heart that is hard to describe. So, for Tove to face those memories, to battle through them, all to save her little brother from a mythical creature that is most definitely beyond her abilities to win a fight against, is incredible.

This becomes prominent in the climax of the game, where Tove faces off against the creature that took her brother. It turns out that Röki is the son of the raven guardian, who is desperate to have her son accepted by the world that cast them out. She is merely a mother that wants her son to have a normal life, though she really needs to work on her methods because child sacrifice through dark magic is not the best approach. In our eyes, she is the villain of this piece but from where she stands, she’s doing what she must. To her, a random human child’s life is nothing in comparison to the happiness of her own offspring.

Aw sweetheart. Back when you thought it would all be ok.

It is in the finale that one of the most emotional sequences in gaming makes its appearance. I’ve spoken before about games like What Remains of Edith Finch and Drawn to Life, with their powerful plots. However, Röki rockets to the top of that list in my minds eye, because it feels so heartfully genuine and real, that it is remarkably similar to some of the nightmares that I have had due to my ongoing battle with PTS. Tove is forced to relive the day of her mother’s death, which depressingly, is also her baby brother’s birthday. You sprint around a forest, desperately trying to track down the ringing phone that could bring medical help to save your mother. Yet every time that you have it in your grasp, you are teleported back to your parents’ side who beg you to do something, that only you can save her. It’s a harrowing but powerful moment.

Anyways, this review has gone on much longer than normal. If you haven’t played Röki, please do check it out, the folks at Polygon Treehouse are talented and extremely lovely. Have a good week everyone, remember to wash your hands and wear a mask. Remember to follow the site, follow my twitter @OurMindGames and like/comment!

CaitlinRC.

PREY – This Article Is A Mimic:

Posted on by in Gaming

In the eternal time-vortex that is the COVID-19 lockdown and pandemic, I realised that I had never finished my playthrough of the game PREY. Considering I’d had a tonne of ideas for articles about the spooky space adventure, I decided it was time to remedy that. However, when loading up my save, I realised that I had left my Morgan Yu in a corridor with a Nightmare and no real way out. So, like any normal person, I decided to watch an in-depth lets-play and scream quietly into my pillow at every jumpscare. I’ll go back and officially finish the game myself one day, maybe as a Halloween stream if that is something that you’d be interested in.

One of the main features of PREY is the enemy type called the Mimic. As its name suggests, it mimics objects in its surroundings and blends in, until you get too close, at which point it tries to eat your face. Personally, my coffee cup becoming sentient and trying to consume the flesh from my bones is on my list of “Things I Never Want to Happen to Me Ever on The Face of The Planet”. Then again, that list isn’t particularly long (yet). Mimic’s can take on the form of nearly any object, forcing you to constantly scan your surroundings for anything that is out of place. That additional coffee cup? Mimic. That oddly angled chair? Mimic. That person trying to kill you? Not a mimic, just a jerk.

…I love my coffee but am not a fan of getting my face consumed.

You are Morgan Yu, a tester of devices known as “Neuromods”, which allow the user to gain new abilities and skills instantly, though it does involve inserting a needle into your eye which is scarier than most of the game’s monsters.  These abilities fall under two categories – Human, such as improved medicine, attack power and hacking ability, or Alien – which gives you access to the Typhon’s abilities like telekinesis, morphing and telepathy. This wide skillset allows the player to choose how they wish to approach each scenario they face, be it with stealth or an overpowered shotgun. My default approach is to try and be as stealthy as possible, then get discovered and panic until the enemies are all dead or I am dead.

Despite the outer-space surroundings and endless swarm of jerks, mimics, and phantoms, it is the atmosphere that makes PREY such a fascinating game. From the moment you start it up, you are consistently shown not to believe your eyes. Your apartment is a simulated environment, that you have been living in for three years, following the same daily routine (a la Groundhog Day). Three years of your memories have been wiped out from the use of Neuromods, and the entirety of Talos One has been overrun with the Typhoon menace. Every shadow seems to contain another monstrosity and you can’t trust what you see or hear.

You’ve heard of tall, dark and handsome. Welcome to massive, horrifying and demonic.

