Season: A Letter to the Future Review – A Beautiful Exploration of Loss

User Rating: 8.5
A Letter from the Future - layer standing in a sea of death flowers

While some games stand out thanks to their eccentric ideas and exquisite combat, other even more evocative adventures can forgo these things for a tale that delves into the human condition. Whether it’s the inventive Behind the Frame or the trauma of Gris, video games contain a wealth of opportunities to explore our own emotions. Season: A Letter to the Future is a similarly impactful exploration of loss and change, set on the precipice of a new world.

Set in a time where an incoming cataclysm is set to wipe the canvas clean, Season starts players on a seemingly impossible quest. With a seismic change due to wash everything away, it’s up to players to head out from their isolated town and document the world before it falters. Initially unveiled to our own world during The Game Awards 2022, A Letter to the Future seemed to present itself as a melancholy walking simulator with a twist, and this artistic take on the far-flung future caught my attention.

 

opening town in a letter to the future

 

Design and Drawing

Decorated Using gorgeous cell shaded graphics, the opening village in the mountains is evocative of Mediterranean townships. Much like Tequila Works’ Rime there’s a mix of clean backdrops decorated with splashes of bright color. While our protagonist’s tale doesn’t stay here for long, this approach seems to continue throughout the game, continuing to mix subtle landscapes with an interesting mix of brightly colored objects, interesting individuals, and occasionally breathtaking landscapes. If you’ve had a chance to play Necrobarista, or are more familiar with the cell shading of Genshin Impact then these comparisons reflect my admiration for the overall aesthetic without really doing it justice. Even in its most oppressive moments you’ll find yourself stopping to admire the storm clouds as they thunder overhead.

Anybody eager to unleash their inner photographer on this utterly enchanting game will appreciate this title’s core mechanics. Dispatched to record the world beyond before the change of season washes the world away, players will get their own in-universe camera. Quickly revealed, this utility is accompanied by a scrapbook and an old-school cassette recorder in our exploration of what awaits.

scrapbook - who is dr furio

Go Play Outside

Wielding these tools and creating a collage of the world isn’t particularly difficult. Plug in a controller and a few easy to understand on screen instructions allow players to click, zoom, record, and paste what they’ve encountered into a flipbook for the future. Don,t however, try to use a keyboard and mouse. We had a torrid time trying to use these with frequent bugs. Throughout large swathes of this tale, it’s up to players to decide how to fill the pages of this ongoing memento with a pair of paper sheets gating each zone. This is intertwined with some narrative chapters that are a little more cut and paste. There’s a narrative necessity to these prescriptive interludes. Certain key moments must be captured for posterity,, but there are plenty of opportunities to simply roam.

Much of Season provides the option to engage in free form photography and exploration. It’s not just an opportunity to capture what has come before, but how the world is now. Abandoned villages, rituals for the dead, and the manic scrawls of refugees long gone all allow players a light touch or a deep dive into the world that was. Prescribed items of note are generally linked to the core narrative, whether that’s an interview with. A villager, a hopeful builder, an elder, or something more moving. These interactions and very simple quest like connections are a mix of malaise at the past, wonder for the future, and an opportunity to root the largely abandoned world in the hopes and dreams of those that still inhabit it. It’s difficult to get too descriptive without soiling the magic, but the writing is magical. The core gameplay loop circles around a mix of free form collection and narrative tales while cycling through the wilderness. Hopping off to take a few photos and moving on might not seem like the most engaging idea, but the delivery is mesmerizing. It isn’t all about watching the sun set as you race down a mountain or helping out an eager volunteer. You’ll sometimes skid to a stop beneath the skeleton of a crane, tilted over like the skeleton of a long dead beast, or pull up in an abandoned building. The environmental elements of this intriguing new adventure delve into the darker side of loss. They speak to everything that’s gone before, and how hope can simply atrophy. Manic scrawls, the empty husks of old machines, and even abandoned homes are early examples of physical and mental loss.

storm clouds gather above a broken highway

While this largely empty environment and the relics it contains can make for a beautiful but foreboding journey, other elements of this game touch on the ways that individuals and even groups handle loss and change. Instead of panic or defeat, there can be hope and acceptance as the end of something approaches.

Final Thoughts

Silence: A Letter to the Future is a genuinely original title that manages to be surprising in many ways. The stylized aesthetic and wonderful ideas aren’t anything like the post apocalyptic rebirth of Horizon Zero dawn. Instead, this end of the world is less about dealing with the fallout of our forebears’ actions than it is about how we experience the impact of personal calamity as it happens. I describe it as a study of loss, but it could just as easily be a commentary on societal change. That’s the great thing about the best type of art, it’s up to you to decide. In between the big questions, however, A Letter to the Future is a fabulous escape to a world that draws on Ghibli-esque melancholy, wonderful characters, detailed design, and an urge to go out and find what’s beyond the next horizon. Check out Season: A Letter form the Future when it launches on PC today.

Summary
A wonderful exploration of a world that is recognizable yet foreign. Fantastical ideas mix with the ordinary in a beautiful bacdrop. this melancholy act of remembrance might not play to action fans but it's a truly evocative exploration of loss and change.
Good
  • Looks wonderful
  • Great mix of free form and directed play
Bad
  • Keyboard support is woeful
  • won't suit action fans
8.5
Great
Written by
For those of you who I’ve not met yet, my name is Ed. After an early indoctrination into PC gaming, years adrift on the unwashed internet, running a successful guild, and testing video games, I turned my hand to writing about them. Now, you will find me squawking across a multitude of sites and even getting to play games now and then

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