Tag: firewatch

High Scores 2016
Feature

High Scores: The Best Videogames of 2016 – 12 to 9

This is part of Kill Screen’s list of the best videogames of 2016. To see the rest of the list, check out all the other parts. /// 12. The Last Guardian You don’t mind when Trico delays the journey to splash in a puddle. This large mythic fusion of cat, bird, and dog is the most lovable videogame companion yet—both daft and majestic. Tasked with escaping a megastructure made of carved stone and rickety wooden plinths, the boy and Trico learn to cooperate, but also to care for one another. They climb up high and fall back down, over and over,…
Firewatch
News

Calling all explorers: Firewatch now has a free-roam mode

If you could shout “Heyooooo” into Firewatch‘s virtual rendition of the Wyoming wilderness then you would now be able to travel to everywhere the call echoed. That’s on account of an update that has rolled out for all the versions of the game—PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One—that introduces a free-roam mode. hike around its trails unhindered After completing the game once, you should find the mode available to select in the special features section of the main menu. Once inside, you can walk and climb around its entire ecosystem with a dynamic 24-hour time cycle to experience too. That…
Proteus
News

Is it time to stop using the term “walking simulator”?

The history of the term “walking simulator” is short but heated. It’s only seen wide usage over the past few years and is often applied frivolously. There’s a lot of uncertainties around it but the one thing that’s for sure it it’s a divisive term. Some people see it as a useful way to bunch together a group of games with similar interests—typically slower games, ones about exploration and contemplation. While others abhor it and wish it would go away. But it doesn’t seem to be going anywhere, at least, not any time soon. “Walking simulator” seemed to come into popularity around the…
News

Firewatch is being turned into a movie. Yes, seriously

Well, here’s something. This year’s first-person mystery-adventure game Firewatch is being turned into a movie. For real. According to The Hollywood Reporter, independent production company Good Universe has teamed up with Campo Santo to develop content for both videogames and feature films. The film adaptation will be their first project together but it sounds like there will be more on the way. not exactly a prime candidate for adaptation This is a pretty big deal, and not just because we’re very into Firewatch, but because it’s Campo Santo’s first and so far only title. It’s quite a surprise, really, but Firewatch does star…
Jane Ng
Feature

How Jane Ng turned the real world into Firewatch

This article is part of Issue 8.5, a digital zine available to Kill Screen’s print subscribers. Read more about it here and get a copy yourself by subscribing to our soon-to-be-relaunched print magazine. /// When an architect drafts a design, they dream big. And where there’s an architect, there’s a craftsman—the person who sits down to bring the concept to life. At San Francisco-based independent game studio Campo Santo, that craftsman is 13-year industry veteran Jane Ng. But instead of fully-realizing buildings, she realizes game art, most recently that of the impeccably stylized Firewatch. “I’m like the builder that comes in…
News

Printable Firewatch maps add a new challenge to the game

With its 1989 setting and focus on exploring the wilderness of the American West, Firewatch recalls a time before cell phones and GPS were common tools among those looking for adventure. Before Siri, the best option most travelers had for finding out how to get somewhere was still the simple paper map, with no guiding voice or blinking “you are here” indicator to make reading it any easier. To make up for this, car passengers would often double as navigators, reading through maps to find directions and arguing with drivers about which route was best—the main thing that’s changed is that we now shout…
News

Night in the Woods to unravel its angsty teen tale this fall

There are two types of stories we tend to tell in the Fall: scary stories, and stories aimed at winning awards. Night in the Woods wants to be both. First announced with a Kickstarter campaign on October 22, 2013, Night in the Woods was pitched as a clever sidescroller twist on the adventure game, which quickly attracted attention from eager fans as they helped it earn over $150,000 dollars beyond its set goal of $50,000. The project was also warmly received by critics, who dug its young-adult angst, muted woodsy environment, and light horror themes. Kill Screen’s own Davis Cox…
Sunset 2
Review

Firewatch and the great American landscape

Steven Poole put it beautifully in his book Trigger Happy (2000): “the jewel in the crown of what videogames can offer is the aesthetic emotion of wonder… such videogames at their best build awe-inspiring spaces from immaterial light. They are cathedrals of fire.” Cathedrals of fire. Sit on that for a moment. I’m at my computer and the screen is burning, roaring with the light of the sun. Steven Poole’s got a point. Wonder is hardwired into the history of videogames. It’s there in the labyrinthine mazes of 1997’s Castlevania: Symphony of the Night. And it’s there in the sheened…
News

Play Firewatch for a breath of fresh air

Sign up to receive each week’s Playlist e-mail here! Also check out our full, interactive Playlist section. Firewatch (PS4, PC, Mac, Linux) CAMPO SANTO People say they go to videogames to escape. And they say they go to the wilderness for basically the same reason. To get lost in something bigger—something outside themselves. But wanting to be lost is one side of wanting to find another answer. Firewatch throws players into the existential crisis of protagonist Henry, a middle-aged man looking to restart his life as a park ranger in a national forest. Through lonely exploration and dialogue choices, the player shapes Henry. With only…