In the six years since, some of the luster has faded. The two girls run off together, happily (we hope) ever after. ![]() Just as the game leads you to worry about their safety-there’s a suggestion that one or both of the girls may have harmed themselves-it’s instead revealed that Lonnie couldn’t bring herself to join the army and leave Sam behind. More importantly, Katie discovers the existence of Sam’s girlfriend, Lonnie. As she explores, she finds evidence of her parents’ marital problems (the reason why they’re gone) and remnants of her sister Sam’s life-riot grrl mixtapes, an empty pizza box, a blood-like smear of red hair dye on the bathtub, The X-Files on VHS, lit candles, and a chalk pentagram in a hidden room. In Gone Home, the player embodies a college-age woman named Katie returning to her empty house after a vacation abroad. By virtue of being new and different (and kicking off the explosion of walking simulators), it was impossible not to talk about. At the time, it was like few other games out there you didn’t play the hero, it revolved around two queer teenage girls, and it was more interested in exploration and atmosphere than traditional game mechanics. It’s a critical darling-when it was released back in 2013, it was everywhere. ![]() ![]() Gone Home was really the inspiration for this column. Grow Up is a series in which I evaluate whether games called young adult actually fit the definition and exploring why that matters.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |