Gone Home

Continuing the trend of talking about games I picked up from the Humble Bundle, today I shall look at Gone Home.  An indie game from The Fullbright Company, which in many ways is more of an interactive story, than a traditional video game.

Gone Home starts with you returning to your family home after a year away travelling.  Sadly, this isn’t actually the home you grew up in, but a new one, one which your parents and younger sister have moved into in the year you have been away, except none of them appear to be in tonight.  Instead you have a strange note on the door from your sister, a thunderstorm brewing outside and an old house that creeks a bit more than normal.

What follows is a game where you explore this new home, finding clues as to what your family has been up to in your year abroad.  As you do so you hear excerpts from your sisters diary, written for you and working to slowly fill in the gaps.  It’s a story I shan’t go into, as quite frankly the story is the game, but one which is pure emotional manipulation and worked on me with little effort at all.

As I said this is not a game in the traditional sense, the puzzles are finding old letters in drawers or making sure you don’t miss that vital clue to what has gone on, but it never challenges you.  I think I once missed a scrap of paper that was hidden under a pillow, but that was about it.  What makes this game worth it is the atmosphere as you explore this old house, it’s not a traditional horror game, but you find yourself rushing towards light switches and creeping down the stairs to the basement.  Something that anyone who has been at home alone on a dark stormy night can relate too.

While the story itself caught me hook, line and sinker.  I don’t think I have ever cried at a video game before, but this one caught me right in the ‘feels’, as the kids are saying these days.  It is hardly a revolutionary tale, but the way it is presented is ripe for manipulating you.  It’s Spielberg esque, in that you know exactly what they are trying to do, but you fall for it anyway and can’t help but be swept up by a tidal wave of emotion.

Gone Home is one of those games that stands unique.  It reminded me of the experience of playing Journey for the first time.  It catches you off guard and makes you truly marvel at the way it is put together.  On a second playing there may be things you appreciate more, but it will never feel as special again.  If you are lucky enough to have not played Gone Home first time round, I cannot recommend enough that you make sure and catch it now.