Have You Played... What Remains of Edith Finch?
A story of life, love, and loss
What Remains of Edith Finch has a story that will stay with you for a long time. Small tableaus of the lives of the Finch family. Much like Gone Home you start at your old family home, but this time you uncover how a lot of your family died. Cheerful, I know. However, with each new story you learn a little more about the family members you never met, or the ones you knew all-too-briefly.
After its release in 2017, it won an incredible amount of awards (including one of our old "recommended" badges) and had its praises sung so highly only cats could hear them. Its rich story and incredible atmosphere place it as one of my all time favourite games.
If you didn’t know by now, I love story-driven gems. There are loads of really smart moments where it pulls itself away from usual walking simulators, that useful but reductive term we’re all so hesitant to use. You learn of a family member’s death through a comic book, another through a scene played out in a bathtub. It’s these moments that make Edith Finch stand out.
Using many recognisable tropes, it still somehow manages to make itself feel like a completely new, fresh, never-before-seen game. With dark stories told in remarkably lovely ways, it’s a beautiful and touching game that really focuses on the important issues of family, love, life, and loss.