This look into what it’s like to not trust your own senses, gives us all a slightly glimpse into what people with Psychosis deal with every single day. Every individual’s experience with the mental illness is different but there are three main symptoms associated with a psychotic episode:

  1. Hallucinations
  2. Delusions
  3. Confused and Disturbed Thoughts

The mimic’s ability to imitate the world around you, forces you to distrust everyone and everything in sight. Your senses are heightened, every shadow is an enemy lying in wait and every unexplored corridor seems too dangerous to risk exploring. You are surrounded by death and chaos, followed by long stretches of eerie silence where every clang of metal or hiss of air causes you to jump ten feet in the air out of panic. It’s a remarkable combination of panic, distrust, and paranoia, lumped in with a healthy dose of genuine fear.

Nope, nope, nope, nope nope, nope nope NOPE

When the Nightmare shows up for the first time after entering the Arboretum, you catch a glimpse of your greatest threat yet. Sure, the mimics and phantoms all want to kill you, but their existence doesn’t revolve around it. The Nightmare, however, only has one sole purpose in life – to hunt you down and tear you limb from limb. It really should get a better hobby, I’m just saying. Try fishing or something.

These things are fast, strong, and capable of swiping your head off with one hit. No matter how powered up you are, these things are more than able to take you out. Those Neuromods I mentioned earlier? Yeah, the more of the “Alien” ones that you use, the more the Nightmare will show up. It’s not worth fighting these guys. It’s a waste of ammo for a one-time reward, with a high mortality rate.

GET BACK SATAN

Encountering your first nightmare, you’d probably assume that it’s just a set-piece and that the abomination will probably turn up as a boss fight near the end of the game. A logical assumption but an incorrect one. These things will stalk you across Talos One, destroying everything and everyone that is in their way. To quote the in-game description – “If all else fails, run.”

Another aspect of PREY that I absolutely MUST mention, is it’s ending. The grand finale of the game has you facing down an enormous Typhon called an Apex, which is threatening to consume the entirety of Talos One. You have the choice of trying to escape, neutralising the Typhon, or setting off the station’s self-destruct sequence and sacrificing yourself. Your actions earlier on in the game, will dictate whether you survive your stay on Talos One.

…Please don’t eat me

Throughout the game, when you encounter other humans, you don’t have to kill them. You are provided with plenty of non-lethal options to deal with your non-supernatural foes. After all, everyone on Talos One is also fighting back against the Typhons. They just don’t want their coffee cup to eat them, is that too much to ask? Each person you spare or kill, whether you choose to free or rescue those in danger, as well as the ending you choose – will be laid out in front of you in a post-credit scene.

The whole game was an experiment. Morgan Yu, your player character, is a captured Typhon entity with Morgan’s memories implanted into it. Every part of the storyline that you played through, was a memory and a test to see whether Typhon’s were capable of developing empathy and human emotions. Dependent on your choices throughout the game, the experiment is either deemed a success or a failure. If you fail, then you die.

Is anyone else getting a James Bond villain from Alex?

However, if you succeed, then Alex (Morgan’s brother) reveals something to you. The Typhons have already invaded Earth. The efforts you went through to contain the Typhon threat, were for nothing. However, by showing that you as a Typhon can develop empathy and emotions, proves that peace could be brokered between the remaining members of humanity and the invading Typhons. It is up to you to choose whether you want to be that bridge between the groups as a hybrid of the two.

We all know that I love games that have consequences for your actions. It forces you to care a bit more about the world you are exploring and the character’s you interact with. That fear and paranoia that you experience throughout the game becomes tenfold when you realise that your anxious trigger finger could be the end of a genuinely good person’s life.

Anyways, apologies that this article took so bloody long! I made it a bit longer to make up for the delay, so hopefully it was all that you were hoping for. If you have other games that you’d like to see my take on (eventually), leave them in the comments or message me on Twitter (@OurMindGames).

CaitlinRC.

