What Remains Of Edith Finch | Review | Taking A Game And Making It Art
18When I was a writing teacher (never mind how long ago that was), one of the first things we’d discuss about creative writing was the concept of why. Why are you telling the story the way you are. This came up largely for writing plays, because the teenage concept of theater really looks a hell of a lot like television. It makes sense: my students had seen far more TV than they had plays. So the discussion comes up almost immediately: why have you written a play? Why wouldn’t it be better served as a novel or a screenplay? Hell, why not a limerick?
This is a discussion that’s come up again and again as video games make themselves known as a legitimate art form. Bioshock Infinite, for example, was criticized for having such a smart, delicate story sandwiched between intense levels of gore and gunfire. Dear Esther also received flack for its execution: why make that a video game? Why not a short film? Would anything be lost if you couldn’t play it as a game? It’s a debate that surrounds of a lot of video games. However, I have no hesitation in saying that What Remains Of Edith Finch truly shows you what a story told through gaming can do that no other medium can.
What Remains Of Edith Finch is a game by Giant Sparrow, and in it you play the titular Edith Finch, as she searches the remains of her family’s bizarre and sprawling home in search of answers and insights to what appears to be a family curse. Those of us familiar with the conceits of the so-called Walking Simulator genre are going to recognize quite a few telltale details here: a gorgeous setting, check. A low, moody soundtrack, check. A narrator who reads and writes out loud for the benefit of the player, check. But what makes Edith Finch one of the best games of its genre is how well it knows the whats and whys of video games. There is no question in my mind that the story of What Remains Of Edith Finch could only be told effectively as a game. You aren’t just receiving the plot and reading about the characters: you’re becoming one with them. And as you work your way through the Finch family tree, there are just as many methods of getting to know these people as there are people to know. You learn about relatives not through just listening to their story, but by taking part in the story itself. And it makes you understand and relate with these characters on a level that isn’t possible when you’re passively taking in information, as you would watching a film or reading a book.
To go too deeply into the storyline would do the experience of Edith Finch a disservice, and I’m not interested in weakening or otherwise giving away anything about what should be a deeply personal experience. This is a story of family, history, and the effect that superstition plays on generation after generation.This game stands on its own as something very special, and it needs to be experienced and played.
That is the most important part of What Remains Of Edith Finch. A novel wouldn’t work. A play or film wouldn’t work. Or at least it wouldn’t have the same level of strength. What Remains Of Edith Finch is one of the best examples available of how a video game can touch you, engage you, and lift its own medium to the heights of art. It is indisputably one of the finest examples of its style and genre, and easily one of the best games of 2017.
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