Through the Eyes of a Pilgrim - A Personal Review

[Kedge]

Hello, I'm Kedge. I'm brand new to the forums and the game collectively, and have pumped numerous hours already into The Long Dark over the span of four/five days. Being a night owl has gotten better, now that I have a world to explore as I stay up. I am a massive fan of survival games and I am an aspiring game developer, and I could never find my own image in a game-what I would love to experience. Realism, a brutal world, wildlife, etc.. Many survival games nowadays seem to take a zombie approach, mutants, etc. And that is fine, to each their own. But The Long Dark.. it makes you face the world herself and it instantly caught my eye.

I rarely get to push my imagination and project my character(s) or idea(s) into a game(at best, The Sims). I have been working on a project for a few weeks and have designed a character over the course of it. She herself lives in a bleak, barren, cold world. So I instantly chose "female", named my save after her/my project, and let my experience flow "as her". I guess if you are not attached to a self made character, don't enjoy any form of RP/RPG, maybe that does not resonate with you.

Onto the review..it's a little lengthy and all over the place but bear with me.

The Long Dark offers an incredible outdoor wilderness experience. I truly felt like I was fighting for my life. As a new player, I chose Pilgrim(and I'll tell you why exactly below). I cannot tell you how many times I got lost, sprained my ankle trying to navigate hillsides and find shelter, how many hours I spent until I realized I could use charcoal to map my way..haha. The game delivers when it comes to both tension and relief. During my first attempt, I fell to the elements, lost on the ice in a blizzard. My second attempt, I survived nearly two weeks at the Coastal Highway and decided to make my first hunt: a bear. I took a shot, once-the bear charged me. Twice, the bear sped up-and then my rifle jammed. I panicked and tried to run away only to be mauled and left to struggle wearily into a nearby trailer. I died of blood loss. The Long Dark forces you to make serious life or death choices. That extra night you could have stayed at that abandoned camp could have saved your life the following morning.

The atmosphere is awe-striking. Many games I have played in the past offer leniency to the player when it comes to visibility-and that's fine! Players should be able to see what they are doing. Those games grant you a pleasing, dim blue night sky, allowing you to see for miles ahead of you. I was in for a surprise when night fell and I could not see five inches in front of my face-not even in doors. I had to strike a match and stumble around the abandoned cottage and scramble for any morsel of food I could find. Not only is the darkness impressive, but so is the outdoors as a whole. The world is visually stunning. I am absolutely in love with the art style. As an artist myself, this absolutely meets my aesthetic(my profile picture, for example. I drew it). I love when games take on a unique art style.

The controls feel right. I don't have numerous functions for my fingers to manage and the radial is easy to navigate. I do wish I could change my default up/down/left/right options, however. So instead of campfire as left, maybe you want it as down, and left could be an item, like a bandage. If you so desired. Hotkeys are important to me(if you play WoW, you definitely feel this haha). This is fine, though.

At first, what struck me as frustrating, was the lack of a reticle. I was starving(so maybe picking Pleasant Valley as a start zone head on wasn't the best idea at the time, haha) and lost and decided to kill a rabbit with a rock. I threw and missed several times. There was no reticle to guide me. I didn't now how high to throw, how low, how the arch worked. And then it dawned on me just how realistic this game really is. There's no reticle floating in the air for you in the wild. You have to learn yourself by trial and error. I took rocks and began throwing them at a nearby fir for practice. I'm still terrible at throwing rocks, but better! I'm also not that great with a rifle, either. I absolutely love that this game does not hold your hand. Real life doesn't and Hinterland's strive for realism is impeccable. I love it.

The realism also comes into play with injuries and the environment. If you walk away from the strong wind, you speed up a bit, if you hit it head on, you are slowed. Amazing detail. The same goes for slopes. Let's not forget the sound. The ambiance immerses you. You may at first dismiss the cawing of crows to the east, but the moment you're starving, you're going to want to listen and follow. Just hope that it is an animal carcass, and not a person. I'll be buying the soundtrack soon!

You experience a wave of emotions and ideas as a new player stepping into this world. I never played the game early on and had no idea what I was walking into. I stopped there(I'll finish once the update goes live!). Days later, I found a distress pistol at the bottom of a ravine. Foolishly enough, I climbed as high as I could and found myself shooting into the night sky, hoping someone would see. But every home is empty, every car is vacant and every cave and road lack footprints. Only frozen bodies are my company. I didn't know what to expect, and I assumed there was no way possible I was the only one alive but..it seems to be that way. You can go from wonder to frustration to fear and hope all in a few hours and it's an amazing experience.

With every positive comes a negative. Keep in mind, these are personal feelings and even some suggestions are below.

