How it Plays
My buddy Josh has beef with certain escape rooms. His thing is that if the puzzles in the escape room just lead to a series of keys and padlocks, the escape room isn’t very well designed. It hasn’t done its job in the creativity department. I couldn’t help think about that as I worked my way through the beginning of Obduction, a puzzle/adventure game released in 2016 by Cyan, makers of Myst and Riven. The first few puzzles are all about finding numerical codes to unlock doors, and Obduction is certainly an escape room. You’re brought to an alien dome against your will and the object, loosely, is to get out. Practically, the object is to do what this guy, C.W., tells you to do and the goal of getting home is quickly buried beneath a vague plot involving an “attack” and a “plan.” There’s a lot of content in this game that serves only to deepen the story and game world and occasionally to throw you off track, but I still do not have a firm grasp on what exactly is going on. There are aliens? And you’re helping some of them? Some of them are helping you, but also maybe trying to kill you? I just kept my head down and solved those puzzles. Eventually I was skimming the flavor text and plunging headlong down corridors towards the next padlock.
I liked this game. I feel like I should say that before I do any more complaining. It was pretty and satisfying and not too frustrating. We only had to ask the internet for help once. I played this with my girlfriend and she really got into it. She liked it more than Outer Wilds because her enjoyment didn’t hinge on her being able to skillfully pilot a jetpack through a variety of gravitational environments. It’s a game where you can take your sweet time, write things down, draw pictures, and debate various ideas over the dinner table. It’s also not terribly long. There are a couple of honest emotional moments and one good, startling reveal. This is a great one to work on with a partner and the game’s main puzzle device is clever enough to make you forget all about punching numbers into key pads.
Advice for the player
At times in this game, things just appear. This happened to us twice where we running around somewhere we’d already been and the world had changed even though we hadn’t done anything to change it. It’s possible we’d done something – kicked a rock, or pushed on a locked door for the 50th time – that caused the change but we were unaware of it as players so if you get stuck, keep looking around. And keep your eyes peeled.
There are a few red herrings in this game. Stay on task.
The loading screens. I played this on PS4 and there are a lot of 8-12 second loading periods. A lot. It happens every time you… do this one thing, and you have to do that one thing all the time. That said, it didn’t bother me that much. You can use the time to pet the dogs or eat a sour patch kid. That’s what I did anyway.
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