Review: Talk Isn’t Cheap in Haunting Teen Drama ‘Oxenfree’
Image: Night School Studio
What happens when a bunch of teenagers have their mundane lives interrupted by a chance encounter with the supernatural? Provided you’ve watched any TV or seen any movies in the past, say, 40 years, you know the answer: They tease the fat kid, overcome their insecurities, and save the world. And probably ride dirt bikes.
Oxenfree, the debut game from indie developer Night School Studio, does a marvelous job elevating this well-worn premise into something unique. It’s a surprisingly engaging game that makes what’s often the dullest part of gaming — the conversations between characters — the real star of the show.
You play Alex, a 17-year-old girl with a complicated family life: Her big brother passed away, her mom remarried, and she’s now awkwardly faced with getting to know her new stepbrother, Jonas. Joined by a few friends, Alex and Jonas head out to a local touristy island with plans to get loaded by a campfire and root around a creepy cave. Naturally (or supernaturally), things go sideways and the island turns out to hide some otherworldly secrets. It’s Lost by way of Freaks and Geeks.
But Oxenfree isn’t so much about cracking the island’s mysteries as it is about cracking jokes with your pals. You spend most of your time walking through the island’s various points of interest and chatting up your friends, and it’s in these stretches that the game finds its voice. Night School Studio lead writer Adam Hines spent time at Telltale Games, and the influence is immediately apparent. You can choose three different responses to Alex’s friends; over time, your choices alter the shape of the story and the way characters treat one another.
That’s been done before, of course, but Oxenfree strays from the Telltale formula in a number of pleasant ways. Rarely do you feel like you’re making huge, impactful decisions (there’s really only one major, obvious fork), as the script instead focuses on the incidental, smaller beats that define relationships. The game’s impressive writing and wonderful delivery perfectly nails the natural, casual rhythms of real conversations. You never feel pulled out of the experience by staring at a button prompt (there are very few prompts in the game, period); characters even talk over one another when it’s appropriate. Close your eyes and you might as well be listening to a lost episode of My So-Called Life.
Or perhaps Buffy the Vampire Slayer, because beneath the teen drama lies a genuinely spooky, time-bending story. Oxenfree isn’t a horror game, per se — you won’t turn a corner and run into a monster — but it revels in jarring, unsettling moments that keep both its characters and its players off balance. It’s tempting to compare Oxenfree’s vision to other sci-fi coming-of-age stories, but while it channels bits and pieces of Super 8, Poltergeist, and, naturally, The Goonies, it’s more an homage than a derivative copycat.
The island holds a few nasty secrets, at the heart of which lies something few contemporary teens have ever seen in the wild: a handheld radio. Tuning into different stations yields some old music, odd sounds, and, weirdly, the ability to unlock doors and communicate with the island’s … inhabitants. (I am trying really hard not to spoil anything here.) It’s the game’s only real tool — you don’t manage an inventory or even do much in the way of puzzle-solving — and tuning into random stations searching for cool stuff to listen to never gets old.
Image: Night School Studio
Unfortunately, walking around the island does. Oxenfree’s multiple-path narrative is penned in by an adventure that has you repeatedly crisscrossing the island, and it’s often a slog. The fun conversations help buoy these treks, but over the course of the game, the back-and-forth wears thin. Alex walks slowly and cannot veer from each screen’s set pathways. There is no running, and you can’t blaze a trail through the woods or over a hill — even when you’ve passed through a screen a half-dozen times before. For a game about a bunch of teens on an illicit island overnight, it’s just too strict.
It also suffers a bit from a lack of gameplay. Other than picking responses and tuning the radio, you do precious little in Oxenfree. Considering you’re stuck on an island teeming with paranormal activity, how about some puzzles? A little more interaction would have added some variety and given players a reprieve from Oxenfree’s at-times sluggish pace. Its brief, three-hour runtime encourages multiple playthroughs, however, and you’ll likely want to give it another go the moment you reach your particular ending.
That speaks to the strength of Oxenfree’s script and well-developed characters. Despite its supernatural trappings, this is a game very much about the human condition, love and loss, and how even the most innocuous decisions can leave the deepest footprints. There’s some great work here, and while Oxenfree isn’t without flaws, like its teenage cast, it points to a promising future.
What’s hot: Realistic conversations, excellent delivery, gripping plot
What’s not: Pacing problems, excessive backtracking; needs more interactivity
Platform reviewed: PC
Ben Silverman went to college with the guy who played Chunk in The Goonies. He’s happy to tell you all about it on Twitter at @ben_silverman
