The Guilt and The Shadow Review

For some games, atmosphere is everything. What would Slender be without its dark forest and disturbing sound effects? Is Journey the same sensation without the arid desert wasteland and beautiful empty horizons? For The Guilt and The Shadow, atmosphere is indeed just about everything. The core elements of the game aren’t especially unique; what we’ve got here is a short, simple puzzle-platformer that dabbles in themes of depression, loss and suicidal thoughts. A brilliant collection of games looking at the same theme have passed through Steam over the past couple of years, the best of which arguably being Will O’neil’s Actual Sunlight. So there’s some tough competition on the writing front, although The Guilt and The Shadow presents a more traditional playing experience alongside the story.

Still, it’s the atmosphere that proves to be the key selling point, and it certainly is the best element of the game. “Use headphones. Play in a dark room”, the game instructs during the title scene. It’s an unusually direct instruction from a videogame, but there’s no doubt that forcing yourself into a sense of seclusion perfectly fits the tone and emotion of the game. Indeed, it’s seclusion that wracks the (odd-looking) player character throughout the game, and The Guilt and The Shadow does a great job of helping you understand his sad situation. The text that accompanies your playthrough is well-written and relatable, even if it can be a tad too cryptic at times. Oh, and if you’re going to have a text-heavy game, can we please have proper use of apostrophes? It’s a small thing, yes, but it certainly aids the overall presentation and feel of the game.

Perhaps the most gripping element of The Guilt and The Shadow is the visual design. Looking through the game’s Steam Greenlight page, it appears that it was also one of the key factors for the game to pass through the indie game release system. For good reason too, the game looks brilliant in screenshots, but even better in action. The art style is a little tricky to describe, it’s reminiscent of school kid’s doodles in their science book. Rough pencil outlines forming dark grey worlds. There’s some seriously weird scenery to see, but it fits the overall tone, and yes - the atmosphere - perfectly. The individual levels all present a unique style, and the they're short enough that you won’t be remotely bored of your surroundings when it’s time to move on - that’s a classic platformer issue artfully dodged by The Guilt and The Shadow.

Of course, part of the reason the locations don’t get old is because the game’s too short for that to ever happen. Reaching the credits is likely to take players between two and three hours, which is to be expected in a game of this sort. The trick, however, is to make every single moment memorable. This isn’t quite accomplished in The Guilt and The Shadow. The actual gameplay is functional, but it rarely rises beyond that. The pace is intentionally slow and methodical, which works for the tone, but it can make certain levels a bit dull. As good as the setting (not to mention the brilliant soundtrack) is, pure atmosphere doesn’t make for an enjoyable playing experience.

The levels task you with finding items scattered around the map, solving visual puzzles and pushing items around. There’s a bit of lateral thinking to do, but most of the puzzles are relatively easy so long as you explore every part of a level and take note of the important points. Despite this, there are a couple of puzzles that can be rather tricky if you don’t follow the logic from the beginning of a level. In fact, the very first puzzle is arguably the most difficult as it’s at this point you’ll be unfamiliar with the game’s generally sensible logic, hiking up the challenge. Despite the developer describing The Guilt and The Shadow as an exploration game, each level has a rather obvious pre-determined path, which is obviously more like a proper platform title.

The Guilt and The Shadow is a dark game with a morbid theme and fitting art style. It’s not for the light-hearted, as the story delves quite deeply into feelings of depression and suicide. These are emotions that almost everyone can relate to in one way or another (even if they have never felt them personally), so it should be an interesting ride for most. Still, the ‘game’ elements of The Guilt and The Shadow don’t quite match up to the brilliant art and sound design, and that’s an issue. The game is short enough that you’ll happily play through the entire story, but given the rather formulaic nature of the gameplay, and relative simplicity, it’s unlikely you’ll want to play the game again.