Reader reviews for Dear Esther

And that’s all.

You wander, wander, and wander some more. Nothing happens. There are no puzzles and you can’t interact with anything in a meaningful way. You do hear some letters read aloud.

Now, this appears to be exactly what a lot of people want, as “Dear Esther” has been quite a commercial and critical success. That worries me. The sort of person I imagine liking this non-game appears in my imagination as depressed, lonely, possibly even suicidal. Is that really what gamers are like? I hope not. I don’t see myself that way, but I didn’t like “Dear Esther,” so I must not be typical.

There has been endless debate about whether or not this is even a game. I won’t go there. But I will say whatever else it is or isn’t, it’s not an “adventure” game. In those games, something happens. In this, nothing happens.

Where’s the adventure in that?

But it is impressive. The graphics are average for modern 3D adventure games, pretty, but somewhat blocky. But you have free movement over a large environment with lots of trails going every which way. I never had to backtrack on my first playthrough and I think it is set up to minimize backtracking. It feels like a real park that you can walk around freely. And not a dreamscape… the scale seems… realistic. Geography is believable. The pathing is amazing. And it is a lush world. A lot of parks I’ve been to have these trails that seem to go to nowhere, but they all circle back and connect with one another, ending at the same places. And my impression was the game does the same thing. It is very well executed.

However, it feels like a proof of concept. Like the whole game is just made to show the ability of the developers and their ability to build a world. An experiment in open, but linear gameplay. It doesn’t have any interactive elements. It doesn’t really make any attempt to involve you in the story. It’s very short and somewhat boring. It’s an impressive feat and I’d love to see how it gets applied to making a game. I’m sure this took a lot of work, but it seems like… demo of a mechanic. I hope the developers keep working on new games and make something with puzzles, better plot, more artwork, and perhaps character development.