Stories Untold – We All Must Face What We Have Done:

Posted on by in Gaming

As we have covered many times over the last year, I am not a fan of horror games. Any enjoyment that could be derived from being scared, is ruined by the paralysing anxiety that accompanies it. I tend to avoid any and all horror like the plague – better than safe than sorry. However, when it comes to psychological horror, I’m a bit more open minded. Psychology has always fascinated me. People often like to joke that those who like to study the inner workings of the human psyche, are either wanting to understand the “unstable” or are “unstable” themselves. Obviously, it’s a whole load of rubbish but there is a grain of truth in there.

Humanity, as a species, strives to understand what we often deem impossible to comprehend. We quantify and label, document and test everything and anything we can get our grubby little hands on. There’s so much we know about the world around us yet so little we understand about how our own minds work. With words alone, we can change a crowd into a mob, start a rebellion, incite cruelty and bring joy to those who seek it. I’ve never been good at understanding emotions, particularly my own. Anger, hatred and cruelty are all foreign concepts to me.

So, when a game claims to be a psychological horror, I am curious as to what hidden truths it will strive to extract from the gold mine that is the human mind.

Stories Untold, is one such game. Presented as a four-part episodic experience in the style of old school text adventure games, it weaves such an intricate web that when the finale arrives, it knocks you flat on your back and holds you there – controlling every rise and fall of your chest. Even when you know what is coming, repeat playthroughs allow you to notice every subtle link and minute detail that builds such a vivid picture in your mind, it’s as if you are standing there, watching it all unfold in front of your eyes but are powerless to do anything to stop it. I love it.

Now, if you haven’t played it and want to do so without any spoilers – stop reading now, go play it and then come back with the experience fresh in my mind. Do come back though, I’ll be lonely otherwise. For those of you who are still reading, lets talk spoilers. The first three chapters each seem to have their own standalone story, meanwhile the final chapter links all of them together. I’m going to talk about each chapter in turn. The four chapters are titled – The House Abandon, The Lab Conduct, The Station Process and The Last Session.

Don’t pick up the phone. You never know who is on the other end.

The first episode, The House Abandon, follows the more traditional style of text adventures. You, the player, drive up to your family’s holiday home. After starting up the generator and unlocking the front door, you’re given the chance to explore the building – reminiscing about your childhood and the fond memories that the old walls hold. Eventually, you find your way to your bedroom and find your old computer – that your father dug out of the attic, along with a copy of a very familiar game, the House Abandon. Upon booting up the game, the power goes out. When everything flickers back to life, it’s all changed. The welcoming house becomes filled with stains, broken windows, dead carcasses and ominous writing on the walls. Instead of a kind note from your father, the note in your hand spits cruel, terrifying and hateful messages – to the point where it seems to burn into the palm of your hand.

A phone rings, breaking the uneasy silence that you have fallen into. You hear breathing down the phone and soon you realise that you are not alone anymore. Creaking floorboards, flickering lights and blaring alarms all echo around you, as if the house you are sat in, playing the game, is the same one as in the game itself… You struggle to distinguish between the actions of your player exploring the house and those of the individual sat controlling those movements. Negative emotions and memories pour out of the protagonist like a tidal wave, culminating in the door behind you creaking open. The computer accuses you of an unknown crime, demanding that you admit that it was all your fault. It barrages you with insults, hurling abuse until you at last type the words “It was all my fault”. It’s response? “Finally.”

Not an ominous setup at all.

In The Lab Conduct, you play as Mr Aition – a volunteer who has agreed to take part in a series of experiments conducted by Dr Daniel Alexander. These experiments are performed upon an object called “artefact 23”, which was recovered from a crash site for further study. Locked in the isolated laboratory, you use various machines such as an X-Ray, sound wave generators and high-powered lasers on the object. At first glance, the artefact appears to be an animal heart of some kind, whose heartbeat we restart. However, upon exposure to extreme frequency sound waves, it explodes and reveals a metallic sphere.

