Developer Open Roads Team

Publisher Annapurna Interactive 

Format PC (tested), PS4, PS5, Switch, Xbox One, Xbox Series 

Release Out now

Exploring a rundown summer home, our gaze alights on a set of louvre doors that have seen better days. Pulling them aside to reveal a shallow alcove, we see an air rifle leaning upright against the back wall. Dragging the tiny reticule in the centre of the screen over it yields no prompt to examine it more closely, let alone take it with us. We turn instead to the tall, narrow shelving unit on the right, upon which lies a red stuffed bear. This time there is a prompt: this can be picked up and turned over in our hands, resulting in an observation from teenaged protagonist Tess. It’s a juxtaposition that seems symbolic: this might look like the kind of dilapidated former residence we’ve picked clean in many a post-apocalyptic adventure, but in this world, guns are less important than discarded toys.

Tess is here with her mother, Opal, an unexpected find among her late grandmother’s possessions having encouraged them to take an impromptu road trip, visiting places that hold memories of the past – with the promise of life-changing ramifications for the pair. Which makes this low-key interactive novella sound more dramatic than it really is. You soon understand that this isn’t likely to be a game of grand revelations; that for Opal and Tess this journey is going to be less about locating long-hidden secrets than finding a new respect for and understanding of one another. At heart, this is a story about that period of adolescence when we start to see our parents differently, recognising their flaws and acknowledging that they were once teenagers themselves, with similar problems. Even if there aren’t as many roller-waitress jobs around in the early ’00s.