This month (January) was Camp Santo’s Firewatch an indie darling from 2016, arriving last on Nintendo Switch in 2018. You are Henry, a man fleeing a sense of fatalism and helplessness related to your wife’s deteroriating medical condition to go to the Wyoming wilderness and watch out for fires. In the process, through the unfolding mysteries of the area you’re responsible for and your relationship with the dispatcher, Deliliah, you find out some things about yourself. The game is beautiful and cinematically framed and paced (each day has meaningful events, less of the mundane), with the intrigue and mystery ratcheting up as the days go on. The player has control over Henry’s dialogue, including choosing to be silent in some cases, or to continue the conversation by pointing out random features of the wilderness in front of you.

On the cast we talk about the relationship between Henry and Delilah, nostalgia for the radio, the sort of narrative purpose of the ‘other’ events, the game’s relationship with red herrings and tension, as well as the sort of magic trick (and work) of crafting a meaningful story around all that walking and talking. For more context on this aspect, as well as music and art, check out our liner notes.

Camp Santo, acquired by Valve in 2018, was working on a new game at least for a while, but this was put on hold in 2019 in favour of other projects happening at Valve.

Check out our podcast at the end of this month (February) on Harvest Moon for the SNES/Super Famicom.

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