So, another game. Sorry about that 😊 A couple of days after writing about Superhot and right before getting The Division from Amazon I wanted to spent a nice cozy weekend in the woods with Firewatch. I had seen some footage some time earlier on Giantbomb and Good Game and wanted to see if this mix of a narrative-heavy game with gorgeuos graphics would be something for me.
Yes it was. Oh yes, it was 😃 The game takes place in 1989 with Henry, the protagonist, trying to escape from a family situation, taking up a job at a national park in Wyoming. It’s rather lonely there as all the contact he has to the outside world is through his boss Delilah via radio but the game turns into a mystery quest pretty quickly with some randoms sightings and break-ins. So, no time for Henry to get bored 😉 You get a map and a compass and off you go and keep your park in order!
That mystery is just a distraction, though, as the main focus is on Henry and Delilah and their backstory. The story has some extremely funny but also some very sad moments. Make sure to play it when you’re happy as it contains some rather tragic parts, too 🙂
Did I already mention that the game is beautiful? I really felt like I was in a real park with lakes, animals, lonely walk-ways. This also helps getting over the sad parts. Just look at that beautiful lake and these awesome mountains and everything is fine again!
And while not everything you can see is something you can also walk to, there is still a lot to see. Hidden throughout that park area are lots of little details and side-stories that you can discover and tell Delilah about. If you only stick to the bare minimum, though, you should be through the story in 2-3 hours. It’s well worth looking a bit off the main path, though 😉
That being said, I played it on PS4 and there the framerate often fell dangerously low. Nothing that distracts too much from the otherwise great expience but more FPS would have been appreciated. I also ran into some weird control issues with one where I nearly couldn’t enter an area. That being said, the devs are still patching this game so what I’m writing about here might have already been fixed in the meantime 😊
If you want to spend 2-5 hours in the woods, I can definitely recommend this game. Sure, EUR 20 for that amount of time sounds a bit much but it was well worth it 😊
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