The only sound I ever heard during my playthrough of Gods Will Be Watching was the crackling of a fire. Slowly but surely, its embers would die, because when you’re stranded in the freezing cold and slowly succumbing to disease, there’s no easy fix-all. Just increasingly high prices that buy you a few more moldy scraps of time. So I’d heap more wood onto the wheezing ash, and my group’s flame would spring back to life, but it never quite returned to the lively, hopeful blaze of day one. Neither did my people. One by one, the little squad of survivors I was managing fell apart. Distrust, discord, and madness flooded delirious minds while empty stomachs’ pleas fell on deaf ears. I wanted to hold it all together, I did, but one man can only do so much.

On my grave, I pray they write, “At least he didn’t let the dog die. All things considered, he was really good about that.” Also, I hope they omit the part where I strongly considered killing my engineer with my own two hands because he wasn’t worth his own weight in food. That was maybe one of my less glamorous moments.

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Given that Ludum Dare 26 spawned several trillion games, we’ll probably be talking about it for the next 30,000 or so years. I will, however, almost certainly do a round-up sooner or later, seeing as the theme – minimalism – has led to a teetering tapas tower of bite-sized, sometimes seconds-long experiences. Don’t get me wrong, though: I have come across a few slightly meatier efforts. Of those, The Unseen stands out as well worth a mention, if only because I’d love to see it take on a life beyond LD26. Doubtless, it’s got some oily, hair-strewn warts on its style-savvy skin, but the core idea is brilliant on a number of levels. See, you’re dead. And how’d you die? Well, while searching for your body, you’re almost certainly going to find out. Agonizing step by agonizing step.

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