The genre of walking simulators is gradually evolving, offering unexpected topics for discussion or incredibly twisted stories. Italian studio One-o-one games trying to create a mystical haunted thriller, but the lack of experience and a good director turns the story The suicide of rachel foster in one of the dullest adventures of the year.
The events of the game take place in the now fashionable 90s somewhere in the heart of the American outback in Montana. The main character named Nicole returns to the family hotel after the death of her parents, trying to put things in order and find out the secret of the death of the girl Rachel, with whom her father started a romance a decade ago.
Once cut off from the world in a crumbling structure, she begins to suspect that behind Rachel’s death is more than a nervous breakdown or a sudden pregnancy.
Using mechanics familiar from Gone home, the authors make you go around the floors, twist objects in your hands and perform tasks quite traditional for the genre. Look for food in the refrigerator, inspect mold on the walls or start a boiler for a relaxing bath and warm water in noisy pipes.
At some point, the hotel manager gets in touch over the radiotelephone, which helps Nicole navigate the maze of rooms and floors. The creators offer you active tools, such as a microphone, polaroid or dynamo flashlight, but their use is limited to rare, and sometimes isolated scenes.
It seems that the game has lost a huge layer of content. A paper map without marks and your position does not help much to find the right point for the development of the plot, and tips, such as counters, are not recorded anywhere and you have to navigate from memory.
Leading the player’s hand through a mystery-giving story, the authors may pose strange tasks that sometimes involve pixel hunting. For example, at some point you need to go to your room and go to bed, but the interaction with the bed does not work … The right trigger only works when the girl picks up the guitar!
