Unmissable Mods Month: Dear Esther

Oh, don’t act like you weren’t expecting it.

I’ve written countless things about Dear Esther, and I’m lazy, and this was supposed to be Andrea’s day, but his PC’s imploded, and I’m filling in last minute, and wah. So instead of rewording the same old stuff yet again, I’m going to quote from the various articles I’ve already written about this glorious mod.

Okay?

It’d better be.

“There’s something enchanting about this foresaken place. Videogame worlds, traditionally, offer focal points and areas of action. Dear Esther’s island is devoid of anything you might expect. There’s a beach, and a hut, and dirt pathways that you suspect might not lead anywhere. There’s no clear destination; nothing to do except exist and explore.”

“Dear Esther turned me into something of a fanatical child. I was so taken by it that I drafted a thousand-word interpretation of the story and emailed it to the creator. Every time it crosses my mind, I scour the internet for people’s responses to this glorious masterpiece, reading through forum threads and blog posts and whatever else I can feasibly locate.”

“Dear Esther – which features no combat and no puzzles – is comparatively tame and certainly less overtly horrifying [than Korsakovia, thechineseroom's other notable mod]. But even it is full to bursting with spine-tingling moments. Despite being dubbed ‘an interactive ghost story’ (‘You don’t want to know how long I agonized over that,’ says Pinchbeck, when I ask if he feels it’s an adequate summary), its submissions to horror weren’t intended to be quite so pronounced, but they’re still very much present.”

“If nothing else, Dear Esther showcases the increasing maturity of our medium, and a desire to treat it as a true art form. Self-conscious experiments like this are the reason developers such as Valve release their engines in the public domain, and the reason independent designers are flourishing more than ever. It’s the sort of thing that could never, ever be released commercially – not in the current gaming climate, at least. But it’s also an experience I’m adamant every gamer should have.”

Why is it on our list?
Artful, poetic and hauntingly melancholy HL2 single-player with just the right amount of pretentiousness? Right up my emo street.

Get it from
http://thechineseroom.co.uk/esther.htm

Easy to install?
Unzip the directory and bung the mod folder in …/Steam/steamapps/SourceMods/.

PS. There’s loads of multiplayer to come in the second half of the list. Promise.