Dear Esther/Triumphant return

Yes, yes I'm back. I'm making another run at this "writing on the Internet" thing, and I think I have a model that will work. Except for this post, you will get a review every Friday. Most of the month, they will be cheap, short indie games. Then, at the end of the month, there will be a more in-depth look at a larger mainstream release. To start, I've decided to look at one of the least reviewable games I've ever played because I like to make things as hard on myself as possible.

            Dear Esther is either genius or an utter failure. I can’t decide. Included with the eighth Humble Bundle pack, it can barely be classified as a game because of its lack of goal or real interactivity. You walk. That’s the gameplay. You walk around an island while a disembodied voice reads letters that are never actually seen except as subtitles. The weird thing is, even as you scoff at the game, you keep walking. There is something compelling in the enigmatic way the game composes itself and reveals the shockingly vague narrative. It’s a mystery, in a way, but not in the classic whodunit sense. The mystery is what the hell this game is about. It truly defies any kind of summary judgment, so the best I can do is lay out the pieces for you to pick up.

            Dear Esther starts with your character staring at the ocean from a first-person perspective while a letter is read and the sun sets. The graphics are fine with that strangely distinct look that the Source engine will give a game. After a minute or two of idly standing there, you, the player, will realize that all this time you have been able to move and the game decided spitefully not to tell you about it. This will be your relationship with the game from here on out. There are no arrows or objectives. There won’t be a letter explaining why you are wandering around on the island or where you actually are or what is going on in even the most basic terms. So you wander at a brooding pace around the island, sometimes getting stuck trying to figure out where to go only to realize that there was a staircase built into the wall that you had no way of seeing but should have known about if you didn’t want to flail into the sea. It is possible to die in the game, but you have to work at it. There’s no life bar or HUD of any kind, but if you swim out far enough into the ocean, you’ll drown.

            I don’t want to give too many of the hints about the story away because those hints are the only reason to play the game; that is unless you like walking but hate exercise. The most I can comfortably say about the story is that it involves people and cars. I also interpreted the game as being about loss and dealing with grief because of some of the content contained within the letter, but I’m sure that’s one of a million interpretations. I myself had at least a hundred of them. Between the cryptic letters and the strange electrical diagrams and notes about Damascus of all things, I occasionally had the sneaking suspicion that it wasn’t about anything. The conspiracy theorist in my mind wondered if designers Dan Pinchbeck and Robert Briscoe were just throwing images on the screen and hoping that they meant something like a bad film student. It’s all very weird.

            The thing is, when the game climaxes in one of the weirdest endings I’ve ever encountered, you get the feeling that you do understand; that there is something there. Subconsciously, on some level, you know what this game is about but you just can’t quite put your finger on it. And that’s the genius of the game. It’s so hopelessly pretentious, but there is something there on the tip of your tongue when it’s over. To use a slightly altered cliché, it’s like not knowing why you’re walking into a room, and then feel like you knew why when you were walking in and then forgot. To its credit, it also engages with narrative in a wholly interactive way. While you can only walk and turn your head (even the flashlight is automatic,) you are always driving the story forward. Even though your actions are limited every one of them drives the story forward, even if the story is driving through a swamp of molasses. It’s truly maddening in the same way that Inception is maddening or any of the other great mind-benders. I’m not saying that this game is as well-crafted as a Christopher Nolan film, but it has those aspirations and comes surprisingly close. I urge you to play this game if only to experience it. Is it good? No idea. I don’t really care, honestly. What I do know is that it’s cheap and it will make you question many things, including your own sanity. What more can you ask for from a piece of art?