Valley of Shadow Reviews

This game is important.  The idea of an autobiographical game - either explicitly autobiographical or just based on the events/life/feelings of the developer(s) - isn't new, but this is the first and only game I've ever seen that is explicitly biographical not just for an individual but for a whole family.  This game moved me deeply. You 'play' as Anthony - a real person! named Anthony! - as he works through his feelings about his family and a death of one of the members.  You meet his younger brother Nick and sister Maria via photographs and home movies, and these are real photos and videos from Anthony, Nick, and Maria's childhoods.  You work through puzzles involving light, etc, that feel very "classic video game" in environments that recall games of the 90s-00s, with lots of little references to games of that time. The oscillation between the challenge of these puzzles (and they get difficult!) and psychological themes of addiction, neglect, and suicide gave me a little whiplash, but in a way that made me think of escaping into games as a kid, when my time wasn't my own, and parents and school yanked my right of whatever book or game I'd escaped to. Playing through this game with the knowledge that this story is real, that Anthony is a real person - and Nick, and Maria - I'm not sure I've ever experienced something like it.  You can read someone's story in their own words but this is walking through Anthony's childhood home, as imagined BY HIM, watching actual videos of him as a kid.  Hearing his genuine description of how he felt and feels.  It's hard not to be moved.  Add onto this that we're of similar ages - we played the same games, I grew up somewhere a lot like where he did, and knew people in the same situations - let's just say I cried a lot. This game is really special.  If you're looking for biography, of looking for games that interact with the real world beyond just what you input, or are in your 30s or early 40s, or just like The Talos Principle or The Witness (but it never gets that infuriating - I haven't gotten every floppy, though ...), this is the one.