The phrase "No truer words have ever been spoken" is used a lot and more often than not it's figurative opposed to literal. In the Vanishing of Ethan Carter, however, it is definitely literal and the game even tells you. The very opening of the game states that "This game is a narrative experience that does not hold your hand". As I read it, I heard that familiar voice in my head saying "Here we go". It was more of the sarcastic version than the excited variety as statements like that tend to underwhelm, typically because it's the fault of the game having little in the form of intriguing content and this phrase is meant as a type of coverup. I was wrong to think this way, and as far as being wrong goes, no truer words have ever been spoken.
The Vanishing of Ethan Carter arrives first to console on PS4 and puts you in the hands of Detective Paul Prospero. He arrives in Red Creek Valley as a cop who has seen his fair share of stuff go down. When he's tasked with investigating the disappearance of a young child in town named Ethan Carter, well, that's when stuff gets real. It's important to note that there is zero combat in this game. It's a pure exploration and puzzle solver that ties into one beautiful story. Prospero is more than meets the eye and possesses the ability to "communicate" with dead bodies. By finding clues in and around the respective crime scene in the game, Prospero is able to put them together (with a little help from you) and solve what happens to their death in his own version of detective mode. Your help amounts to placing the clues back together in the right order so Prospero can accurately reconstruct the crime scene and see exactly what happened to the victim. There aren't too many clues for each puzzle so you get the hang of it pretty quickly.
I won't get into the cases and puzzles themselves as it would spoil much of the storyline and the end result of the game. In order to truly get the complete ending you need to complete each puzzle, but many are easy to miss. If you do, you'll find yourself walking back across the map in order to do so. No need to worry as there is a twofold benefit to this. One, the map is not that big so even walking across the entire thing doesn't take that long. Two, the environment is one of the most beautiful I've seen in a game. This is hard for me to say, but I'm glad I'm saying it. The Vanishing of Ethan rivals Ryse: Son of Rome and is now co-champion of this generation for graphical and visual beauty. I was expecting Uncharted 4 to take this crown, but the dark horse of Ethan Carter now has this honor.
One of the most amazing parts of Ethan Carter is how the team over at the Astronauts blended so many different genres into one game. The town of Red Creek Valley resembles that classic "Anytown, USA" in the middle of Fall, something you'd expect out of a Stephen King novel. This is then blended with the aesthetic and warming sensation of beauty that you get from looking at a Thomas Kinkade painting. You know, those few seconds you just smile and don't realize you're smiling as you truly enjoy the moment? The sun's rays overshadow everything in town and cement that phrase "when it's darkest you can see the light". How these two completely separate concepts are integrated so seamlessly is a thing of beauty development wise, and is only strengthened by Prospero himself. As you progress through the puzzles, his Noir type dialogue and attitude draw and enhance the beauty of the environment. When many games combining different genres like this leave a mixed or rushed feeling in players, Ethan Carter provides a depiction which is so perfect where the only way to truly explain its impact to anyone is to simply hand them a controller, put them in front of a television and say "Play."
The Astronauts are careful not to fall into the standard trap of exploration games of making the puzzles so entrenched that you forget about the lack of detail put into the environment. You know, that feeling like you are just floating through the world just to get to the next puzzle? With so much emphasis on the environment itself in Ethan Carter, it's evident how involved you are to become in the game's story. Just walking through the woods provides you that "snap" of a branch or rustling of trees as you brush past them. It's little details like these hand in hand with the lighting and shading that I found myself stopping more often than I usually do in order to soak in the moment. Of course, this becomes more and more surreal once you begin to figure out the happenings of Ethan Carter's disappearance.
There isn't too much writing in the game, but just as in Valiant Hearts, sometimes it's more about what you don't say that really makes a difference in communicating a message. You'll find many times where rather than attempting to locate the next puzzle or crime scene, you'll walk. Just walk and look. And marvel. Overall you will only need about four hours in order to complete the game while solving all the puzzles but it's very easy to get yourself lost as I mentioned. The entire map is open to you from the start and not a single loading screen will be found in Ethan Carter. Total freedom is what you get when exploring the world. You can go to the far side of the map and do a puzzle then come all the way back to the start to do one there. The most ironic part about this is that total freedom is the same feeling you get when viewing the environment. Not in the way that you have the ability to simply go anywhere and look at anything, but more that you're free from everything. Free from thought. Free from fear. Free from all but happiness.
Near the midway point of the game when you begin to figure out what really happened to Ethan Carter, you start asking questions. These aren't your normal questions about the game, but about yourself. You start asking yourself if you made the right decision about some specific topic or certain time in your own life. You start questioning your own actions and what impact they had. Very few games are able to accomplish this task by getting you to reflect on your own life, but The Vanishing of Ethan Carter executes this flawlessly in a manner that makes it one of my favorite experiences of the year. Notice I said experience, as just by calling it a game will sell short its self-reflective moments. Just as the control scheme not holding your hand as the beginning message of the game states, I don't believe that is how the message itself is intended. Initially I did, yes. But after playing Ethan Carter the no hand holding rule is more along the lines of not telling you where to go, how to feel, what to do. In other words, total freedom.
The Vanishing of Ethan Carter is a must purchase game for PS4 and I highly recommend taking as much time in it as you can. You won't regret it as the Astronauts team has launched their first indie title out of the stratosphere with a beautiful blend of encapsulating feelings you need to experience to understand.
