Game Club Discussion: A Short Hike

[elf]

Now that we've had time to play (...and possibly, time to forget why we played and lose track of time because of NaNoWriMo), let's talk!

This month's megabundle game was/is (for another week) A Short Hike (itch.io version), "a little exploration game about hiking up a mountain."

Here are some potential questions to discuss, but you're not required to answer any of them. Feel free to make up your own questions and answer those, or just talk about what caught your attention.

1. What did you think this game was going to be, before you played it? What was surprising about it? 2. How far did you get in the game? Do you want to play more? 3. What was the central focus of the game, and what was on the sidelines? How did the sidelined parts support or detract from the central focus? 4. What kind of worldbuilding does it have? What questions about the setting were left unanswered? 5. Did you particularly like or dislike any of the characters? 6. What parts were most frustrating? What parts were most fun? 7. Did you use a keyboard, a controller, or both? How do you think that affected the game?

Comments

[vriddy]

I did not expect the game to be this long or to reward exploration so much! It took me ages to "finish" because every time I told myself "Okay, I'm going to ignore everything and just go toward the Peak so I finish in time to talk about it on the comm," I would end up noticing a new area from above and I couldn't help going to have a look.

I did reach the Peak and it was a sweet ending (going back to the nap), although I wish I had spent more time on some side-quests, especially the painter person or more treasure maps. Realistically though, I probably wouldn't have finished those quests either so it's just as well that I pushed myself to finish so I could participate in this post before 2023!! Haha. It might be a nice game to explore again during a quiet holiday. I'm glad I got those 15 shells while getting lost a dozen times because I think I would have kept wondering about it otherwise 😂

I was also kind of impressed and often happily surprised by the dialogue choices. The NPCs often had a lot of personality or unexpected depth presented in funny ways (like the slightly rough person selling feathers at twice the price close to the Peak! Chatting with them more was interesting.)

I ended up using a controller as per the advice (really struggled with climbing without it) although the A/B/Z/etc suggestions don't match my cheap no-name controller so I was perpetually confused, but it was rarely all that much of an issue.

Really happy I finally got to play it (it was recommended to me before!) and how rich and wide the world is! I didn't expect the game to be this long, and I didn't even finish exploring everything and talking to everyone.

[isis]

I agree that the NPCs were full of personality and kind of funny!