Spoiler alert: I try not to reveal the specifics of Hob’s Barrow in this article, but in order to understand what makes this game special, I have to talk about some design elements you might not want to know.
My favorite moment came about three hours after I finished Digging Hob’s Cart. But we’ll get to that later.
From the beginning, it was hard not to support Thomasina Bateman. In the age of steam trains and parasols, she came to a small village in northern England to dig an ancient cemetery, even though the local patriarchy and wet British weather would hold her back.
And it’s hard not to root for Hob’s cart dig itself. This is a compact but well-crafted point-and-click horror game in the style of classic adventure games. The interface and inventory are very smooth—there’s a button to show all points of interest, and you can even jump to the exit with a double tap—but the solemn rhythm of a classic adventure game is greatly respected.
The less you know about the upcoming story, the better. Note that Thomasina wants to excavate a cart, but her first priority is to get the locals to admit that the cart even exists. She had to convince some of them to even admit her in the first place. What do you do with this stuff? Classic adventure game business, the obvious: talk to everyone until there’s nothing left to ask them, pick up anything that isn’t glued to the floor, and keep an eye out for hopefully locked doors.
The animations are lovely, switching between elegant, beautifully animated sprites as you move around the world, and jarring, rather terrifying close-ups as you watch cutscenes. In keeping with that, the secondary characters walk a fine line between showing up humans and inhabiting all the horror fiction and small-town stereotypes you could possibly want.
Puzzles, especially in the first two-thirds of the game, manage to be enjoyable jobs that keep you thinking, but never create annoying roadblocks. You’re always figuring out what you want while focusing on what other people want — so you can create synergies where these want to overlap.
More than just puzzling, however, it’s a real joy to be in such an atmospheric world. The landscapes are by Constable, and the dialogue is light and characteristic. In the early days, Thomasina met some local idiots who wanted her as a woman, and other local idiots who wanted her to participate in discussions, studying the conflict between folklore and reason, and the whole thing had the potential to become a kind of Playable Essex Serpent, another elaborate gothic tale built from displacement and superstition. The railroad just arrived in the area – is it all over? It’s all well done.
The Essex Serpent is an interesting touchpoint. Sarah Perry’s novel flirts with horror as it serves something deeper, stranger, and ultimately sweeter. At first – and “at first” counted until the credits rolled and a few hours later – I’d love to say Hob’s cart flirts with horror flirts, and then more firmly into the safe genre territory. The game progresses with grace, and I’m caught up until the end, but at times I worry that the allegiance to tradition and the horror’s specific narrative gravity will get in the way of the more interesting story Hob’s Barrow begins to tell. Horror provides excitement and proper magic, but doesn’t it often come with requirements and limitations?
Likewise, the narrative choices made by the developers forced a change in the kind of puzzle I had when things came to a head. I moved from fun settings that encouraged me to think about the people around me and how I could use social engineering to get what I wanted to more mechanical adventure games. Again, it’s handled beautifully and has a lovely doom mystery throughout, but Thomasina is such a charismatic protagonist that I miss the part of the game that sees her interacting with other people.
To quote another Thomasina: You can’t turn things upside down. Or can you? After the game, I stumbled to wash the dishes, disappointed. I went through a familiar list of disappointment thoughts. The danger, I remind myself, is to get annoyed that Hob’s Barrow isn’t the game I wanted. Of course, I guess, I’m just happy to put everything else aside and enjoy this featured slice of shady British folklore. But even so, I suspect, especially at the end, that Hob’s Barrow isn’t the game Hob’s Barrow was looking for. When it jumps to conclusions, it leaves too many interesting themes. Thomasina’s work is so good, she deserves a game that gives her more agency.
I was pulling on a thread like this for four hours that day until it all went well. I suddenly felt like I had a better understanding of what the game was trying to say and how it used horror elements instead of giving way to them. What a wonderful thing – it’s a puzzle in itself, like Link’s Awakening or something – but a narrative thematic puzzle rather than a map itself a huge brain teaser Turning space puzzle.
Here’s the thing: Four hours after finishing the game and shutting down the computer is where I actually play Hob’s Barrow. Besides the busy work and conversations, they are where I put together the narrative, unravel the real themes and make sense of what I’m witnessing. There’s more evidence, I guess, that for some games, we’re talking about gameplay that goes far beyond the screen and keyboard or controller.
Well, beneath the Constable skies and the endless drizzle, Hobb’s cart worked a sneaky magic. Dig in.