Dear esther landmark edition metacritic series#

Dear Esther may not be a bombastic spectacle, but itвЂ™s unforgettably pretty.ДЄs you reach certain landmarks in the game, the gameвЂ™s narrator вЂ“вЂЇan unspecified man whose voice has a wonderful timbre вЂ“ reads out lengthy, florid lines of dialogue that only become more strained and stressed as you get ever closer to the end.

Dear esther landmark edition metacritic series#

A series of letters in the water, a map of Britain, near-illegible writing scrawled on the stone wallsвЂ¦ ItвЂ™s truly stunning, bordering on photorealistic in places, whether youвЂ™re looking out across the sea, or stumbling into your first moonlit cave with ceiling-to-floor stalagmites and stalactites that look almost exactly like the real thing. This island itself is a kind of relic вЂ“вЂЇthe structures upon it exist as clues that you can begin to piece together in order to work out whatвЂ™s happened there.

This only builds the sense of loneliness. There are abandoned houses, a lighthouse, a beached freighter ship, but youвЂ™ll never see another person in your journey through Dear EstherвЂ™s short one-hour run-time. There are cliffside drops, country paths, stone structures and beautiful cave systems. YouвЂ™ll do the odd bit of backtracking, but for the most part itвЂ™s a strictly linear adventure, one that manages to feel like a single cohesive place rather than a bunch of bits strung together.

ItвЂ™s basically one path through the game вЂ“ up, down and across various parts of the island. Its pace is slow вЂ“вЂЇlike, really slow вЂ“вЂЇbut the palpable atmosphere, haunting musical score and wonderfully effective narration keep you pressing onward. Dear EstherвЂ™s world is a misty Hebridean island that you just walk across.

It balances the mix of mystery really well. There are no puzzles, either, at least not in the active sense вЂ“вЂЇthe only puzzle you have to solve is in deciphering the gameвЂ™s well-written, ambiguous plot, and even then youвЂ™ll never really know if youвЂ™ve reached the bottom of it. ThereвЂ™s no platforming or fast driving, no explosions or level-ups.