AT THE END OF EVERYTHING HOLD ONTO ANYTHING

February 22, 2017 3:21 PM

Night In The Woods (yt trailer) is a story-focused adventure/exploration game about the adventures of Mae Borowski after she drops out of college and returns home to the crumbling former mining town of Possum Springs. It is the creation Infinite Fall a development team consisting of Alec Holowka (Aquaria), Scott Benson (Late Night Work Club, But I'm A Nice Guy), and Bethany Hockenberry with a game-within-a-game rogue-like by Adam Saltzman (Canabalt).

There are two supplemental free/pay-what-you-want games released prior to Night in the Woods: Longest Night and The Lost Constellation.

posted by juv3nal (20 comments total)

Oh also, here's a decent NYT piece about the game.
posted by juv3nal at 3:27 PM on February 22, 2017

I've been waiting for this game for so long! I'm glad it's finally out.
posted by weewooweewoo at 4:05 PM on February 22, 2017

Oh, man. I've been holding off on even watching the trailer because of the delays, but this is right up there in the Steam wishlist. The supplemental games are highly recommended, fwiw.
posted by sysinfo at 4:08 PM on February 22, 2017

This game is gorgeous. I haven't finished it yet, but it's already one of my favorite narrative games, up there with Kentucky Route Zero and With Those We Love Alive.
posted by brecc at 4:11 PM on February 22, 2017 [1 favorite]

It's so pretty and I can't wait to play it!
posted by Pope Guilty at 4:43 PM on February 22, 2017

I've played about an hour of it so far and am really enjoying it!
posted by jessypie at 5:24 PM on February 22, 2017 [1 favorite]

I had heard nothing about this until yesterday when it was suddenly everywhere. Were there promos?
posted by solarion at 8:27 PM on February 22, 2017 [1 favorite]

I had played The Lost Constellation before, and then Longest Night. Longest Night is a tiny trifle but Lost Constellation is an impressive work just on its own.
posted by RobotHero at 8:58 PM on February 22, 2017

Longest Night came out a month after the Night in the Woods Kickstarter ended in 2013, and was remade in 2015 with new content. Lost Constellation is a spinoff of Longest Night (itself a spinoff) and came out in 2014.
posted by BiggerJ at 9:10 PM on February 22, 2017

GREGG RULZ OK
posted by davejh at 10:34 PM on February 22, 2017 [6 favorites]

--wiggles arms--
posted by RobotHero at 9:29 AM on February 24, 2017 [3 favorites]

I like the game but less of a fan of the dream platforming aspect. I feel like it could've been improved with partial or full voice-acting but then again indie title.
posted by chrono_rabbit at 7:03 PM on February 24, 2017

Picked this up last night due to the positive press. It's GREAT so far. The art is beautiful, and even just two game days in the mystery is definitely pulling me along.
posted by codacorolla at 8:30 AM on February 25, 2017

Longest Night is tiny but I loved the emotional punch of the very end, after having played Night in the Woods. Also it only costs a dollar.
posted by halfsquaretriangle at 8:35 AM on February 25, 2017

Two hours in: as someone who grew up in dying, formerly industrial towns where the industry left and the people who remain are trying to keep the place afloat with service jobs that pay shit and tourism that doesn't really do very much... this nails it. Nails it to the wall, really. Man, the small town malaise is just dead on. I nearly fistpumped when I found the plaque on the statue of the Carnegie-esque figure who was a robber baron that sucked wealth and health out of the town and then tried to redeem himself by building a library.
posted by codacorolla at 9:47 AM on February 25, 2017 [1 favorite]

Finished it! I need to talk about it with other people who have finished it, but I don't want to put spoilers in here, and Fanfare doesn't really exist for games...
posted by codacorolla at 11:05 AM on February 27, 2017

I'm not finished, but I'm ruminating on the journal. Or maybe I'm comparing it to Life is Strange, which I was also playing recently. In LiS the main character has a journal but the game uses it much more as a big info dump, and explaining backstory, so she has to write in complete sentences.

While NiTW is more, using it to remind you of things you've already seen? So she can fill it with in-jokes that you had to be there to understand. So in a way it's more ... intimate, maybe? Like this is a friend that you have a shared experience with so you can get all the references.
posted by RobotHero at 6:38 PM on February 27, 2017

There's some meta discussion on FanFare and MetaTalk about discussing "narrative heavy" games, inspired by this specifically.

It is a problem for discussion of games that games tend to be so long. I have played for 8 hours and am still not finished.

I've seen some fan art where the characters are drawn as human people, and one thing that's interesting is the different interpretations of that.
posted by RobotHero at 7:07 AM on March 3, 2017

Okay, so we're starting out with Gone Home in the Narrative Games club, but I'll probably advocate for a Night in the Woods post next or soon, so join the club and watch for it appearing there.
posted by RobotHero at 9:37 AM on March 19, 2017

Oh, and someone in the Mass Effect: Andromeda thread pointed out an Arby's Twitter post which reminded me they also did one for Night in the Woods which I guess is how you know you've "made it" these days.
posted by RobotHero at 11:19 AM on March 21, 2017