As a child, you’re always told not to stare at the sun, or it’ll hurt your eyes. Well, in Stories Untold, don’t stare at the hovering metallic sphere or it’ll knock you over, draw some blood and “connect” you to its inner core. You know, just normal things. Once connected, you walk through the spheres memories – reliving the crash, reaching out to a silhouette for help and waking up in a hospital bed, covered in wires and recovering from a torture session. When you pull out the wires, an alarm goes off. You, Mr Aition, hear that alarm as well. Yet again, the events seem to be occurring at the same time. Once you instruct the creature to leave their room, Dr Alexander recognises that you are causing this and begs for you to stop. Yet, you do not stop. You release all the spheres. They converge on you and as the world fades from around you, the last words of Dr Alexander ring in your ears – “Someday Mr Aition, this will haunt you.”

Don’t go out in the snow alone. People don’t come back.

The Station Process is a chapter that leans into the love of puzzle-solving that echoes in the hearts of most gamers. Using a microfilm reader with a guide on it, you, only known as “James”, must decrypt a series of signals and submit the correct code in order to pass on the relevant messages. The puzzles involve decrypting Morse Code, observing patterns and adjusting frequencies. Nerd that I am, I adore them. After all, what’s the point of studying Computer Science if you can’t show off your understanding everything occasionally? As you complete the puzzles, your fellow communication tower operators talk about something coming, attacking supply teams and ripping entire cabins out of the earth.

One of the signals you intercept is a distress signal that details how the rest of the world has been collapsed by the creatures that now stalk the mountain range that your cabins are situated on. They beg you to lock your doors and stay inside, but fate has other plans for you. When the main transmitter is knocked out of place, it’s your job to go fix it. When you’ve done so, you hear the voice of Station 2, a kind female voice, seemingly going into shock – unable to feel her legs and just wanting to rest. You can’t help her; you can’t help anyone. When you finally get back to the cabin, it’s not the one you left. It’s the bedroom from The House Abandon.

One of these things is not like the other, one of these things does not belong.

Clearly, there’s an overarching plot between these episodes. These lingering threads are all pulled together in The Last Session. As the opening credits play, they pause and pull back to reveal that you’ve been watching a TV show. Your character, James Aition, is wheeled by Dr Alexander into an empty room with a cassette recorder and prompted to try and recover the memories of what happened before he arrived in hospital. It is revealed that you were involved in a nasty car accident and had been in a coma for two weeks prior to the events of the game. Your last three attempts at recalling the accident had ended in panic, with the truth being mixed in with fantasy such that you couldn’t tell which was which.

The game proceeds to take you through the previous chapters. You return to the communication tower and examine the microfilm – which now displays a police report about the traffic accident you were in. Your sister, Jennifer, was trapped and critically injured and the other driver was found dead, with an empty bottle of whisky in his hand and stinking of alcohol. However, upon solving a puzzle, you hear a testimony of a friend of said driver, claiming that the guy had never spoken about alcohol before and would never imbibe like that – especially considering he was a former police officer. He accuses James of foul play.

Never been a fan of hospitals. Don’t think I ever will be.

We burst into the emergency room, to James’s heart stopping on the gurney and a haemorrhage threatening to destroy any chances of resuscitating him. Upon the doctor’s orders, you restart your own heart and drill into your skull – saving your life. As the drill approaches, you startle awake in the computer desk from The House Abandon. It details a leaving party being hosted by your family, to celebrate James going travelling with his friends abroad for several months in the new year. After having a few drinks and being gifted a nice bottle of whisky from his dad, Jennifer asks James whether he can give her a lift home. Unfortunately, you can’t say no to this choice (trust me, I tried).

As you stagger to the car, forget to take the handbrake off the car and drive faster than is safe, even when sober – Jennifer slowly realises that James is drunk. She begs him to slow down, to pull over, to just stop, but he does not listen. He goes faster, eventually crashing directly into oncoming traffic. When he awakens, he drags himself out of the car – leaving his sister in the burning wreckage. Terrified of going to jail and wrecking his reputation, James decides to frame the other driver by pouring alcohol on him, removing his fingerprints from the bottle and planting it in the dead driver’s car. When the police arrive, James collapses from his injuries and wakes up in the hospital room with Dr Alexander. The doctor takes James back to the TV room, stating that he will report what James said to the police.

Sometimes telling the truth, is the hardest thing to do.

