What Remains of Edith Finch
A WALKING SIMULAR IN WHICH YOU DO MUCH MORE THAN JUST WALK. $29.95 | PC, PS4 | www.giantsparrow.com
YES, THERE’S SOME walking involved in this lean, yet rangy, narrative adventure, but, as the developer proves in a bravura early sequence, What Remains Of Edith Finch is equally happy to be a pouncing, swimming, rolling and slithering sim, too. This might not be the game you’re expecting, but there’s no bait-andswitch here. As the young woman of the title, you revisit your family home in rural Washington State after your mother’s death, intending to satisfy your curiosity about the other Finches who have passed, and to examine the idea that a curse is causing them to die before their time.
It’s a macabre conceit, and the house itself does little to dispel early suggestions that we might be in for a scare or two. Inside, however, there’s little to be afraid of. There’s nothing abnormal, beyond a surplus of clutter. But this is a house full of stories, the most important of which are still under lock and key. Edith’s mother, Dawn, has sealed up the bedrooms of the departed in an apparent attempt to confine the hoodoo, which has transformed the Finch house into something of a mausoleum. It’s a contrivance that makes the place more fun to explore, an intricate puzzle box of hidden passages and crawlspaces offering alternative entry points to areas that serve as hermetically preserved memorials.
The developer doesn’t downplay the tragedies, but these interactive flashbacks are frequently playful, surprising and occasionally even blackly funny. This game makes you more than just a passive observer of past events; instead, you’re afforded a fleeting opportunity to inhabit these poor souls before they die. Yes, you’re essentially marching them towards their deaths in many cases, but with their fates already determined, it’s a chance to see the world as they did.
Constantly shifting storytelling methods also help prevent Edith’s journey from becoming a gloomy wallow in melancholia. These diverse narrative techniques aren’t simply variety for variety’s sake, but are also an attempt to communicate meaning through interaction.
It’s clear Giant Sparrow has invested great care and thought in how best to tell these stories. On a base level, you’re still exploring an empty environment, but you’re doing much more than simply following a paper trail or listening to surrogate audio logs. It’s a game that involves you more directly in its storytelling, and it envelops you all the more deeply as a result.
And to use that reclaimed catch-all, this is one walking sim that doesn’t drag its feet. Edith’s poignant narration (half curious, half resigned) is overlaid on the environment, gently guiding you through, while bright glows on key items draw your eye, ensuring you’re never left wondering what to do or where to go next. Some stories are over in a heartbeat; others last longer, but these are novellas, not sagas. Even so, by the bittersweet ending, you’ll feel like you’ve discovered more than in games five times the length.
There’s no escaping that this will, for some, be an emotionally demanding game. But it says much that even the most potentially upsetting sequence is handled in almost celebratory fashion. As Edith herself implies in a late-game voiceover, a person’s passing is not just a time to grieve, but an opportunity to commemorate their life — or to appreciate the miracle of existence. It’s a sentimental thought that informs a remarkable, big-hearted game from a developer whose debut gave barely a hint of the storytelling confidence and poise on show here. This game might even set a new benchmark for the narrative adventure.