A New Beginning hands-on archived preview
The world is ending, and only you can save the planet from a destruction of humanity's own devising. If this sounds cliché to you, you're not alone, but while Daedalic's long-awaited A New Beginning starts off on a familiar foot, the tropes end there and what spirals out is an engaging adventure that balances its ecological message with humor and intrigue. I recently played through the first half of the near-final version and walked away eager to see how the rest unfolds.
With a development history spanning several years already, most adventure fans are probably well aware of the game that was originally announced as the German developer’s launch title before slipping behind The Whispered World and Edna & Harvey: The Breakout. For those who need a reminder of its premise, here is the rundown: Turns out mankind's abuse of the earth's various ecosystems comes to its fatal conclusion in the year 2500. Aware that the end of the world is just weeks away, a group of specialists decide the only way to stop oblivion is to travel into the past, alert officials to the disastrous repercussions of their current ways and convince them to change course. Throughout the game, you will bounce around in time and space, exploring different areas (and eras) in your hunt to alter humanity's future.
The story is told non-linearly, with play beginning in the present as retired scientist Bent Svensson is settling in for the colder months at his lakeside home. All alone, Bent has been worn down by years of carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders, a sacrifice that cost him dearly in his personal life, and he now seeks to shut himself off from the cares of others. Not long into the story, Fay, a time-traveler from the destroyed future, interrupts his seclusion to implore the man to help her, since it is Svensson's algae-based fuel source that she believes will save the planet. Bent is understandably skeptical at first, but humors the new arrival by listening to her story. Fay's tale begins 500 years in the future and works backwards as she and her crew attempt to find the moment where everything started to go bad. The journey first takes them 50 years ahead of our time, but the planet is already too far gone even then, so a single time capsule makes a final, desperate leap further back to our present.
Where this narrative easily have become a jumbled mess of timelines, the backstory unfolds in a clear and logical manner, as you’ll get to experience Fay’s present and near-future adventures yourself. As you play, Bent interrupts Fay's story occasionally to point out inconsistencies or to criticize her choice of action. It's a clever device and allows for some genuinely funny exchanges and new ways of telling the player that maybe you've done something wrong. I stopped playing at the point where Fay's backstory ends and Bent grudgingly agrees to team up again with his old lab partner to continue his alternative fuel research.
Given the ecological warning at its heart, the writers could have taken a preachy approach here, but they never did during the hours I played. Fay is impassioned, sure, and the industrialists and politicians she confronts are loath to heed her warnings, preferring to cling to the status quo, but it all fits comfortably into the fiction. Never once did I feel the character was turning to the screen, single tear rolling down her cheek, to deliver a plea to the player. That said, taking care of the only (accessible) planet capable of supporting human life is a pretty good idea, and A New Beginning offers an interesting perspective to consider.
Along with its eco-minded message, the game manages a lot of personal emotional depth. Play alternates between Bent and Fay, each with a unique personality and struggle. Bent is deeply unhappy with his life—has been for a long time—and sees himself as an old man who has outlived his usefulness, while Fay is a strong-headed go-getter with ambition to spare. She struggles to show her worth and gain some recognition from her dismissive commanding officer while effecting dramatic change in the name of her cause. These folks are not stalwart heroes, just good people dealing with the same regret and anxiety that hits us all. I also met a handful of secondary characters, such as Fay's mission leader Salvador and press agent-turned-pilot Oggy. These characters are well-written and engaging, each with distinctive personalities and quirks, some charming and others unsettling. Oggy speaks to machines as if they were people, while Salvador doesn't think Fay is fit for anything beyond operating the radio and has a dim view of the lives he's apparently fighting to save. There is an interesting story here and it's told well, but it isn’t always a happy one. There are moments where tragedy strikes, serving as a troubling reminder of the stakes involved.
Bent and Fay have separate inventories, but you’ll navigate and interact with the game's 2.5D world the same way for each. Holding down the left mouse button opens a radial action menu, while right-clicking brings up the inventory. The context-sensitive verb selection only presents options that make sense for the item or person. This helps prevent wasteful actions for the most part while offering some options that maybe wouldn't be as obvious without the prompts. Neither Bent nor Fay will run, but double-clicking a door or hallway to another room teleports your character right to the new location. Holding down the space bar highlights all hotspots, though I never felt any of the objects you could interact with were obscure or nonsensical.
While the majority of the obstacles are inventory-based, the game pops up some standalone puzzles as well, giving players a chance to flex their spatial intelligence and engineering logic by putting together radio equipment or finding the right power-up sequence for a terminal. A skip button appears after a bit in case you get stuck and just want to move on with the adventure. The designers also made some pretty smart assumptions when it comes to object interaction and navigation. Click on a soda machine and Fay tries all the button options, something most gamers would do anyway. In one instance, Fay does something in one room that triggers an animated cutscene, during which she’s shown entering a different room. When gameplay resumes, Fay is where the game requires her to be rather than forcing players to travel to the new room themselves. These are both small touches, but they are two of many subtle details that really smooth down some of the rougher edges common to adventure games.
The hand-drawn graphics are stylized but realistic, and the characters have a comic book quality to them. The designs are consistent, the animation is fluid, and everything works together so the visual style never lapses. The different areas have their own color palettes: Bent's home features primary colors, the world of 2050 has a lot of muted browns, while the hallway of a major conference center is industrial blue and grey. Glow effects, from neon signs to computer monitors, stand out as particularly well done. The game doesn't support widescreen, so vertical black bars frame the left and right side of the screen, though this didn't bother me. A few flaws crept up that are common in pre-release versions, but nothing that caused anything more than a temporary stutter. The music is mainly orchestral, punctuated occasionally with industrial overlays, and the pieces I heard fit their areas well and never felt monotonous. Audio quality breaks down a little in the voice acting and sound editing, which doesn't always deliver, though problems aren’t particularly frequent and some of this dialogue may yet be cleaned up before final release.
A New Beginning was already released in Germany last year, but the English version is scheduled to drop in the United Kingdom and North America next month. It’s been a long time in coming, but assuming the second half measures up to the quality of the first, this self-proclaimed eco-thriller from Daedalic looks to fulfill the years of promise it has shown. If previous coverage of this game has excited you, nothing I saw should disappoint, and if it’s new to you, it's definitely worth putting on your radar. Our long-term future may be in doubt, but at least the immediate future looks bright for adventure gamers.
