Dear Esther

A beach, on a Scottish island.

There are a lot of games that have so many different activities and such that even if you don't get into a lot of it, there will still definitely be something for you. This is a way that Grand Theft Auto and Assassin's Creed have been able to attract huge numbers of players. Some just want to drive around, many are there for the historical characters, settings and events, or to simply go everywhere that they can in these open worlds. In "Brotherhood", I once found myself with something I badly wanted to buy with the in-game currency, not having quite enough, so I pick pocketed a guy until he realised and started to fight me, took him out, went on to another mark, and in no time, I had the cash and there was a pile of a few dozen that I had carried this out on.

This is nothing like that. It is very much one of those where you have to want to experience exactly what it has to offer. The good news is that if that is the case, then this delivers. There are countless titles where that absolutely isn't the case, where even if you are desperate to dig into a certain subgenre, it is not something that would get suggested.

One of the things that loses a lot of people is that this is truly a walking simulator. This is not one of those cases where someone was just annoyed at linearity or other simplicity, and applied that term even though it really doesn't fit. Here, all you can do is go in a straight line or strafe. There is no running, jumping or environmental interaction at all. You can zoom your view slightly, and there are several things that will happen automatically under certain circumstances; if you go into a dark area, a flashlight will come on that will go back off when you leave, same thing if you need to crouch, and on one occasion, a seagull spooked the protagonist, prompting him to duck.

I think it is commendable when someone has the strength of their conviction to stick with a decision like that - when it's based on it being the most logical, even if it does alienate many. It definitely does limit replayability, and there were times where I felt myself wishing that there was at least an optional fetch quest, not to mention the ability to speed up at least slightly, not enough to spoil the mood, when I was backtracking, not the first time that I covered a certain distance.

The atmosphere is truly amazing. There is an eerie stillness, of feeling that what you are seeing has been abandoned, which along with the minimal context is going to inspire quite a few, and infuriate many others. There are several interpretations online that are valid, contradicting not themselves, only each other. Over the course of this, the narrator will read letters that he wrote to his wife, hence the title Dear Esther. I have not encountered any bugs. It took me 70 minutes to clear this; I think that was the right length. Long enough to get under your skin, but not for it to outstay its welcome.

At the very start, there are clouds in the horizon, and gradually the wind grows in intensity, to where you can practically feel it on your face. You see it move the tall blades of grass, you hear it. There are rocks, caves, even simple structures built by human hands. Every so often, you'll come across something that makes it impossible to deny that there is definitely something strange going on. The score is haunting, using piano, violin, viola and vocalisation. It is a bit like a ghost story by way of a museum trip. Basically, they didn't want anything to distract you. The graphics were great when this came out in 2012, and the 2017 version is even better. There are certain aspects that are stronger in the original, I leave that to people who have spent more time on them to detail. I saw someone on Steam go into detail.

The Chinese Room, the developers of this, went on to make Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs, the second in that series. This was probably based on their skill at creeping us out, which they did a phenomenal job recreating, and it did of course run into issues with an expectation of puzzles. Essentially, they did add what could graciously be described as that, although honestly they felt like busy work compared to the brain teasers that Frictional Games, who made the first one, along with Penumbra and others, excel at. With that said, I still played it multiple times through. I'm honestly not sure I see myself doing that with this; I feel like I got everything that I was going to in just the one go through.

It's very clear that a lot of people did not take to what they were given here. Via Achievement stats, only slightly over half of players completed the first quarter, which got all the way down to about a third once you reach the ending. I don't think we need many reviews, maybe one for each page, that basically just say that "this has minimal gameplay, and thus is not for everyone". If this truly had not been my kind of thing, and I felt compelled to write something, I would merely offer up my take on what's actually going on in it. I think there are entirely too many individual entries where someone is basically just saying some version of "I didn't like it", without bringing anything new to the conversation. The internet has given everyone a voice and a lot of people spend more time using it than thinking about how to.

This features disturbing content and implied violence. I recommend this to everyone who finds themselves fascinated by the core concept. 10/10.