Empathy: Path of Whispers - memories of the end of the world. Empathy: Path Of Whispers Review - Empathy Walk Walkthrough empathy path of whispers

Empathy made in sweden butit creates such a feeling, as ifcreatedand her in the CIS. The Soviet spirit has penetrated the design and plot, and the game itself is as exciting and thoughtful as domestic casual games - that is, not very much. Empathy is like this , whatever the authors would have done . Or, as an option, the series "The X-Files", re-shot by the NTV channel.

We, as an unknown child, are placed in a surreal, deserted world and asked to explore it inside and out. No one explains anything, and for a long time nothing is clear. The narrative goes through audio diaries, voice-overs, and much less often through visions. But the audio and visions are too fragmentary. They talk about details, about cases from the life of different, sometimes unrelated characters. And the comments, albeit more specific, are still cunningly silent about what is happening, who is saying this and why. They don't even explain who you are.

The world of Empathy is empty, depressing and... uninteresting. It's funny when you appear on the platform high above the ground, you see lampposts in front of you, railway and a huge sculptural portrait of Atlanta. He is still entertaining when it turns out that this is an elite utopian city for the elite called Chernovsk, where everything did not go according to plan. But then you spend two hours at the first location, stumble upon some puzzle with an unobvious solution, assuming that it’s not even a mystery, but a bug, and in the meantime you still don’t understand what’s going on. And then you realize that there is no desire to go further. The game just sucks out of you a good mood and at the same time your time.

Empathy plays like the same In Fear I Trust. This is a walker that requires you to search, pick up, study various objects, recognizing fragments of history through them. Some things can be taken away and then used: these are mounts, pass cards, mechanism parts, and so on. They are scattered all over the map. Most lie in plain sight and immediately catch the eye, but there are those that are well hidden, and nothing indicates where they are. Therefore, you can walk from one key point to another for an hour without straining at all, and then suddenly get stuck, because the necessary item was not in your pocket. Where to look for it is unknown. Not a hint. You start running around the location back and forth, looking again under each bush, looking in vain for clues in some fireflies. Of course, this game quickly and very tiring.

Even the second and seemingly most important feature with radio frequencies does not help. It is similar to what was in: you find a key item, tune in to its wave using a radio receiver and get an audio recording. The receiver also works as a pointer, only it doesn't point to everything and is often confusing. It seems cool for a very short time and quickly becomes an annoying, exhausting routine in which there is no need. This is such an extra add-on to the game to make it seem more difficult. You seem to be led in a roundabout way, when your guide, and you yourself - both of you know that there is a shorter and more convenient way.

Monotony and confusion would be easier to accept if Empathy was mesmerizingly beautiful. After all, it worked with "Ethan Carter" and even with the recent one. We experience the world first of all visually, and cool design with graphics saves any bad gameplay. But there is no such thing here. There are nice places, but they are few. More often the game is like a cheap tablet adventure. A remaster in a bad way. The only thing that is definitely good is the English voice acting. But these pleasant, diligently playing voices usually sound in an uncomfortable, completely dead silence.

Empathy doesn't feel like a finished game. She is not able to keep interest, there is a lot of superfluous in her. It grew out of a student project and has remained at the demo level.

Empathy: Path of Whispers

Reviewed version of the game: PC

Pros:

• Voice acting.
• Design in places.

Minuses:

• Very boring.
• Very monotonous.
• Not very well thought out.

With the light hand of Dear Esther and her followers in recent years, computer games a whole new genre has blossomed - "story-based research adventures", affectionately referred to by detractors as "walking simulators". Walking, here, of course, you really have to do a lot - but the main emphasis is not on simply moving around virtual world, as well as not on traditional quest puzzles, but on studying this very world - in most cases, original, atmospheric and mysterious - and on a gradual immersion in the plot invented by the authors, often no less original and very emotional. Like, for example, last year, Empathy: Path of Whispers is a very exciting first-person excursion into a picturesque and desert world - this time with a considerable touch of surrealism and in the entourage of the post-apocalyptic theme that is always popular in the gaming ranks.

Empathy: Path of Whispers

Genre adventure / visual novel
Platforms Windows
Developer Pixel Night
Publisher Iceberg Interactive
Website, Steam page

Empathy is the debut project of a Stockholm-based indie studio founded by a developer named Anton Pustovoit, who, with the help of several programmers, artists and sound engineers, including from Ironbelly Studios, who joined the project and was responsible for most of the 3D graphics, was able to realize his vision of atmospheric-narrative adventures on the progressive Unreal Engine 4. First-person perspective - as usual, an invisible and nameless protagonist: after several introductory slides designed to show us the death of mankind for completely obscure reasons, we find ourselves first in a certain laboratory, and then on the ruins of civilization - and in proud solitude. We are accompanied only by the voice of the presenter, who from time to time comments on everything that happens, and most importantly, fragments of the memories of its missing inhabitants scattered around the world, which we will collect, trying to restore the chain of events, similar to how it was done in such samples of the subgenre as or go home.

