Sea of Solitude an indie adventure game with a big message

Sea of Solitude is a beautiful game with a powerful message, Stephanie Bendixsen writes, but its ham-fisted approach made that message obvious from the very start and left her craving something a little more subtle.

Every now and then a game comes along with a direct desire to communicate something profound.

Indie adventure game Sea of Solitude by German devs Jo-Mei Games is certainly one of those — with lots of little metaphors wrapped up in one giant, glaring message of mental health awareness.

You find yourself in control of a young woman named Kay, adrift in a boat, floating amid the flooded ruins of a sunken city.

As she struggles to make sense of her surreal surroundings, she almost immediately encounters a large, black and terrifying monster who is blocking her way.

Instead of physically attacking her, the monster seems to prefer hurling emotional abuse. “You’re fake, you’re worthless, you can’t do anything” — that sort of thing.

Sea of Solitude delivers a powerful message on mental health, even if it could be more nuanced.

Kay, indignant, fights back — though obviously weary and defeated as the monster’s shadows continue to follow and engulf her.

By now, I’m sure you’re with me: the “Sea of Solitude” represents depression, with the monster taking the physical form of Kay’s own dark thoughts. And visually, Kay herself has taken on the dark, red-eyed and shadowy features of the monster as if becoming a reflection of her own self-loathing.

It’s a powerful device through which to communicate a very emotionally-charged message, one that calls back to a few other indie titles I’ve played that tackle similar issues.

2012’s Papo & Yo by Brazilian studio Minority Media for example, saw a child protagonist running from a monster, which as the game progressed turned out to be a representation of the boy’s alcoholic abusive father.

Video games can be an incredibly dynamic way to tell a meaningful story like this one. Putting the player in control of a character plagued by such turmoil creates a visceral connection not often achieved by other mediums.

The world building and design is beautiful.

That being said, there is a rather ham-fisted approach to the messaging in this game that makes it overtly obvious from the very start — and I found myself craving a little more subtlety.

The player needs to be given some credit, or at least an opportunity to uncover meaning on their own through exploration, clues, the characters you meet and the story itself.

In Sea Of Solitude, nearly the entire concept is laid out in front of you from the very beginning.

Most of this obviousness is delivered through the dialogue between Kay and the monster — and being a German studio, I wonder if perhaps a little of the nuance has been lost in translation.

Moving through the story it became clear that there was perhaps a little more mystery to uncover, but revealing these layers slowly would have been so much more enjoyable than being served so much analogy from the start.

Regardless of this, there are some interesting mechanics to tackle reminiscent of games like Limbo or Inside.

There are no real weapons or combat abilities, just puzzle solving and clever investigation.

Without any real weapon or combat abilities to arm yourself with, you will need to solve enemy-based puzzles by leading your shadowy foes into patches of light, avoiding sea monsters with timed platforming and some clever investigation.

All the while, you’re led by memories of happier times, lifelines and beacons of light to guide you away from the dark thoughts clouding your mind.

To dive any deeper into the story would spoil the plot, but there is thankfully more than meets the eye if you persist.

Being a relatively inexpensive indie title (I paid $29.95 on the Microsoft store) you can forgive a few technical struggles.

Platforming is somewhat clumsy and world design is fairly linear and contained — not to mention I managed to get my boat stuck on a few occasions which meant restarting from the latest checkpoint. Beyond that, though — it’s well made.

Sea of Solitude lacks a little polish but can be forgiven given its indie status.

Lacking a little polish, perhaps, but again — I think these foibles are reflected in the price and it’s far from becoming a major deterrent.

Overall Sea Of Solitude is a beautiful idea in which a very troublesome concept is explored through some strong imagery.

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An argument could be made that the unsubtle heralding of these ideas is purposefully done to have the game’s theme made clear to a younger audience — but I think even then a more cryptic approach could have served all players well.

In the end, though I do maintain there was a missed opportunity to make this something spectacular — there’s no doubt that Sea Of Solitude is indeed a beautiful game with a powerful message.