Game news This hand-made game for over 10 years has captivated me, I’m going to resubscribe to Game Pass just for it
In 2024, Harold Halibut will be released, an impressive Xbox Game Pass game with settings made of clay, wood and metal.
Available for a few hours on Steam ahead of the platform’s next demo festival, an extract of around an hour and a half of point’n click Harold Halibut is playable. A nice surprise for a project that we have been dying to discover for a handful of years already. Harold Halibut was born in 2012 during discussions between members of the German studio Slow Bros during a dinner about their love of story games and stop motion. The title was first announced publicly for the first time in 2017, the subject of an unfortunately unsuccessful campaign (€50,059 committed out of a target of €150,000). A failure which did not prevent the team from continuing development and bringing its game into the spotlight of the Future Game Show during E3 2021. The wait has since been long, but Harold Halibut finally shows up the tip of his nose, its official release is planned for the beginning of 2024 on PC, PlayStation and Xbox (and in Xbox Game Pass). And suffice to say that I have a lot of hope in it.
The best game of the year?
Harold Halibut is, first of all, a long-term work almost entirely created by hand by a few great enthusiasts. “We started building dollhouse sized sets and puppets in our bedrooms”, they say on their internet page. You probably noticed it at first glance, the Slow Bros studio. uses a stop motion effect, this technique which consists of animating real objects, as already seen in the Wallace and Gromit saga. On the other hand only the settings and characters are handcrafted. In an interview recently given to gamesradar, artistic director Ole Tillmann explains that he leaned towards digital animation of his clay men, so as to offer movements that are still natural. The result is therefore a unique cross between a game and a stop motion film, made of welded metal, textiles sewn onto tiny wooden boards and clay faces the size of a walnut which constitute a splendid underwater universe. The latter is slightly indulgent if you want to enjoy its most beautiful textures.
A trigger zoom system gives you a privileged point of view on the small details of this world narrated a bit like a Wes Anderson film (actually author of the feature film Aquatic Life), and whose protagonist would be a perfect character. You will just have to get used to the lip animations which are quite confusing for the first few minutes. The rest of the movements are, on the contrary, nicely done. Also the movements, which we feared would be too heavy on the pad (accessory recommended by the developers for playing), are really correct. The experience is generally smooth, linking tight shots and wide shots to offer us a slew of moments of wonder and constant contemplation while crossing each painting. Of course, if you hate stop motion sets, move on straight away.
SF, 70s decors: Good atmosphere guaranteed
Harold is the name of our main character, a frail man, in his thirties, with very little second degree, but otherwise quite likeable. He is a member of a community that resides on Fedora, a sort of ark ship that fled Earth 250 years ago before a Cold War wreaked its havoc And which smells like 70s sci-fi settings. Due to bad luck, these beautiful people find themselves stuck on a planet made up entirely of water, with no escape. Great good to them, the inhabitants have gotten used to this lifestyle; apart from Jeanne Mareaux, the ship’s official scientist who still strives day and night to find a way to break camp and find a home where life will be good. And it is a fateful meeting made by our hero – who also serves as the lady’s assistant – which could well restart Mareaux’s plans. In his mechanics, Harold Halibut explores himself like a classic point’t click. The lifespan is estimated between 12 to 18 hours of gameplay, during which you will be able to meet more than 40 unique characters. The cutscenes include 8 hours of dialogue and animations.
1h30 of happiness
If the demo is rather long (1h30), it is probably because Harold Halibut allows himself a generous amount of time to establish his framework and his characters, whose intrigues initially seem as intense as a French drama. by Xavier Dolan. Immersion in the story is not necessarily made easier by some scientific terms to which you have to quickly get used to in order to get the hang of it. The end of the extract nevertheless leaves us with a mouth-watering cliffhanger and some mysteries to decipher. Overall, the principle of the game is more or less similar to what the excellent Mutazione could offer. : narrative game which presented itself as a “soap opera” and whose adventures were nourished by the gossip and little stories of each inhabitant. And this is not to displease me, the game of Die Gute Fabrik is among my favorites. As for interactions with the player, Harold Halibut is peppered with a few dialogue choices whose scope is still nebulous and falsely satisfying mini-games which we could surely happily do without. The title seems to have enough hooked plots and sub-quests to keep us interested.. Regardless, I only want to dive back into this world that is as dense as it is seductive.