Tweet
Zombies, Trains, and the Struggle to Rescue Survivors in The Final Station
In The Final Station, a train conductor is forced to fight for survival in an apocalyptic wasteland. You guide this conductor through towns inhabited by shadowy, zombie-like creatures that will tear you apart. Ammo is scarce and the zombies are strong, so you must balance a desire to explore and find supplies with survival. Your train is your home base; as you move between depots on the train, it provides you with a minute of respite even as you work to keep it running correctly.
The train is also a mobile shelter for the other survivors you encounter along the way. If you choose to rescue these people, you'll be responsible for their livelihood: they need medkits and food, and some are brought aboard your train already injured. If you deliver them to their destination successfully, though, you'll get a monetary reward. The game primarily focuses on developing your own story as you attempt to survive in this wasteland, but you'll find scraps of information about the people who used to live in the towns you explore. Notes, journal entries, and the survivors you meet and rescue help convey the game's dark and subtle narrative.
I was able to play a bit of The Final Station at E3 2016 and watch a more lengthy demo this week, and I was struck by the game's ability to convey the agonizing difficulty of choosing when to help and when to leave someone behind. I've played games that required me to prioritize and make tough choices before, and often I'll just attempt to maximize the gain, regardless of the human consequences involved. For reasons that I cannot fully express, however, the decisions in The Final Station hit me harder than I expected.
As I watched my colleague attempt to save three dying people on his train, I noticed that these survivors were incredibly vulnerable. The three were lying down on this train, motionless, and fully dependent on the conductor to provide them food and medical supplies. Their rapidly draining health bars further emphasized the fact that these people were in danger, and only my colleague could save them. And he didn't have enough supplies.
I was surprised to feel so profoundly about 8-bit characters who didn't really grant significant rewards for survival, and that feeling is what developer Do My Best Games is trying to capture. On the game's Steam page, the description compares its tone to This War of Mine, and from what I've seen, that parallel is apt. The Final Station doesn't aim to give you a power fantasy, but rather it attempts to make you feel small, weak, and overwhelmed.
In addition, environments are beautifully rendered in blacks and grays with rare splashes of color. Its retro, 8-bit style works well in this game, and the buildings and caverns you explore are filled with detail that provide clues about the game's story.
I'm concerned, however, that the game might become repetitive after several trips out into the wasteland. Each location you explore is a train station, and during the demos I watched and played these stations didn't vary much. Moment-to-moment gameplay all involved peeking through doorways and watching for zombies; the environments, although beautiful, were all similar enough that it was hard to distinguish between each of them. However, Tiny Build CEO Alex Nichiporchik told me that there will be a bunch of different stations and concept art shows several settings, so I'm hopeful that the full release will have more gameplay and environment variation.
I came away from both demos cautiously optimistic, especially considering the effect that the survival mechanics had on me. I wanted to do as much as I could to keep my group alive, even if that meant sacrificing valuable supplies that I wouldn't be able to use later. I enjoyed the struggle to survive during the exploration sequences, too, when ammo scarcity required caution and smart movement. This game looks promising, and we don't have to wait long to find out if the final game builds effectively on what I saw: It launches this summer on PC.
More...
The train is also a mobile shelter for the other survivors you encounter along the way. If you choose to rescue these people, you'll be responsible for their livelihood: they need medkits and food, and some are brought aboard your train already injured. If you deliver them to their destination successfully, though, you'll get a monetary reward. The game primarily focuses on developing your own story as you attempt to survive in this wasteland, but you'll find scraps of information about the people who used to live in the towns you explore. Notes, journal entries, and the survivors you meet and rescue help convey the game's dark and subtle narrative.
I was able to play a bit of The Final Station at E3 2016 and watch a more lengthy demo this week, and I was struck by the game's ability to convey the agonizing difficulty of choosing when to help and when to leave someone behind. I've played games that required me to prioritize and make tough choices before, and often I'll just attempt to maximize the gain, regardless of the human consequences involved. For reasons that I cannot fully express, however, the decisions in The Final Station hit me harder than I expected.
As I watched my colleague attempt to save three dying people on his train, I noticed that these survivors were incredibly vulnerable. The three were lying down on this train, motionless, and fully dependent on the conductor to provide them food and medical supplies. Their rapidly draining health bars further emphasized the fact that these people were in danger, and only my colleague could save them. And he didn't have enough supplies.
I was surprised to feel so profoundly about 8-bit characters who didn't really grant significant rewards for survival, and that feeling is what developer Do My Best Games is trying to capture. On the game's Steam page, the description compares its tone to This War of Mine, and from what I've seen, that parallel is apt. The Final Station doesn't aim to give you a power fantasy, but rather it attempts to make you feel small, weak, and overwhelmed.
In addition, environments are beautifully rendered in blacks and grays with rare splashes of color. Its retro, 8-bit style works well in this game, and the buildings and caverns you explore are filled with detail that provide clues about the game's story.
I'm concerned, however, that the game might become repetitive after several trips out into the wasteland. Each location you explore is a train station, and during the demos I watched and played these stations didn't vary much. Moment-to-moment gameplay all involved peeking through doorways and watching for zombies; the environments, although beautiful, were all similar enough that it was hard to distinguish between each of them. However, Tiny Build CEO Alex Nichiporchik told me that there will be a bunch of different stations and concept art shows several settings, so I'm hopeful that the full release will have more gameplay and environment variation.
I came away from both demos cautiously optimistic, especially considering the effect that the survival mechanics had on me. I wanted to do as much as I could to keep my group alive, even if that meant sacrificing valuable supplies that I wouldn't be able to use later. I enjoyed the struggle to survive during the exploration sequences, too, when ammo scarcity required caution and smart movement. This game looks promising, and we don't have to wait long to find out if the final game builds effectively on what I saw: It launches this summer on PC.
More...