Post Script
The challenge of trying to reinvent the vocabulary of the open-world genre
Let’s get the obvious out of the way first. Though there’s plenty of freedom in how you explore it, it’s easy to see why creative director Alx Preston was reluctant to describe Solar Ash as an open-world game. The setting isn’t sprawled out in front of you so much as blasted apart. No vast tracts of land lie ahead, as you gaze out towards a snowy peak in the distance, making mental plans to head there, as per the oft-spoken promise of the genre.
Nevertheless, many of its verbs are the same. You must complete a handful of smaller missions – which can be tackled in any order – to unlock a story-critical one, culminating in a climactic fight. Hidden collectables offer hints of narrative background, but more importantly unlock gear that offers bonus perks, in this case boosting your movement abilities in a variety of ways. Trails of pickups guide you towards points of interest, and gathering them provides a boost to your stats – or rather can be synthesised to replenish part of your shield, allowing you to take an extra hit. And the game’s narrative is largely delivered through traditional cutscenes and expository dialogue.
None of that in itself is a problem, of course, and Solar Ash benefits from being relatively compact. It does eventually succumb to repetition, but only right at the end, and not to ruinous effect. Besides, it’s understandable that smaller studios might lean on a few genre best practices – do three of this to get that, and so on – for the sake of welcoming curious players.
Beyond that, inviting comparison with triple-A games seems unwise for those with shallower pockets. So, it makes sense that independent developers – and teams working with light-touch assistance from boutique publishers – should seek other ways to distinguish themselves from their big-budget peers. And how they go about it promises to shake up established sandbox conventions.
Including Solar Ash, three recent attempts to do just that spring immediately to mind – all representing a conscious shift away from the combat-heavy approach of their biggerbudget cousins. Giant Squid’s The Pathless siloes its fights off from the rest of the game, limiting violence to its set-piece hunts. Heart Machine incorporates it into Solar Ash’s exploration – enemies are hazards that can be hurried past or else folded into your acrobatic routine, with the help of your grapple and time-slip abilities. And Shedworks’ Sable eschews threats entirely.
With such a foundational element of the genre – bound as it is to the colonialist notion of conquering a space – either minimised or cast aside completely, inevitably these games have to find ways to plug that hole. And it’s perhaps telling that, to an extent, all three have chosen traversal as a point of difference. (If you’re going to build a large world, it’s only natural to try to make navigating it as pleasurable as possible.) While we weren’t wildly impressed by The Pathless, it certainly attempted something new with its unorthodox method of getting around. Sable borrowed the Breath Of The Wild climb-anywhere mechanic – which still feels relatively novel, given no one else has attempted it yet – while striving to create an emotional attachment to your vehicle. And while we might quibble about protagonist Rei’s inertia or that inconsistent lock-on, Heart Machine’s game folds elements of Jet Set Radio, Gravity Rush and Super Mario Galaxy into its movement systems while feeling entirely distinct from those influences.
Conversely, it’s truly exciting that we can mention a game from a team of around 25 people in the same breath as those much more expensive productions. It’s a reminder that the tools, resources and expertise to build bigger worlds are no longer limited to larger teams. Flawed as Solar Ash and its ilk may be, these early steps towards a new language for open-world games will surely inspire others to follow.