"Dear Esther is hardly a conventional game, and it strips away all of the classic mechanics to leave only walking controls intact. The game focuses on narrative rather than puzzles, battles, or exploration—and even then, the narrative is vague and randomized. Its soundtrack is quite good compared to the rest of the game, and the sound effects as you travel through the game are absolutely perfect. However, its short length is very disappointing, even considering its strange approach to gaming." | Explosion.com
The Chinese Room's Dear Esther goes free on Steam to celebrate the 10th anniversary of this foundational title.
Eh.
I mean free is free, but I found this to be a boring slog.
Not to mention this remasters actually made the game look worse in multiple areas.
I did quite like their A Machine for Pigs and Everybody's Gone to the Rapture though.
On Valentine's Day a decade ago, Dear Esther went from a Source Engine mod to a full-fledged indie game, catalyzing the "walking sim" genre. How does it measure up today?
"The China-based indie games publisher Secret Mode and Brighton-based (the UK) indie games developer The Chinese Room, are today very pleased to announce that they will celebrate the tenth anniversary of "Dear Esther" by making the genre-defining 2012 narrative exploration game free to download from February 14th to February 15th via Steam." - Jonas Ek, TGG.
