Gone Home

Gone Home is an original exploration adventure drama game released for PC, PS4 and XONE. This is a debut project of The Fullbright Company, studio founded by industry veterans. Among their previous achievements there is Minerva’s Den DLC for BioShock 2. That add-on received great reviews – many of which said it was better even than the original game.

Plot

What makes Gone Home stand out from the crowd is its original narrative. In contrast to current trends, the game does not tell a blood-chilling story, instead focusing on problems of a typical American family. The game is set in the 1990’s and you play as 21-year-old Katy, who goes back home after spending a year in Europe. To her surprise, there is no one at home – her mather, father and sister have all vanished without a trace. While the game preserves slightly disturbing atmosphere (it’s night and it’s raining), the protagonist has to explore room after room searching for documents, notes, and recordings. Piece by piece they reveal the story of the house and help find the answer for the question: what actually happened to its inhabitant?

Mechanics

Gone Home PC, PS4 and XONE is hard to be categorised either as an adventure game or horror. Gameplay is based entirely on exploration and searching for traces of the protagonist’s missing family. You gain that knowledge by interacting with items you find, wchich can all be picked up, examined, and then dropped. There are no ghosts or action sequences in the game, and logic puzzles are at the minimum. All this makes you feel like taking part in a typical drama movie about common problems of an American family.

Technical aspects

Gone Home PC, PS4 and XONE is based on the popular Unity Engine reinforced by an advanced physics engine, but the graphics is of average quality at best. This is because the developer, having limited financial resources, focused not on spectacular visuals, but on narrative, therefore offering a one of its kind game, which is hard to categorize.

Last updated on 22 June 2016