Home
System: PC (available on Steam)
Developer:
Benjamin Rivers
NA Release: June 2012
Link: http://homehorror.com
“Now, the point of the story is this: Did the tiger come out of
that door, or did the lady?”
– The Lady, or the Tiger?
In 1882, writer Frank R. Stockton penned “The Lady, or the Tiger?”
a short story in which a young man faced the trial of choosing from
two doors. Behind one door was a beautiful lady, with whom he would
win immediate marriage. Behind the other door was a tiger of
inconsequential gender or appearance, who would win a meal of the
young man.
Stockton makes great effort to lay out all the details surrounding
the young man's situation. We learn of the loving relationship with
the kingdom's princess that brought him there in the first place, how
only that same princess has found out the secret of the doors, and
the internal dilemma she faces in telling her love which door to
choose. And as she covertly points him toward a door, the tale
climaxes... by not climaxing. Stockton does not tie up his story. He
leaves it in the hands of the reader to take the evidence presented
and choose what happened on his or her own, ensuring his story would
be read by frustrated high school English classes for all of
eternity.
Now, only 130 years later, we get the same style of open-ended
mystery in a nifty interactive form!
 |
| Retro graphics hearken back to old adventure games and add focus to the narrative. |
Home,
by Benjamin Rivers, gives players control of a man who wakes up in an
unfamiliar house with little memory of how he came to be there and a
dead body to contemplate. By exploring in classic adventure game
style, the narrative is revealed through the man's first-person
perspective, as if he's relating the events to an unknown listener.
Even choices to grab items don't come in typical “Take paper?”
fashion but more, “I wasn't sure what use this scrap of paper would
be to me. Did I take it anyway?” It's almost like the listener is
also a collaborator in some way, verifying whether the main character
did or not do certain things.
This
style is easy to get used to and starts to become a second
thought—that is, until the questions become a lot more influential.
It soon becomes clear that you need to take the sum of your
experiences in the game, including all you chose to do and not do, to
determine yourself what actually happens. It's “The Lady, or the
Tiger?”, but instead of taking the side of the cutest person in
class to argue how things might have gone one way or the other,
you're there in the princess's seat, making the ultimate choice based on your perspectives on logic and human nature.
 |
| Not the ultimate choice. |
And
even then you're still
not going to understand exactly what happened, leaving so much to
think about and debate well after you've closed out the game. Rivers
has offered a place for players to contribute their own
interpretations, and it's just as much a part of the game, really.
Stockton
received a lot of mail from readers demanding what the “real”
ending to his story was, and Rivers is probably going to get his
share of curious requests as well. Me? I doubt whether either ever
had a definitive ending in mind—in fact, I would find it supremely
gratifying if I knew they didn't. Crafting these kinds of tales take
a lot of effort, but the ultimate intention is external: it is
placing all your circumstantial evidence in another's hands and
seeing what they find out about themselves by letting their minds and
hearts fight over it.
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