“Gone Home” the walking simulator story
The sound of rain and thunder struck fear into my heart as I searched around the front porch in the dark, looking for the key to get into the house. I was engaged, excited for the haunted house ahead, wondering what kinds of things would jump out at me as I walked around. Shortly after finding the key and making my way into the house, I realized that I had probably misjudged the intentions of the game. “Gone Home” is an interesting walking simulator in which the audience is told the story of a family with a lot of the same problems that an average family faces. Marital issues, betrayal, molestation, and gender identity and sexuality issues, are all among the list. Despite not actually meeting any of the characters, they are all fully developed by the end of the game using a variety of techniques.
“Gone Home” establishes character through notes and other more discrete messages left throughout the house, along with a series of audio logs left by the protagonist’s sister, Sam. The audio logs are placed strategically around the house to help keep the player on track throughout their quest to find out what has happened while the protagonist, Katie, was away on her trip to Europe. They provide details about the backstory of Sam’s life while Katie was away and about the development of her new love interest, Lonnie. Interspersed between the audio logs are little bits of backstory such as, letters from the parents, awards on the shelves, or cassette tapes with Sam’s preference in music, punk rock. One critique I have of the game is that, despite completing the game, I feel like there was more backstory that I was missing. There were many questions that I was left with at the end. What happened to the uncle? Is the house actually haunted? If there were answers to these questions I did not have them answered when I played through the game. Having more clear objectives would have made it more obvious where the answers to these questions were and would have made the game more enjoyable.
I felt a range of emotions while playing this game, from boredom, to excitement, to sorrow. At first it was excitement. I get to play a video game for homework? How awesome is that!? Then, excitement turned to boredom while I walked aimlessly about the house without knowing exactly what I was supposed to do. After that there was a mixture of excitement and boredom but ultimately the game ended in sadness. The last letter to Katie from Sam was particularly heart wrenching for me. As the youngest of 3, I know what it is like to have your siblings go away; to college, to live on their own and create their own lives. It is never fun to see the people you love go away, even if you know that they are doing what is best for them. The realism of this game made it very different than any other kind of game that I have ever played. Usually what I look for in a video game is action and adventure, but this took a twist on the traditional kind of video game and was more of an interactive story. Overall I really enjoyed playing “Gone Home” because it introduced me to a different way of thinking about video games as a way to express ideas and feelings, and to analyze them the same way you would a novel or a work of art.
