Cairn

absolute cinema

Juegazo de juegazos. 10/10

The path seems to be tough but at the end of the journey you get one of the best ending in video games

Cairn does a fantastic job of taking the realism of climbing and gamifying it. Easy to learn and plenty to do.

非常好游戏。好像自己真的在爬山，真实的呼吸都跟随着角色。攀岩的玩法虽然角色肢体扭曲但也很好玩，令人专注于每一个动作。真的是非常好游戏，让我感受到了攀岩登顶的独特魅力。 但是，登顶结尾的动画莫名其妙，非常低审美。不如就主角大吼后她安静跪坐在哪里几秒后就黑屏跳片尾，最后的询问也很幽默（负面），令人非常不思考。没有这个结尾真是神作，不知道制作组哪个（或是一群？）的主意，真是俗人。

Cairn is a game that piqued my interest when I first heard about it; I've only ever played one game whose main gameplay was climbing, and that was PEAK, a fun co-op game that's climbing is definitely more arcade-y when compared to this game. Although my backlog is ever growing, I'm trying to show more attention to newer games, especially those which seem a little foreign when it comes to my usual game choice; although it was on the backburner for a while, Cairn was one of the first (maybe even [i]the[/i] first) new games I picked up this year. And I can't thank my past self enough for that. The mechanics in this game, while they can be frustrating at times, are incredibly fun to learn and adapt your play style to. Climbing takes a minute to get used to, but once you do, it is incredibly fun; there is also a decent amount of creative freedom in how you climb, as I found myself often contorting Aava's body is fantastical ways that shouldn't be possible but albeit aided me in my climb. Storage management is pretty streamlined, and I honestly didn't even realize (and thus utilize) manually moving around items in my bag until probably 10-12hrs into the game 😭😭. Resting and creating wild culinary concoctions is incredibly useful, and the additions of needing to keep an eye on the conditions of your hands and making sure you have/are crafting pitons adds a level of uncertainly that can only be answered with preparedness. Gameplay overall felt incredibly intuitive and was a blast to use. The only quirk that gave me even the smallest level of annoyance was that sometimes I would climb onto flat surfaces but Aava would act as if I was still scaling a wall, forcing me to technically jump off the "wall" so I can walk around, and this did happen decently frequently, but it's neither game-breaking nor is it such an inconvenience that it took me out of the experience. The story is shockingly complex for a game that some may say is "just about climbing" on the surface. As to not spoil anything, while battling the ascent of Kami itself, Aava simultaneously battles herself, her motivations, her aspirations, and her life on solid ground, all while unraveling the stories of the people who used to live upon and within the mountain. I decided to go with the "Home" ending, as I felt it best fit what Aava should do, especially when you think about the inner turmoil she is battling throughout the game. I fell in love with the art style the more I played, although I will say the lighting does interact with Aava's face in a very weird way that often casts a strong shadow upon her, but given what I said before regarding the story, looking back, maybe this was intentional. The scenery itself is incredibly beautiful, with the sky really bringing it home for me. I often found myself taking a lot of screenshots of the sky itself, whether it was a beautiful sunset and the contrasting tall Kami or just the stars at night; this game is truly beautiful. I [i]just[/i] wrapped this game up maybe 15 or 20 minutes ago as I write this, so there's always a possibility that I haven't had time to let it all sink in, but I'm absolutely enamored with this game. Truly an 11/10.