But what fundamentally sets Empathy: Path of Whispers apart from most other first-person exploratory games is the vast open spaces with virtually no four-walled confinement and no textbook narrow path with invisible fences on the sides that would lead in a straight line with no way to evade away from linear narrative. The scenario is strictly divided into five successive "acts", but within them you can move freely. In the game, we are waiting for surreal and deserted locations of varying degrees of abandonment: a railway station, a large park that has become a spontaneous refugee camp, a high-altitude settlement among the rocks, that same top-secret laboratory in a distant mountain gorge, as well as sewer and other underground tunnels that are mandatory for each case. By the way, the local city is called Chernovsk, and we will come across references to Eastern European realities more than once, from associations with the Chernobyl nuclear power plant to Russian, Ukrainian, Polish names and surnames constantly found in notes and memoirs.

At the same time, the picture is expectedly beautiful and stylish, and after changing from night to day and traveling to the mountains, it is generally very impressive. True, the price for this is the relatively high system requirements - 8 GB of RAM and a graphics card with DirectX 11 support - coupled with not the best quality optimization. Movement is carried out using the traditional keys W, A, S and D, the space bar allows you to jump, and Shift allows you to run, although there are no arcade or even combat inserts in a calm narrative game. It’s impossible to even die falling off one of the many rocky cliffs here - we will immediately be returned to our original position on solid ground. From the rest of the interface elements, the F key is used to turn on the flashlight (because we will spend almost half of our journey in night locations or underground), J to access the archive of notes and “memories” found, and Tab to open the inventory. True, this indispensable element of the quest gameplay is extremely minimized here: it will be possible to collect items in an amount of no more than three at a time, and often just one at all, the contents of our invisible pockets are displayed exclusively with text symbols, and all this goodness is applied in obviously illuminated places, practically do not allow ambiguous interpretation about their purpose.

Exactly the same illumination and characteristic flicker are used to determine other active objects that we will need to collect in the process of exploring the world and to advance along the storyline: those very “fragments of memories”. Most of them are optional: activating them allows you to listen to the words or thoughts of one of a dozen or two characters, whose story gradually unfolds before us, shedding light on the fate of the world and on the psychology of people who witnessed, and often participants in, his death. Some of these "memory activators" are required for review; at the very beginning of the game, we are also given a special device for tracking them: called by pressing right button mouse, it shows us the approximate location of the currently available key items. When approaching each of them, you will need to play a mini-game, adjusting the frequency and amplitude of the signal on the same device, followed by another phrase from the past (often accompanied by a commentary from an unseen host). After that, we either get a new set of clues to find, or we move on to the next large-scale location.

These transitions are sometimes accompanied by small "excursions into the past", where it will be possible to move into other characters at least for a short time and do something with their hands - but in this case, no serious riddles are foreseen, in addition to elementary actions to take some object and placing it in a specially illuminated place. Some diversity is brought into such a research game process isolated cases of puzzles with switching valves, opening a safe or even a stealth mission: again, everything is extremely simple and does not cause difficulties in passing. However, the study itself will not make you bored: the locations allow you to walk around to your heart's content, and the plot, although it does not shine with special originality against the background of other post-apocalyptic stories, is quite fascinating, especially since the Russian translation for once gives the impression of a very high-quality and literary (which is not surprising, given the already mentioned general Eastern European flavor of Empathy).

One can only complain about the architecture of the same type: not only the tunnels of underground sewers, but also many of the buildings that we will visit, either in the park or in the mountain settlement lurking near gigantic rocks, are made according to the same standard architectural design ( however, the situation in them is quite different). Much less justified is another feature of the game: the presence of exclusively automatic saves. Despite the theoretical impossibility of dying or going into a plot dead end, the game's tendency to include an autosave with or without a reason can, with special bad luck, lead to getting stuck in some inaccessible place without the ability to return back - fortunately, the author has already announced the addition in the next patch the ability to save manually.

