For my critical play, I played “What Remains of Edith Finch” developed by Giant Sparrow and published by Annapurna Interactive. While I played on iPhone, multiple mediums exist. The target audience is at least older teens due to the sensitive nature of topics and occasional gore.
The basic premise of this game follows Edith Finch, exploring her abandoned house and interacting with various objects. Despite playing for a while, I was unsure of what the final outcomes of the game were — while I slowly progressed through each level, I wasn’t sure if it was possible to “lose” the game. In addition, due to the controlled nature of the game, it almost felt like procedures and rules were not necessary to know. As I was walking, if the character wasn’t supposed to go to a certain area, they simply would not be able to pass despite directing. In this sense, the walking simulator allowed for procedures and rules to be built in. In addition, the game makers built in small indicators of what actions the player was supposed to perform. For example, in the following picture, the white dot made it clear that the player should walk up to the mailbox.
I thought the way the creators included the narrative style was very interesting.
Edith served as the narrator but even playing without sound, the captions appeared as part of the game. As Edith/the player walked more, they slowly learned more about the premise and the relevant characters.
Despite the game seeming to appear as an embedded narrative at first where Edith is collecting various clues, I thought certain stages of the game did not fit within the narrative architecture. For example, Edith enters Edie’s bedroom and reads her journal. Then, Edith almost enters Edie’s narrative and the walking sim changes from Edith to Edie. Then, in Edie’s world, the player is various animals trying to chase prey.
I will admit that this section took me a very long time as in each stage, I found it very difficult to find the animals but I also was confused by how this part fit into the overall narrative. It seemed to be changing the game and the type of fun from fantasy and narrative to challenge. Though I thought this was a really interesting dynamic shift, I’m not sure the mechanics support it. Particularly playing on the iphone, I found it challenging to swoop in to kill rabbits or seals — it seemed like perhaps the mechanics of controlling the animal should have been different than the mechanics used to control the walking sim. I found myself getting frustrated at this part of the game because it felt like the mechanics did not support the player’s goals.
Overall, I enjoyed this game despite the challenges I found in certain parts. I found that the walking simulator increased the sense of mystery and scariness — I even had to turn off the volume because I got scared at one point! Experiencing the game from the perspective of a character enhanced the fun in the narrative aspect of the game.
