Saltwrack

The first thing I realize is that it hurts not having a back button. All the visual detail, snippets of backstory, and comments from the people who end up joining my party—what did they say before about the second interpreter? I have to slow down and pay attention. This is a good sign.

The buildup of suspense before my journey helps me prepare, and explains why my character knows so much and feels confident going on this journey in the first place. By the time I get out there, I’m pretty excited to see this saltwrack, as bleak as it is. I see rocks, lichen, iridescent worms. Some tentative connections to our world, maybe? But real-life concerns are just unsettling shapes in my peripheral vision. The saltwrack is overwhelmingly large. I’m getting lost in another world, and I really needed to get lost in another world.

I travel for many minutes/days until, how about that, I walk right up to the ominous location I’ve been searching for. Would you like to enter? the game asks. As I loiter at this choice point, I realize it’s absolutely crucial that this game has no back button.

Whether because of my choices or my groundless expectations, Saltwrack didn’t really feel threatening until it suddenly did, and I was appropriately disoriented, like the horror movie victim who doesn’t realize what they’re dealing with until it’s too late.

Things changed after that. I played a different game, the game of the victim trying to get back to safety. Let’s not worry about the details of my mistakes. I let my guard down, and I paid for it.

But the game eased me back into the real world without punishing me for any missteps. I can feel the emptiness of the routes I didn’t take in a way that echoes the boundlessness of the world I just visited. But the outcome of my adventure feels like mine.

Saltwrack luxuriates in the space between heavy-handed comparison with reality and abstract sci-fi fancy, leaving plenty of room for internal reflection and personal connection with the material. I would call it immersive. I would call it art. I would recommend it for anyone who feels like getting lost in a story, and I will be mining it for ways to improve my own writing. I think it’ll haunt me for a while.

This is a masterful example of how minimalism can stimulate readers' imaginations.

Although the game is presented as a horror title, it is better described as a narrative game with resource management elements. You must travel to an abandoned city with two people who have special abilities and carry as many rations as you think you will need. Along the way, you may discover flora that has survived the apocalypse and that you may want to study to understand why the world ended.

Throughout the game, I never felt tense, but the world presented intriguing mysteries and opportunities that made me wonder if I should sacrifice some of my rations or the characters' energy to explore the world. Even when natural disasters occurred and impeded my pilgrimage, I could talk to my partners about their vocations and lives or just go to sleep.

The choices I have taken -- I am an Interpreter, I ignored studying many organisms, and I found something in the middle of the game I couldn't explain -- was certainly less than ideal. I must have missed a lot during my playthrough. There's so much I don't know about what I was doing.

But that is what I find most satisfying about the game: the choices I didn't take made me wonder, the setting feels beyond my reach, there are more stories than what the game can show, and I am awed by how little I know after trekking for 40 days plus.

Saltwrack was a magical experience, and I hope more people play it soon.

Saltwrack follows a perilous expedition across an unforgiving arctic landscape. The story is bleak. The odds are grim. The characters search for secrets best left undisturbed.

Gameplay
Saltwrack describes itself as a “post-post-apocalyptic” story in a world that has been devastated by snowfalls of salt and an ice age. The land is now one vast deposit of salt, also known as a wrack. Human civilization resides in six cities, existing as points of light, huddled at the edges of this harsh wasteland.

You are an interpreter- a scientist. The Observational Society has agreed to fund your proposal: to journey to the center of a salty wrack to discover its secrets. No one has attempted such a journey.

But first you select two individuals to aid you on the expedition: a saltwalker and an oracle. Saltwalkers know the physical landscape through experience and excel at survival, while oracles have precognition and interpret dreams. There are two candidates for both categories, providing incentive for replays.

The entire expedition- traveling to the wrack’s center and returning to the city of Hearth- is expected to take 40 days. Player decisions center on navigating the land with the guidance provided by your travelling companions. The game keeps track of your progress at the top of the screen.

Day 1 | Miles travelled: 40 | Rations: Plentiful

You also collect specimens and samples as proof of your discoveries. And no save features, either. Death looms behind every action.

All sorts of unexpected things can happen.

What frustrates me about the gameplay is how your choices don’t always have as much influence as you would think.

For example, (Spoiler - click to show)the number of specimens I brought back to the Observational Society had no effect on whether they believed my account of the expedition. The protagonist takes notes automatically, but surely physical specimens are needed as proof, right? Turns out, you can skip every opportunity to collect samples, and the Society will still believe you.

There are also moments where the game overrides the impact of your previous choices in favor of a pre-determined outcome. Sometimes the (Spoiler - click to show)female saltwalker would leave even when I followed her advice and established a good rapport with her through conversation. It felt like the game simply wanted her to be taken out of the picture, rapport or no rapport.

Despite this occasional rigidness, the game still managed to surprise me. I didn't think it was possible, but I somehow managed to (Spoiler - click to show)make it to Hearth with the second oracle where we recovered in the hospital clinic together. Usually, the oracles either die or choose to stay in the wrack.

I enjoyed finding every salt-sign glyph encountered by the saltwalkers. I found glyphs for (Spoiler - click to show)Contamination, Trap, and Death.

Story
The game is somewhat reserved in the amount of backstory it provides, but from the looks of it, there is a dead city in the center of the wrack. This city was once a hot spot for technological advancement until something devastated the world. You intend to find its origin. Spoilers.

Fortunately, there are other endings that are slightly more optimistic.

Further impressions
The wrack is probably the coolest (I don’t mean that as a pun) piece of frozen wasteland I’ve encountered in interactive fiction.

It’s interesting how it (Spoiler - click to show)almost has its own consciousness, tied in with the local ecosystem and (I assume) independent from what we find in the facility. Exploring the wrack for too long can result in you becoming “wrack-touched,” where you gain oracle-like abilities that enhance how you perceive the world. Your body’s biology can even be altered.

The protagonist is surprised to see that the wrack is not devoid of life. Rather, unfamiliar organisms- extremophiles- have appeared, their biology allowing them to thrive in this cold wasteland. I love the concise yet vivid way the writing describes these creatures.

Hydras, polyps, a profusion of tiny invisible life.

This life, however, is absent in the city ruins. We learn, vaguely, that the (Spoiler - click to show)anomaly created in the facility would consume natural ecosystems and produce salt as a waste product. That’s probably the clearest answer we’ll get.

We tend to envision the future as being high-tech, but Saltwrack approaches this differently. It appears that the saltfall and ice age has knocked humanity backwards in technological advancement. Any tech we encounter feels rediscovered. While there is no mention of computers or radio communication, we wear clothing made of synthetic fibers and travel in an experimental machine powered by a motor engine.

Parallels to our world
As is often the case with my reviews, I like to take a detour to explore some broader concepts. Feel free to skip this part. I'll stick it under a spoiler tag to take up less space.

Visuals
Just a basic black screen with white text formatted neatly in the center. Links are underlined and stats are clearly listed at the top. Its lack of frills fits with the game’s grim, no-nonsense atmosphere.

Final thoughts
Saltwreck is an intriguingly desolate work of horror with vivid writing that conveys the bleak, salty expanse of the wrack and the expedition that attempts to cross it. There are a variety of events that can happen during the journey, encouraging many playthroughs.

Over time, the gameplay can start to feel inflexible, but the descriptiveness of the setting and its harsh realities make it difficult to turn away. I enjoyed it immensely.

(And if there’s spiky mold on your rations, don’t eat it.)