What Remains of Edith Finch is a first-person story-driven adventure game about the secrets of an abandoned home.
What is the criteria of what defines a video game? Certainly it’s a question that I found myself posed with while playing this latest walking simulator from independent developer Giant Sparrow who follow on from their 2012 debut The Unfinished Swan with this fascinating if brief title.
A first person adventure game, here you travel to the Finch family home, whose history of unusual and unfortunate demises have seen them branded ‘America’s most unfortunate family,’ which the Finch’s themselves believe is the result of a family curse that has been carried from one family member to the next over the last five generations. Now, following the journal of Edith, who provides the narration for your journey, you uncover what happened to each of them.
It’s worth noting from the start that this is not a game of intense action scenes nor intense puzzles, instead it’s a game based purely on story, putting you on rails as you visit each of the rooms in the Finch family home, which now acts like memorials to their former inhabitants. As such, no room is the same, each with the fantastic design work really bringing each new room to life as the walls and surfaces are packed with small details relating to their former inhabitant be it the movie posters of former child actor Barbara or Walter’s underground bunker. Each Finch comes with their own unique room to discover and with no room ever being inhabited by anyone else, the house really begins to take on a rather unique Frankenstein design as new rooms are bolted onto the original structure, reminiscent of The Royal Tenenbaums.
What Remains of Edith Walkthrough
Of course it’s not just the rooms that are different as each of the tales comes with its own unique style, often fitting the personality of the family member. It’s these constant changes in style, much like finding out how the family members meet their demise, that really keep you engrossed in the story. These stories can almost be seen as a series of mini-games as you complete the required actions to essentially trigger the demise of the character. Due to the family meeting their end in so many different ways, it’s a grim fascination alongside compelling storytelling which holds your interest to the finale.
Unquestionably a unique title to say the least, it’s perhaps because of this that it’s all the harder to recommend, especially if your idea of video games revolves around levels and quests than essentially watching a story play out with minimal interaction from the player. Its short playtime of around two hours only makes it a harder sell. However, if you enjoyed the likes of Firewatch or Everybody’s Gone To The Rapture, you will no doubt certainly enjoy this one as well.