Flight

Flight is a game about leaving an abusive relationship with only one significant choice, which I thought was used well. The PC has been living in a foreign country with their abusive partner and is now trying to make a flight back to their home country, only to be beset along the way by various obstacles (some more self-inflicted than others).

It’s a very small slice of this character’s life and the toxic relationship they’re trying to escape, but as the description above may indicate, it avoids the common trap of over-genericizing to try to make things more relatable. It’s very strongly grounded in this specific character’s somewhat unusual experiences and in who they are as a person.

As the PC makes their way through the cavalcade of complications that attend international travel, the stark, simple prose efficiently conveys their bone-deep exhaustion. It’s not just that they’re coming off a restless night at a hostel (where they didn’t even get to use the shower!); the whole situation has been draining their energy for as long as it’s been going on. It’s the kind of exhaustion that makes it so much easier to keep doing what you’re doing than to make a change—underscored by the knowledge that if you don’t make the change you’re never going to feel any better.

Whether they do make that change is, of course, up to the player. I recommend taking the time to see both options.

This is a fairly brief game made for the Short Games showcase. In it, you play as a traveller at an airport who is going through a crisis of sorts.

Throughout the game, it shows your mental state as distracted and unsettled. It reveals different details about your life that show it to be unhappy.

In the end, there is a single choice, centered on the main relationship you've had in the last while.

It's not a bad concept, and I liked the individual scenes. My mind didn't tie it all together, though, and the stakes at the end didn't feel as fresh as maybe they could have. I thought the writing was high quality overall.