Evoking the texture and imagery one might associate with an abandoned hydroelectric dam or an imagined nuclear power plant, the deep and unending cave the game takes place in stretches for what may be infinity. It’s all rotting concrete, rusted pipes, vents, girders, cables, huge tanks, metal tunnels and tubes of other, stranger materials. The routes through these places constantly backtrack and loop in on themselves, even in this small demo I enjoyed multiple moments of “Ah, so THIS is the other side of THAT thing from before.” This imparts an excellent sense of the reality of the space and helps me form a relationship with it. The climb becomes less desperate and more exploratory. Less Smeagol and more Shackleford.
Lorn is a little lost android who has strayed from his colony following a ghostly specter, the Lure presumably. The figure which draws us forward and into the dark glitters in a kind of RBG glitched haze just out of reach. Regarding this, Lorn narrates: “I need to find it again before my energy core expires. It’s all I have left.”
And follow we do, up and down rusting pipes and platforms and across daredevil gaps to the sounds of our footsteps, creaking impacts of metal as we land and the deeply satisfying kinks and crumbles of our trusty climbing picks. The most interesting part of the traversal is the climbing. The picks can stick in some surfaces but not all, the reticle tells us which and at any time we may turn to jump away from that wall to land somewhere else. One incredibly humanizing detail is sometimes we will turn away from the wall to spot the next point and we must turn the other way to see it, suddenly I feel Lorn’s shoulders. It’s great.
The world of the industrial abyss is not a totally dead one. Lights flicker, sludge pours from ancient pipes, and a hazy atmosphere struggles to pass through the caverns. And most importantly, we are not alone. We see evidence of another android, who would have been down here for centuries like ourselves. They were trapped, tethered to a vital power source with a small screen which our scanners only label as “entertainment device” for company. Their log states that their joints have lost too much oil to travel safely but they wish to see the bottom. We find a rope dangling from their ledge.
Moreover, we see evidence of some kind of expedition, terminals with scant text referencing a colony (our own?) The writer of these entries has a tone of curiosity and optimism, even speculating about the nature of the dark endless space. Towards the end of the demo the Lure leads us deep into a triangular tunnel which ends in a tiny triangle picture window framed by huge brutal yellow and black striped beams. They are rusted and suggest industrial waste. However, through the window we see a garden. Our scans tell us the glass is unbreakable and that it is the glass which sustains the life we see beyond, bright and green, and perhaps a bit of sky. A nearby expedition terminal discusses the curiosity of the window and the need to press on. Lorn’s narration says about the same. We’ve lost the Lure again so we just press on deeper. We end the demo leaping into a huge pipe which we learn once “supplied fluid to the ecosystem below.” The final moments show Lorn apparently damaged and a lingering shot of what may be a small campsite or collection of houses. I might even call it a village, all perched on top of another great inscrutable tank.
The caverns and machinery of Lorn’s Lure all tap into that same sublime horror of inhuman architecture found in the manga “Blame!” or in other lofi, indie horror games by creator Kitty Horror Show. You feel a presence within these spaces. Not the haunted house horror presence of malevolence, but rather the truly inhuman presence that such structures, or even natural caves, hold. This sense that this place isn’t evil, just so much bigger than you, and although it’s made out of manmade materials it was never built.
This presence puts me in mind of the silent conversation the player of a game is having with the designer, the interpretation of the space, games must communicate with their players, whether by shining a light directly on where you’re supposed to go, or in more subtle ways. The moment I ask myself “Ok, this pipe was positioned just so, and the next one is coming out that way, what does this mean?” is when I feel happiest and closest to the designer, reading an autobiography or sorts into play architecture. Also, that engendering of curiosity and the faith that that curiosity will be, not rewarded, I don’t like saying rewarded, but justified, is such a powerful tool of expression for the designer.
Here the atmosphere and the cave-like quality of the space all lead this player/designer exchange to take on a real theatrical quality. I don’t know who designed (or rather, is designing) this game but they aren’t Lorn, nor the expedition, nor even the Lure. (They MIGHT have once been the other android who’s little alcove we found, but not anymore.) The designer is the cavern. And they want me to do sick jumps off of multiple inclined planes. And when I land they want me to look out into the distance and understand that I’ve wrapped around a column whose end I may never truly know and to whom I mean nothing more than a fly.
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