Given the optionality of most exploration activities, it is difficult to pinpoint the exact time it takes to complete Empathy: Path of Whispers: depending on the tendency to explore every corner and look for all the documentary and "mnemonic" evidence of the past, not to mention simply admiring the surroundings, adventures in a surreal world can take six to ten hours. And if you like meditative music, leisurely walks through picturesque virtual places and thoughtful exploration of them to reproduce the sad stories of the people associated with them, this watch will be very enjoyable!

Site score

Pros: Picturesque landscapes; a pleasant combination of surrealism and post-apocalyptic; large-scale locations to explore

Minuses: Primitive nature of the quest component itself; automatic saves

Conclusion: Atmospheric and colorful "exploratory" game on the verge of adventure and interactive story

Walkthrough is relevant for all versions of the game

« Empathy: Path of Whispers» is an adventure game in which players take on the role of a nameless, sexless character wandering through a ruined world while collecting fragments of memories scattered around this world. These memories will be needed to move to other locations, and to solve simple puzzles, mainly related to finding and using the right items. Our hero is assisted in this by a scanner, which the character finds in the very first minutes of the game. Tracking with its help the location of memories on the light pointing arrows on the screen, and collecting them, the hero of the game begins to realize the depth of the events. The memories themselves are dialogues of pre-existing people who discuss their current problems or share their impressions. In addition to the main memories found with the scanner, there are other “plot” memories on the locations, they can be “revived” by interacting with the object in which they are enclosed.

Movements around the game world are carried out with the keys WASD using mouse movements to turn on the move and change the viewing angle. The key is used to run. Left Shift. To jump, use the spacebar ( Space).

For interactions with active objects that are highlighted on the screen, use the left mouse button ( paintwork). However, there is one characteristic feature here. To get the main memory, you first need to adjust the amplitude, frequency and wavelength of the scanner to the characteristics of the subject so that they match. To switch between performance indicators, use the right mouse button ( PKM). Adjustment is carried out by turning the mouse wheel.

The memories collected in the game are recorded in a journal, which can be opened by pressing the key J.

To illuminate the dark areas of locations, turn on the flashlight using the key F.

Inventory opens by pressing a key Tab. Collected items are entered into it automatically. In order to apply (use) an item, you need to move the cursor in the form of a circle over the object, open the inventory, select the item and click paintwork.

Menu games open by pressing a key Esc. Has a set of standard options.

Preservation the current state of the game is performed automatically, at certain intervals, as evidenced by the inscription appearing in the corner of the screen. The save is in the subfolder Save Games, which is located at (for Windows 7 ): C → Users → user(or assigned username) → App Data(hidden folder) → Local → Empathy → Saved.

Important. There are two types of memories in the text of the walkthrough: memories that are required to complete the game (collected using a scanner), they are highlighted in blue, and there are plot memories that do not affect the passage of the game, but provide information on the plot. Such memories are highlighted in pink.

Note. To enlarge the screenshot, click on it in the walkthrough text. To view additional screenshots, click on the active links highlighted in the text of the walkthrough in dark red.

Prologue

“Something happened to the world. The darkness, which had been sleeping in the corners before, crept under the doors and crawled into our beds ... At first, chaos and confusion ruled the world, then silence reigned ... ”.

Watch the introductory video.

The stranger turns to the main character, claiming that he should help him put the crumbling world together from the remaining fragments.

Let's get into the game.

We are in the control room. We take the SCANNER ES-15 lying on the table. Reading instructions that appears next to the scanner. We adjust the graphic characteristics of the device so that the lines match by switching between amplitude frequency and width with the right mouse button and rotating the mouse wheel to adjust.

We click on it.

The world begins to tremble, the warning system turns on, the red alarm flashes. Apparently, something is not right. Main character moves in space and time.

Act one. Chernovsk

Exit to the broken world

We are in the bedroom. We leave the room. Take off the hook KEY from the attic. We go up the stairs, open the door with the KEY. We go outside.

We look at the surrounding landscape of the destroyed world.

scattered islets

Site 1

Memories collected with the scanner:

Markus' memory 1/4 – a hammer lying on a bench on the right side of the site.

Note. The memoirs are numbered in the order in which they were discovered and may not coincide with the order in which they are placed in the journal.

Going down the stairs to the platform, we hear a voice talking about the abandoned object.

We pass to the right, set up the SCANNER on the hammer lying on the bench. We get a memory.

Markus' memory 2/4 - a box with a tool on the bottom of the site.

By stairs, located next to the dangling branch of the railway track, we go down to the underlying platform. We pass forward, look at the box with the tool, set up the scanner. We get a memory, we are transferred to it.

Storyline Memories:

Remembrance Savinshek 1/1 – binoculars lying on a table in a residential building.

