Caltrops - Dear Esther - I've heard nothing negative against Dear Esther

Forum Overview :: Dear Esther

by Vested Id 06/02/2013, 9:47pm PDT

Or, at least, every criticism is that it's not a game, an argument which disqualifies you from even discussing it. I've heard several gaming luminaries praise or at least vet it, including (I think) Gabe Newell.

I'm excited about the possibilities of interactive non-games and I though this was supposed to be good, whatever it is. But then I played it, and it's not very good. You walk in a confusing, overgrown yet highly linear landscape, come across objects and entities that are apparently important, though how is never ever clear (is this your crashed ship? No, this is my crashed ship.... oh wait, this is it right here), you have a someone speaking in a flowery 18-century-style Romantic dialect to describe a car accident, there are chemical diagrams on the walls drawn by one of three people, oh no they're drawn or hallucinated by you. The whole experience seems to be a build-up to the part where you enter some bioluminecent caves that express something, which is fine by me, but I wasn't totally overwhelmed by the experience and it certainly wasn't worth the trek.

I know you just wanted to give me shit but I'm still thinking about the game so: let me put it like this. Some of the most incredible moments in Half Life 2 were when you were discovering the landscape as you moved around from Point A to Point B - think the approach to Nova Prospect, the first scene when you are accidentally transported outside the building into a danger zone, the Sand Lion beach, any of the vehicle levels. So the whole game save for the final section. Dear Esther is recognizably built on that principle, and sometimes I appreciated what it was doing with it's environments, but it is still a thing I am trying to navigate (if not a game) and there is still a (hidden) narrative, which means there are right and wrong ways to go. Where the driving force in Half Life 2 is gameplay, which is what causes you to scrutinize the landscape looking for clues, the driving force in Dear Esther is theme, and it's the dumbest fucking "drink your Ovaltine" PSA bullshit theme that forces you to think like a dumber person in order to recognize it. "Here's a shitload of visual and narrative details... just think slavery." I also don't know if I believe the game was designed to treat that theme or it was just selected like a human interest swatch ala George Lucas. It definitely doesn't seem to be saying anything insightful or personal about the topic.

[SPOILER WARNING BECAUSE THIS IS ONE OF THOSE GAMES THAT HAS NOTHING ELSE GOING FOR IT]

In the original, you apparently get to do exactly one thing - jump to your death. Why are you in this dreary landscape on this totally deserted island, with no one or nothing to interact with? Because you've lost your reason for living and the only remaining thing left is for you to take your life. That's clever, good for that mod. But they replaced all the emptiness and dreariness with something like photorealistic detail - sun poking through clouds, a pretty moon - and the jumping part is a cinematic! You don't even get to climb the ladder! So there is literally no point to the game now except to feel bad that you aren't dumb or sensitive enough to be affected by it.