More than anything, Stories Untold is about consequences. You must live with the consequences of your actions. Your choices affect more than just your life. They ripple, like pebbles on a lake’s surface, spreading further and further out until they form tidal waves that threaten to consume the lives of so many. In this case, James’s actions caused the death of his sister, the grief of his family, as well as the death and attempted framing of an innocent man. His panic at reliving what he had done, his refusal to accept the horrifying reality of his memories – all these lead us on this journey through the shattered remains of a young man’s mind.

Anyways, I hope you’ll all think a little about the stories that you tell and whether they are stories that you’d want people to hear about or not. If not, make positive changes. I believe in you. Like, comment and follow the site – both here and on Twitter @OurMindGames for future articles.

Much love,

CaitlinRC

Firewatch – Too many fires, too little time.

Posted on by in Gaming

A few years ago, an indie game called Firewatch was released to the admiration of many people online – including the YouTube gaming community. You couldn’t really take two steps without stumbling across it but somehow, I managed to avoid it. Not that I wasn’t interested, it looked like a game that was right up my alley, but I didn’t want to spoil it for myself by watching someone else play it. Yet in typical gaming tradition, it sat on the pile of games that I wanted to play but never got around to, until about this time last year, where I live-streamed it as a change of content from my usual art streams.

If you’re interested in seeing some of my reactions to the game, I made a little compilation video of some funny moments including me going “mhmm sensual paint” (it makes sense in context I swear… kind of.) You can watch that here – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d1KbsP7QL8E . Firewatch is the kind of game you should experience yourself rather than watching a playthrough. It’s one of those games that tells a story that we all can interpret in different ways and I’m going to talk mainly about how the various events in the game affected me, so if you don’t want to be spoiled, don’t keep reading.

So, for those of you who are still here, let me at least explain what on earth this game is about. Firewatch is at its core, a story-driven walking simulator. You play as Henry, who has taken the job as a lookout in one of many fire towers in one of America’s national parks. He is to spend the entire summer looking out for fires, stopping people from setting off fireworks (darn teens) and generally just wandering through nature and hopefully not dying of boredom. The only person you really interact with is Delilah, your supervisor who speaks to you over the radio. You never meet her, but she is the one other voice you really grow to love throughout the game, which is one of many reasons her voice actress won an award CAUSE SHE’S BRILLIANT OK.

I cannot emphasise how beautiful this game is.

From the moment you start the game, Firewatch throws emotional turmoil at you. You constantly switch between Henry travelling to the watchtower and a series of screens telling stories from Henry and his wife Julia’s relationship – from their first meeting in a bar, to them getting a dog together and eventually, Julia is diagnosed with Alzheimer’s and ends up being taken to be cared for by her family in Australia, whilst Henry stays behind. Even though it’s only a small section of the game, it’s more than enough for you to get invested in their relationship and gain an insight into why Henry has taken this job in the middle of nowhere. He doesn’t know how to cope; he needs time to process the events that have unfolded and how he might move forward. It’s something we can all relate to.

Speaking from personal experience, I think having to watch someone you love in pain is one of the worst things you can ever experience. Sure, when bad things happen to you it can weigh on you for the rest of your life, but you feel a sense of control over how you deal with it in the days that follow. Meanwhile, the sheer helplessness that consumes you when you are forced to just sit and watch those you care about suffer, cuts you to your very core. You want to help, to fight back but it’s beyond what limited powers you have and I think Firewatch touches quite well on this subject – by leaving titbits of information about Henry’s relationship with his wife, how he’s processing it all and what he might do after the summer ends.

Now, last week we talked about Alien Isolation and the profound impact that loneliness can have upon you, especially when you are in a stressful situation. With Firewatch, you instantly become attached to Delilah and her relationship with the player, as it’s the only real source of human contact you get throughout the course of the game. Apart from brief interactions with some no-good teenagers and reading the various letters sent between two of the park’s rangers, you only ever come across traces of other people. You grow to care for Delilah, quietly hoping that you’ll be able to meet her in person before the game ends. Everything you go through throughout the game’s story, she is right there by your side, giving her opinion and providing crucial context to what Henry uncovers.

Delilah, like you, wants to know what the only other person she can speak to, looks like. Because then it feels real.

