burial rites for the exiled and forgotten. what else can i do to save these people?

painterly in a way that eludes a lot of similarly inclined first-person shooters, genuinely really striking images presented here and accompanied with an eerie soundscape. it’s shackled to linearity both in rhythm and in how it opts to supply the player with resources, which admittedly may not have earned it the warmth it deserved back in 2009, but there’s an appreciated pointedness to its pace which perfectly accompanies its relatively short runtime. frankness is ultimately its greatest asset; most of the nonlinearity here is deployed through the vignettes comprising its narrative, portraying the north wind’s genuine tragedy with a leanness & brevity that underlines the humanity of its limited cast. as your journey shifts from something seemingly corporeal to metaphysical and impressionistic, it is this comfort with being construed as folkloric which allows its final moments to not only register as meaningful, but to provide this unexpected & poignant catharsis. really loved it.