On his first day, Delilah ( Cissy Jones), a lookout in another watchtower, contacts him via walkie-talkie and asks him to investigate illegal fireworks by the lake. In the spring of 1989, after his wife develops early-onset dementia, Henry ( Rich Sommer) takes a job as a fire lookout in Shoshone National Forest, Wyoming. Objects found in the wilderness can be kept in the inventory for later use. The game also features a day-night cycle. As the story progresses, new areas will be opened up for players. The player's choices will influence the tone of Henry's relationship with Delilah. Players may choose from a number of dialog options to speak with her upon the discovery of new interactive objects or environments, or can refrain from communicating. Henry's only means of communication is a walkie-talkie connecting him to his supervisor, Delilah. Through exploration of the surrounding area, Henry uncovers clues about mysterious occurrences in the vicinity that are related to the ransacking of his tower while he is out on a routine patrol and a shadowy figure that occasionally appears watching him from afar. Players take on the role of Henry, a fire lookout who is assigned to his own tower in Shoshone National Forest. Henry interacts with Delilah using his walkie-talkie.įirewatch is an adventure game played from a first-person view that takes place in the American state of Wyoming in 1989. By late 2016, the game had sold over a million copies. Firewatch won the award for Best 3D Visual Experience at the Unity Awards 2016, Best Indie Game at the 2016 Golden Joystick Awards, Best Narrative at the 2017 Game Developers Choice Awards and Debut Game at the 2017 British Academy Games Awards. However, the presence of technical issues and the game's ending were both subjects of criticism. The game received generally positive reviews, earning praise for its story, characters, dialogue, and visual style. The design draws inspiration from New Deal advertisements by the National Park Service and field research conducted in Yosemite National Park.
The game's environment was modelled by Ng, based on a single painting by Moss. The game was directed by Olly Moss and Sean Vanaman, written by Chris Remo, Jake Rodkin, Moss and Vanaman, and produced by Gabe McGill and artist Jane Ng. His exchanges with Delilah inform the process by which their relationship is developed. Henry interacts with Delilah using a walkie-talkie, with the player choosing from dialog options to communicate. A month after his first day at work, strange things begin happening to him and his supervisor Delilah, which connects to a conspired mystery that happened years ago. The story follows a fire lookout named Henry in the Shoshone National Forest, a year after the Yellowstone fires of 1988. The game was released in February 2016 for Microsoft Windows, OS X, Linux, and PlayStation 4, for Xbox One in September 2016, and for Nintendo Switch in December 2018. But the point is, it's a good game and you should play it.Firewatch is an adventure game developed by Campo Santo and published by the developer in partnership with Panic. This is usually met with genuine laughter, I think mostly out of relief that nobody ruined the Firewatch experience for themselves as much as I did.
Those teenagers skinny dippy? They left a fire improperly extinguished and unattended! *click!* What's this? Littering! *click!* Hmm, improperly managed climbing equipment eh? Not on my watch! *click!* Know what I used that camera for? What I naturally assumed it was for? Documenting forest crime. I took my job as a park ranger very seriously. Players could send away for and receive high quality prints of the photos they took.Įxcept, I didn't use it for that.
There's a weird mystery subplot and whatever, but for the purposes of this short post I'm going to hand wave that away.Īnyway, in Firewatch you get a disposable camera, which you can use to take pictures of the beautiful forest and nature, and so on. Sitting and living in your big weird one room home on stilts. In Firewatch you spend the summer working in a national park watching for fires. One of my favourite game-related anecdotes to tell - y'know, to get out at the fancy dinner parties we have where games journalists get together to collude and decide which games will be reviewed well over the coming months - is about Firewatch. One a day, every day, perhaps for all time. Have You Played? is an endless stream of game retrospectives.