One thing that Firewatch and well-produced horror games have in common, is how they build suspense and paranoia throughout their gameplay. Firewatch leans more on the paranoia aspect, as you slowly realise that it isn’t just hikers and campers in the woods around you. Someone is watching you, listening to your conversations and outright knocking you unconscious when you find the information you weren’t meant to see. An incredible example of this is when you are walking back to your tower at night, talking over the events of the day with Delilah when she casually says:

“Oh well, you’re back in your tower, I guess you need a drink too.”

At this point in the game, I was trying to find my way back and was making my way towards my tower, quietly considering the story implications of the events I had just experienced. My heart stopped momentarily in my chest when I realised, there was someone in my tower. Whether they were lying in wait to ambush me or leaving a threatening note next to my pet turtle, I had no idea. All I knew is that they were there, and I was not. (Side note, if they’d hurt Turt Reynolds I’d have burned down the entire place myself).

Throughout the game, you get to choose how you respond to Delilah over the radio. You can choose to be an ass and not respond at all if you want but anyone who does that is a monster and I’M COMING FOR YOU. This element of choice is there to help you build that relationship and to involve you more in the story, so that you are actually affected by the various events that unfold in the game, rather than just reacting by going “oh well, moving on”. This game is meant to impact you, everything from the art style to the voice acting and the soundtrack is built to involve you in this world and make you care about what is happening to it.

Cissy Jones, who plays Delilah, deserves so much credit. The game wouldn’t be the same without her.

One aspect of Firewatch you really don’t expect is your discovery in the ravine. Sure, the creepy person listening to you over the radio and throwing your typewriter out the window is a tad unexpected, but it isn’t entirely out of the blue. When you’re alone in an unfamiliar place, we all think that we are being watched or listened to. That paranoid part of our brain is screaming, considering the worst when in fact it’s probably just a squirrel. For games that have this central tension and suspense, you don’t expect them to do emotional impact well but oh boy does Firewatch punch you in the heart and brings tears to your eyes.

During your various treks through the wilderness, you occasionally come across various traces of a father and his son who used to live in the tower you now inhabit. They left after a short period of time, but Delilah got quite close to the young boy, Brian, and would lie to her superiors about his presence as children weren’t allowed to stay in the lookout towers. You find an abandoned backpack attached to a tree that contains various climbing gear that Brian presumably “lost”, as well as his hideout containing fantasy novels and role-playing games. Eventually, you venture into the ravine using the climbing gear and discover Brian. Or what remains of him.

There at the bottom of the cavern, is Brian’s decomposing body. One of his shoes had landed away from his broken form, which was nearly unrecognisable. At that moment, the music becomes sombre and you just stand there, staring at this little boy whose life was cut short. I realised what had happened the moment I saw the shoe, but I didn’t want to believe it. I stepped forward into the cavern, my eyes searching for what I hoped wouldn’t be there. When I saw him, the only thought in my mind was: “Did he suffer”. My brain saw this little boy, in agony on the cavern floor, clinging to life desperately as it seeped away from his shattered bones.

RIP Brian Goodwin. He deserved better.

You quickly realise that he fell and later discover that Brian’s father Ned has been living in the wilderness ever since his son’s death, hiding from the authorities and as a result, spying on Henry and Delilah. In the tape left to you by Ned, you hear the broken man recount the moments of his son’s death, talking about how Brian’s hook didn’t sink into the rock properly, how he was forced to watch his son fall without being able to help. Part of you wants to feel for him, as a father who lost his son but another part of you can only see that broken little boy in the dark cavern.

As you are airlifted out of the woods and away from the fire that is spreading, you just look at the credits as they roll – showing the pictures of Ned and Brian from their disposable camera, as well as the ones you took on that same roll of film. You don’t see Delilah again, with your final interaction being over the radio in a lookout tower, just like it was at the beginning of the game. A poignant end to a powerful game.

Honestly, I could probably go on about various elements of Firewatch for about a full-fledged novel’s worth of content, but I think what I’ve said in this article sums up the most powerful parts of this game. Grief, loneliness and paranoia are three of the most powerful things that can influence our choices and our memories. No-one is exempt from these feelings, regardless of whether you suffer from a mental health condition or not. You are not immune. So, reach out, there will always be someone there who is willing to listen.

