View Halloo! Sir, You Are Being Hunted
Sir, You Are Being Hunted is a game that epitomizes the phrase "truth in advertising." In it, you play a Sir (or Madam (and yes, you can actually change it)). You are being hunted.
There's a bit more to it than that, but that's the game in a nutshell, and for something so simple, it actually is quite unlike anything I've seen before. I've experienced roguelike-like survival games like Don't Starve or Sunless Sea, but never have I seen one that leaned quite so heavily on the central tenet of being prey. Many survival games put you at the bottom of a foodchain that you quickly become aware of, and many will mercilessly spawn enemy mobs that pursue the player well past reasonable boundaries. With Sir, You Are Being Hunted, however, you are pursued constantly, and it can be terrifying...but also great fun.
I may have undersold the story slightly with my blunt assessment of the game's main conflict, but not by much. Upon starting a new game, you are treated to a slideshow intro narrated by your loyal manservant, who informs you that an experiment has gone wrong and you have been teleported to an alternate reality. Unfortunately, this is a reality where Victorian-styled robots have taken over, and have hunted humanity to the brink (or even past it) of extinction. There is hope, however. Your servant assures you that there is a device that can send you home. All you have to do is find the device's scattered pieces, somewhere on the five-island Archipelago that you have been transported to. By assembling the device on a mystical stone circle, you can escape your pursuers and be home for tea time.
As you've probably discerned from the language of the title and the setup, this game is very Steampunk in style. The technology and aesthetic is all clockwork hodge-podge and brass plating, extending to the landscape, your inventory, and of course, your enemies. The robots are probably the biggest highlight of the game. As you progress, so too do your enemies, from simple shotgun-armed hunters to packs of robotic dogs that literally shout "WOOF" to jet-mounted riders that blast train noises instead of bugles. Observing these varied opponents and learning their schedules, weaknesses, and patterns is vital to your survival.
Steampunk (or as the creators, Big Robot, insist: "Tweedpunk") is a darling of the internet, which may go some way to explaining Sir, You Are Being Hunted's Kickstarter success. With a modest goal of £40,000, the game ended up being funded with more than double, finishing at £92,551 (in Canadian sad dollars, that's nearly $200,000). The creators offered some very fun incentives for donations, including placing names of backers onto monuments and statues that dot the landscape. For me though, the appeal of seeing this game made and playing it lies in the central conceit's wonderful execution.
There's a pitch-perfect level of dark humour in Sir, You Are Being Hunted that all seems aimed at driving home how the shoe is now on the other foot. "The hunter," goes the cliché, "has become the hunted." This is a vibe echoed in the words of the creators in their messages on their Kickstarter page, for example:
Our most ambitious NPCs will take on the form of a classic British fox hunt, one of the favoured bloodsports of the rich and landed. These red-coated rider robots will be the most merciless - and the fastest - hunters in the archipelago. Once they have you sighted, well, run, Fox, run.
But moreover, the few insights you get into the humans that populated this world - usually from old letters you discover - paint a portrait of a society of total ninnies. It's a very British kind of sensibility reminiscent of Monty Python's best.
It's that fine line of pillorying and celebrating the ancient sport of hunting that really makes Sir, You Are Being Hunted a great experience. The terror of being the fox one moment, then chuckling with admonishment at the silliness of the hounds the next, makes for a great contrast that blurs into a jaunty romp. Have a cuppa and have at it.