The Vanishing of Ethan Carter
Platform: Windows, PS4
Developer: The Astronauts
Publisher: The Astronauts
Author: K.D.
This game went somewhat under the radar, though a compelling play. On aggregating review sites it has done relatively well for itself. Published by independent Polish studio The Astronauts, The Vanishing of Ethan Carter is considered a horror adventure game. So what’s it all about? Well, I’m so glad you asked!
Paul Prospero (paranormal PI extraordinaire) travels to a young fan’s (the eponymous Ethan Carter) town of Red Creek Valley, WI. When he gets there, crap hits the fan and his select skillset becomes necessary in order to solve mysterious and spooky murders around town. His investigation takes him on a journey of discovery and boy oh boy, things are very messed up—especially with the Carter family. It turns out that Ethan disturbed a very old and very evil spirit and his town is left to suffer. Unfortunately, I can’t divulge much more than this other than an M. Night Shyamalan plot twist (no, no… a good one this time) worthy of finding out for yourself!
I got it! The Railcar is the murderer!
How you help Ethan is completely up to you, there are no invisible walls limiting you to one area to perform fetch quests before being able to progress to other areas. This is built upon a very solid open-world concept. The other interesting tidbit is that typically in adventure games, when something is examined, prior knowledge the character has is prompted giving the player additional information about the world in which the character exists. In this game, however, when things are inspected, questions and suggestions pop up but there’s nothing indicative of what is supposed to happen with the inspected object or what has happened. What IS cool about this, though, is that if there is a related item the word will pop up several times (indicating one of Paul’s abilities) and will circle the screen. As you look around, the words will come closer together indicating the related object’s direction. Even cooler, once you lock in on the direction, Paul’s ability will even show you the object in its immediate vicinity. Using Paul’s special abilities, the goal is to solve enough issues that come up in order to contextualize what’s going on in town, and how/where to find Ethan Carter.
Another Railcar? Which one did it, I wonder…
It has some of the most visually striking places and environment I’ve seen in video games thus far, and the voice acting is pretty spot-on. Not to mention beautifully crafted background music. Even the trailers sent shivers down my spine as both enjoyably macabre and somehow delicate. Confusing, I know. But when you try it, you’ll understand. It feels like an interactive short story, or as Matt Sloan of CultNoise Magazine put it: “an interactive novella… a Lovecraftian mystery…” If that’s not compelling enough, I don’t know what is.
This game is a slower pace than what one may expect from a horror game and utilizes the player’s own perceptiveness. If you pride yourself on solving mysteries and puzzles, this game is a great opportunity to do so and I would highly recommend it!
Follow us on Twitter to keep up with the latest posts, or to recommend a game for the team to review: @TheSaveSpot1