I hope you enjoyed this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. A bit more of a sombre tone compared to last weeks but hey, don’t worry. We’re talking about Mario Odyssey next week and how it’s worldwide journey can bring joy to our lives in ways you wouldn’t expect.

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Till next week,

CaitlinRC

Octopath Traveller: A Kraken Good Time

Posted on by in Gaming

Opening a game and immediately being told to choose between eight characters, is a tad daunting, to say the least. However, I am a sucker for story-driven RPG’s so I didn’t let it put me off and threw myself into the game, starting with H’aanit – because I saw she had a snow leopard as her best friend and I wanted in on that immediately. When you choose a character at the beginning, you are given a basic description of their personality, abilities and where their story is going to go. The eight you must choose from are:

  1. H’aanit: A hunter, who can tame beasts to help in your quest and is loyal to the balance of nature. Has a pet snow leopard and is phenomenal with a bow. A good starting character for anyone unsure of where to begin with this behemoth of a game.
  • Alfyn Greengrass: An apothecary, who travels the land providing care and treatment to anyone who needs it. Can be extremely powerful if you learn how to mix ingredients properly, but difficult to master.
  • Primrose Alezhard: Her story line is not for the fainthearted. After witnessing her father’s murder at a young age, she grew up as an exotic dancer, trying to survive and searching for her father’s killers. Proficient with a dagger and able to buff her teammates during battle, she is not to be overlooked.
  • Cyrus Albright: He is a scholar, with ridiculously powerful magic attacks that can affect multiple enemies at once. I’d recommend making him a staple in your party, especially if you’re out grinding levels for a weaker party member. Word of warning though, he’s a bit of an idiot, which can cause you to cringe in response to his actions.
  • Ophilia Clement: The best darn healer in the game. You want her in your party, always. ALWAYS. She is a kind, sweet girl who deserves the world and I will MURDER ANYONE WHO HURTS HER. Anyways. She can also inspire NPC’s to fight by her side, giving you that extra edge in battle.
  • Tressa Colozone: A merchant, whose appeal doesn’t seem majorly obvious at first. Her storyline is about discovering herself and improving her “merchant skills”, which isn’t that interesting but her ability to pick up endless amounts of loose change from the ground is essential for being able to afford those shiny new swords.
  • Olberic Eisenberg: A knight, who can probably beat you to death with his little finger if he wanted to. He is a very honourable man, seeking the truth behind his friend’s betrayal of the king they served. A tad cliché but you can’t help but like him, he’s a good man and one of the heaviest hitters in the game.
  • Therion: A thief, with the ability to steal anything off anyone (if the percentage gods are in your favour), and after a failed robbery, ends up on a mission to retrieve some valuable artefacts and track down his childhood friend. Not the best fighter but stealing is fun, right? Right?
H’aanit or Olberic are good starting characters, as they have a strong enough attack power on their own. Once you have one of them, go get Ophilia because lord knows you’ll need a good healer.

Whoever you choose to start the game with, is locked into your party until you complete their storyline. However, you can still meet every other character and experience their stories, coming back to your main character’s tale when you think you are ready for it. Like most RPG’s, you can have four character’s in your party at a time, meaning you can’t have all eight of the adventurer’s at once and encourages you to switch out your companions to suit the situation you are facing. You can switch characters at an inn, which are present in every single town you come across – so you don’t have to run across the entire world every time you want Ophilia in your party. The only restrictions on who you can have in your party, is the character you chose to start with and the character whose storyline you are attempting to follow (because you can’t really follow Therion’s story if he isn’t there)

Octopath Traveller is a game more suited for handheld systems like the Switch. Not because it is a short game, but because like any RPG, you can get a bit fed up of it if you play for too long at a time. Boss fights can take half an hour, so being able to work your way through a dungeon to a boss, then take a break and come back to kick its butt, is quite relaxing. Save points are frequent, normally right after you complete a section and are always present right before a big fight, so you don’t need to trek all the way back if the boss pounds you into a bloody pulp.

