Home / Indie / Shelter (PC) Review

Shelter (PC) Review

The rise of the indie game has been one of the most important features of the last decade. At least it has in the sphere of influence this glorious hobby of ours calls home. Titles created by a one person team with absolutely no publisher and PR might behind them can still find themselves featured in digital gaming stores and major publications the world over. And best of all they can be a major financial success too. Even with the most weird and wonderful ideas.

Take Shelter for example. Imagine the scene as the high up executives at Major Publisher X sit and watch a quick presentation from an outside development team. They sit back, dreaming of the next blockbuster Grand Theft Duty VIII alike they’re about to witness. One that’ll swallow up multiple working years of hundreds of developers, cost millions purely for outlandish press trips for their chums working for the ‘friendly’ sections of the gaming press, and be handed all those lovely game of the year gongs.

Instead, they witness an artistic representation of a badger and it’s cubs meandering gently through a calm field.

The proverbial faeces would strike the equally proverbial fan. The developers bottoms wouldn’t touch the ground as they’re flung to the curb by burly security guards, and the execs would have to sit back and take in Wall Street once again to remind them just how astonishingly great greed, and what they do, is.

Shelter is basically ‘Badgers: The RPG’. As the elder badger, you’re tasked with funnelling your tiny crew of five along a surprisingly linear path, avoiding the various dangers awaiting around every tree and bush. Falling branches, swooping eagles, and forest fires and all just waiting to steal away your cubs. And being a badger, there’s not too much you can do other than make sure you keep as far away from danger as possible.

Shelter, it has to be said, is no great shakes when you boil it down to that always difficult to grasp idea of gameplay. Hence the not too masterful score at the bottom of this page. Everything is solid enough, but this isn’t exactly what you’d consider a particularly ‘fun’ game to play. Particularly at the very opening which requires you to actually utilise one of the actions you’re not taught via the in game tutorial until you’ve been forced to use it beforehand.

Perhaps we were expecting too much. At first glance this looks like it could be some sort of procedurally generated world where you’re role is to simply survive as long as possible. Think Don’t Starve, but starring a badger. Instead this is just as linear as any big name blockbuster that funnels you along a narrow pathway to the next objective. Again, perhaps we were expecting too much for a game priced at such a tiny cost.

It’s not that Shelter is bad by any stretch of the imagination. It’s just that despite being merely a few hours long, it still runs out of ideas long before the closing credits. You spend your entire time rushing from cover to cover, avoiding whatever danger is next on the list, and push onto the following one. Yes it might be the dangers that a badger faces from day to day, but that doesn’t necessarily make it exciting gaming fodder.

One thing you can’t say about Shelter is it looks any worse than a modern day big budget blockbuster. Alright it might not be pushing your GPU’s to their absolute limit, but this is visual art. The reason every screenshot looks absolutely gorgeous is because this is something special to witness. It’s not flinging around millions of pixels per second, but the developers can proudly cling onto the fact that this is easily one of the most aesthetically pleasing games ever created.

Final Thoughts

It’s odd really that although Shelter seems like the complete antithesis to the big budget triple A titles we’re usually confronted with, it actually shares quite a lot in common. That being gorgeous looks let down by shallow, meandering gameplay.

At it’s tiny price point its difficult to try dissuade anyone intrigued by its premise, just don’t expect the moon on a stick. As long as you’re willing to accept that the levels of ‘fun’ you’ll find within Shelter’s few hours of gameplay never raise above a ‘meh’ rating then feel free to give it a try. The more adult titles that touch on mature themes like this that get sold, the more likely those high paid executives we all believe have lost touch with the modern gamer will find themselves out of a job.

 

About chrisp

Chris might have finally reached the age where he really should be starting to 'grow up' but that still doesn't prevent his expansive video game collection from continuing to grow. (Un)Luckily he quite likes to write about them too.

Check Also

Just like that, Alpha Protocol returns to PC thanks to GOG

Formerly long gone from online shops, developer Obsidian’s spy-themed RPG Alpha Protocol is back on …