Have you ever opened a game box in the back seat of your parents’ car on your way home from the supermarket, carefully slipped out the instructions, and started reading right away? Have you ever gotten cheap ink and plastic out of a game box when you’re flipping through a brochure hoping to glean clues about the game or learn some information about the game’s characters? Did you feel powerful about it – like you learned something mundane and secret that other kids might not know?
Well, that feeling – that exact intrigue impulse when you discover a little hidden secret that only you may know – is Tunic. The whole game is filled with these moments, these little quiet nods and suggestions that you, the player, have outsmarted something and got ahead in the game as a result.
You’re a little fox on an adventure, jumping right into the world with minimal background and a brief advice on why you’re trying to collect something that’s definitely not Triforce. There is no tutorial to speak of. No, instead, you’ll find little pages of instruction manuals scattered around the world that you piece together. That’s about as much hand-holding as you get. OK.
This means that – even if you have access to most of the interesting mechanics in the game from the start – you either ignore how to do a lot of things, or bypass them entirely.Defeat an enemy on top of an ancient tower, take the man page from its stash and realize “Oh, if only I could unlock things from the start of the game [redacted]’ should be annoying. but it is not the truth. It’s charming and clever, and it makes you feel like the game is playing against you (which is fair, because if you sniff out very hidden passages and shortcuts in its gorgeous isometric world, you’ll feel like you’re being beaten) in game, too).
This constant back-and-forth is a mind game between you and Tunic, and it feels fun and dizzy – which may have been intenti onal by the developers. The whole tone of the game (though it’s indirect and wordless) revolves around sparking your curiosity and getting you to try something. Have some coins you don’t know what to do with? A page in the book suggests, maybe, that you should throw them down the well – and see what happens! That basic gear system? Why not wear something different in different places and see if that makes a difference?
Last year’s extraordinary Death’s Gate took modern Zelda-style gaming in a more hardcore direction, and Tunic feels like it’s heading towards the same destination on a more scenic route: it’s very Beautiful, it’s fairly light-hearted compared to similar games, and it requires less of you to boot. In Tunic you just need to know how to manage your stamina, how to dodge and how to lock on to your target. This can be tricky, but it’s not difficult. Great for precocious children of all ages.
The real fun of Tunic doesn’t come from its brilliantly animated enemies (crabs are a highlight), but from its map design. It’s inspired by isometric games, but isn’t afraid to pull out the camera, twist it, shift it to a corner or whatever else gives you a sense of place. Even fixed camera angles feel like they’ve been set up by a smiling cinematographer; never satisfied with simple choices, you’ll find the camera zooms, pans or rolls at will, highlighting dusty toys Any part of the box world works best in the moment.
One highlight was – finally – finding a way to access the library, which I mentioned in a random page of the manual early in the game. Climb up the wall, squeeze through a hole, and the camera pulls back, revealing my entrance for me to climb up the bookshelf – until I run for a while to see where my fox avatar ends up and knock some books over Realize this over.
Tunic is full of happy times like this, and it makes me so sad when it suddenly dawns on me that I may have combed every inch of the game and saw what our foxes saw on the gorgeous (and subtly sinister) island Friends call home. It’s great to learn the intricacies of dodging iframes in scrolling, or seeing how various magic items interact with different types of enemies, Tunic is at its best when you’re looking around and trying to find its moment of genius – small Paths hidden in plain sight, or tricky treasure chests that make fun of you in a distant overhang, unopened.
Tunic comes at just the right time; it’s a calmer, gentler take on adventure games that want to have friendly conversations, packed with delightful games in the middle of a tight release schedule. It doesn’t want to yell at you – it wants to encourage you. Explore, engage and experiment. It’s the perfect palate cleanser, it takes 6 to 20 hours, and it’s an absolute must-have if you’re into adventure games with potions in your pockets, a cape around your neck and sparkling eyes.
Tunic reviewed on PC (Steam) with code provided by PR.