The first thing people will notice about Octopath, is that it is a beautiful game. Developed in a 2D-HD style, the world is mesmerising. Every place you go to is unique, no location looks like a replica of another, even dungeons can range from mansions to caves, to sewers and abandoned ruins. The sprites of your characters are expressive and a joy to watch, especially when executing new moves in combat. However, the best art in the game must go to the bosses. Typically, the enemy sprites are small, around your size or slightly bigger, depending on the monster. However, bosses, have gigantic unique sprites that are incredibly detailed and stun you for a moment when you first enter battle with them.

Who doesn’t want to attack a giant demon bird thing.

The soundtrack of a game often makes or breaks an experience. After all, a game can be as stunning and interesting as you want, but if the music is abrasive and irritating, you won’t want to play it as much. Trust me when I say, the game’s music doesn’t disappoint. Every location and character has their own unique theme. Tense cutscenes have dramatic music playing underneath it, sadder scenes make use of piano chords to tug at your heart strings whilst boss fights inspire you with kickass tunes (even when you are getting beaten to a pulp).

It’s hard to put into words how much I love Octopath, even though it’s story can be a bit weak in places (looking at you Tressa and Therion). A lot of people’s criticism of it, is that the stories are quite separate from one another. Excluding the “secret final dungeon” after you beat all eight stories and some specific side quests, there is very little linking the characters together. However, for me, this makes sense. We are all living our own stories, walking our own paths. Sure, I may be sat in the same coffee shop as about ten different people as I write this, but it doesn’t mean our journeys through life are intertwined in any way.

I think if all eight characters were linked together by the story, the game would lose its impact. By having four chapters focused entirely around a character, you get to understand them on a deeper level. Having so many playable characters means that the amount of attention you can give each one, is limited. So being able to break the story down and follow one person’s tale at a time, results in good character writing and storytelling, rather than reducing some of your party members to boring, rushed NPC’s with a brief backstory.

H’aanit speaks in a very Old English style, which takes some getting used to but LOOK AT THE KITTY.

More than anything, Octopath is about travelling. Shocking, I know. No matter who you are playing as, you get to experience the world built by Square Enix with little concern for accidentally coming across story spoilers. The game lets you know the rough level requirement for an area, so you don’t walk into a level thirty forest when you are still only level twelve (totally not talking from experience). There’s something calming and fulfilling about Octopath. From the little interactions between your party members, to getting to know every NPC you come across, to exploring the lush landscapes and fighting everything you come across, this game is incredibly detailed and a lot deeper than most people expect.

A big example of this, is the combat. Like most RPG’s it is turn based, where depending on your character’s speed, each party member can make an action each turn (or several depending on your perks, thank god for H’aanit being able to attack twice). Enemies have a certain defence level that can be broken by attacking them using weapons/magic that they are weak against. Once their defence is broken, they are stunned, will not attack you for a turn and take greater damage from your attacks. All generic enemies have set weaknesses, that once discovered, will appear next to them in future encounters – so you don’t have to recall every single enemies’ weakness. Bosses, can change their weaknesses mid-fight, so be prepared to switch up your attacks and have a good range within your party, otherwise you might be wiped across the floor.

In summary, Octopath is probably one of my favourite RPG’s I’ve ever played. From the intricate combat system that forces you to think ahead and strategize, to the beautiful art style and haunting music, I’ve thoroughly enjoyed my time with these characters and have sunk over a hundred hours into it, from the main storyline, to levelling up my weaker party members, to completing side quests and stealing everything I can (sorry not sorry). If you like RPG’s and want one you can really sink your teeth into, I cannot recommend it enough.

What’s yours is mine, what’s mine is mine.

What games do you recommend I try out? Which ones keep you up at night? Let me know in the comments and maybe I’ll write my next article on them! I’m currently thinking childhood nostalgia in the form of a certain puzzle solving gentleman. Remember to comment below and subscribe to my site so you get notified whenever I post a new article! If you want to keep up to date on what’s going on, follow me on Twitter @OurMindGames .

Until next time,

CaitlinRC.