Having received the memory of Marcus, we go to the left half of the site. We climb the stairs to the living quarters of the building. We examine the binoculars lying on the table.

Markus' memory

Storyline Memories:

Markus' memory 3/4 and 4/4 - flooring boards, which he must lay on the destroyed section of the track.

We take the board (press paintwork, and the board appears in the "hands" of the character), we carry it to the laying place and put it on the highlighted laying place (press paintwork).

A HAMMER appears in the "hands".

We hit the board once on the right and once on the left, securing it with the fastening pin. We go for the second board, repeat the manipulations. We take the third board, and lay it in place. We return to reality. We are moving forward along the restored path.

Elevator to the park

Items:

WRENCH - lies on the bench in front of the elevators.

Climb up the stairs to the tower on the right. We find ourselves on the upper tier of the tracks.

Let's go ahead. We are approaching the entrance to the park "Atlant". We turn onto the platform on the right. On the bench, in front of the elevator cabins, on which the “Repair” sign flaunts, we find the WRENCH KEY. We take it.

PART OF THE LEVER - removed from the second elevator. Using the WRENCH, unscrew nut in the cabin on the right, take the LEVER PIECE. We install it in the cabin nest on the left, turn the repaired lever.

The elevator car goes up.

We leave the cabin, follow the park.

Atlant Park

The park is located on three levels, interconnected by a stone staircase. The stairs between the second and third levels are broken.

Video games remain one of the most unique opportunities to tell a story in a way that is not possible in any other area of ​​multimedia. In the interactive world, there is much more chance to combine a person with a screen, and developers are experimenting in every possible way in order to find new ways to realize their plan. First-person narration, unraveling the mysteries of a once prosperous society and the voices of the past - this is exactly what the studio project looks like in an attempt to implement its experiment Pixel Night, and you are reading his review on the portal SIMHOST.

In the past, publishing house Iceberg Interactive released some interesting games, so I was intrigued by their Lovecraft-inspired project Conarium(Review of which will appear in a few days). In the meantime, we were given his relative in the genre - Empathy: Path of Whispers. Both games are told in the first person, but while Conarium focuses more on terrifying bouts of psychological, Empathy talks about moral issues.

The main character uses strange device, which allows you to reproduce the echoes of the past. To do this, you need to find the object highlighted on the device, tune in to the desired frequency. This fairly simple activity is achieved by scrolling the mouse wheel and switching between three channels - intensity, width and height of the wave.

In addition to listening to the stories of the old days, we also have to solve puzzles. Here you will find a more traditional approach for an adventure game - look for the necessary item, take it and continue walking until you get a place to interact with it, for example, to use a crowbar on a locked lock from a hatch to get to the sewer tunnels.

However, the main part of the areas that we will visit are more alive and look very utopian in the abandoned clouds. Well, when you find a huge statue of Atlas holding a small town on his shoulders, you involuntarily associate what is happening with Rapture, moreover, building history in fragments in Empathy sounds like a similar activity with audio recordings from a series of games bioshock.

At first it is very difficult to understand what it is about, because it is presented in small segments taken out of the context of a certain event, of which there are enough here. However, to be honest, it hardly went to the main storyline in favor. It's hard to remember at least one character by name. Yes, all these audio diaries are steeped in moral dilemmas - violence, regret, decadence. All these emotions stemmed from the decisions of different moral positions. This even fits perfectly into the name of the game - Empathy, but almost none of the above causes proper emotions.

Project Pixel Night takes a little from everyone, but in such a rudimentary form that it does not have time to open up. And when the moment comes that it becomes not interesting, then other shortcomings pop up. By the middle of the game, the next setting of our gadget begins to tire because the authors did not come up with any more mechanics. The same applies to tracking objects - in theory, the screen shows the outline of the desired thing, and we are already stomping to it, but sometimes the size of the object can be deceiving, and you will pass a couple of minutes before you realize that the plot junk lies on another level of the location , at the same time lift the camera so that it gets into the lens of the device.

Narrative games have reemerged after success telltale and cute indies like night in the woods or Firewatch. And this niche always needs experiments and distinctive features, which Empathy almost not. The passage will not take much time, but you will probably want it to be shorter. Not because of the boring story, no (she keeps it here until the end) - because of the gaps in the story, because most of the game you have to run and walk, run and walk, and at some point the voice blotches become less and less, which breaks the narrative arc. Who should play this? To the same ardent fans Firewatch, The Vanishing of Ethan Carter and previously mentioned, but with the proviso that, in fact, Path of Whispers can be skipped without regret.