WILDLIFE

When I first loaded up the game a disclaimer is shown(which, kudos to the team for warning people. I'm shocked we live in a world where we need to but, someone out there could see The Long Dark and attempt what they learn. Good work looking out for folks). I assumed this only had to do with just that, replicating your experience in real life. But then I noticed a mention about wolves. I chose Pilgrim because well, I wanted to explore and I am new. But also.. wolves are important to me. They always have been. They are my favorite animal of all time and are such beautiful creatures. When I did try a higher difficulty, I frowned. Everything was perfect! Except for the wildlife. I often wish I could take the weather from Stalker and the wildlife from Pilgrim and throw them together. Some sort of conflict is needed somewhere, I understand! I just kind of frown seeing curious creatures(bears too, animals are animals but wolves and bears don't track people down and try to kill them as a normal behavior). I chose Voyageur, Mystery Lake and ran into three wolves on the railroad track. They all turned to me and slowly crept forward. Not one wolf I ever met ran away from me. I can, however, understand fighting one off for kill reasons. I managed to shoot a deer, it ran, and a wolf took it down. I had to defend my kill. Overall, wildlife is not varied-YET! With the arrival of moose coming, I am certain they will put in foxes, maybe owls, sparrows, squirrels, etc. That is my only feedback regarding the wildlife. I'm excited about this! You can go a long time without seeing any animal or you can bump into a handful and they're all violent or flee depending on difficulty.

SUGGESTION: In my opinion, I believe animals could do with some more interactions/animations(I know, this is a lot of work. I may not be on the same level as a veteran developer, but I have use keyframe animating in Blender and created mods for The Sims 4. It's tedious work. And I can't imagine using other models like Hinterland does). For example, it would be incredible to peek around a tree and watch a few wolves playing with each other, eating a carcass together, running in a pack across the ice, etc. Bears could also be spawned around cars(they're known to open them and search for food), could scratch on trees. Perhaps two bears are fighting. Males are known to be aggressive and hunt young. A mother fighting off a male could be an incredible watch from afar! Bears could even be seen fighting wolves and trying to steal a carcass. They're scavengers after all. 

COSMETIC/VISUAL

I read somewhere on Twitter, someone mentioning the inability to see our clothing on our hands/wrists(it was mentioned that this is a difficult task). It doesn't bother me TOO much but it would be an incredible addition to see my mittens, or my parka's furred cuffs at my wrists. I also am aware we will never get a third person view-loads of work! But wow..it would be incredible. I'm not going to make a suggestion for more hand animations, but from a visual standpoint, I think it would be amazing to see my hands throwing tinder into my campfire, or tilting back a can of soda to drink, or actually gutting a deer. I swear I saw a video somewhere where a man was visually gutting a deer in game but maybe that was for trailer sake. I don't mind being greeted with a loading wheel but, actually seeing my feet and my hands doing my current activity would be splendid. It's so satisfying lighting a match and watching it spark up. Maybe some day we can see more animations like this.

PERFORMANCE

It's not like I have a physical disc that could bump into problems. I play on PS4 and unfortunately have crashed about six separate times. Twice after waking up from sleeping in a bed, and four other times just entering/exiting buildings. It is super frustrating. I always watch the wolf silhouette on the loading screen and the moment it stutters a bit, I get scared I might crash again. I am not sure of the cause of this. Maybe because it is just loading a new cell, but I have no idea. They aren't key areas, either. One was a Pleasant Valley farmhouse and the others were homes on Coastal Highway(one being a trailer as I was ascending the mountain). I experience no lag whatsoever during game play-not once. It runs beautifully. I am just not sure of the cause of the random crashes. When you can only save on sleep/entering some buildings, this becomes a little frustrating. It isn't constant, but random rare times after a few hours(am I playing too much haha).

In all, The Long Dark consists of a breathtaking world to cast your eyes upon, intense experiences(I have not tried Interloper, just Stalker and wow!) and a whirl of emotions as you play. I remember seeing the Coastal Townsite and jumping for joy, but I also remember seeing the Forlorn Muskeg and feeling tense. Nothing but a bleak site of felled trees and weak ice to keep me company. When blizzards hit and you can't see a thing, you scramble to find sticks, anything to keep your campfire alive. Otherwise, you'll freeze. To anyone that adores visually pleasing works, the survival genre or wants a challenge, this game just may be for you. And I am glad I hopped about The Long Dark train and get to watch it grow into something more with additions and tuning. This game is an instant favorite of mine like other titles such as This War of Mine and The Last of Us. Thank you SO much for an incredible game and contributing true realism in game play.

 

Now.. I have decided to set my Pilgrim save aside(I've made it 35 days so far!) and try Stalker again now that I understand the game a bit better and some of the zones. But I don't want to just play it. Above I mentioned a character of mine and I've decided perhaps I'd play for a few days in game, and then illustrate my experience day by day. Perhaps I'll even share it here. It sounds like a lot of fun to take on.

- Kedge

[Fuarian]

nice