Sad Games

Sad games are games that are heart-wrenching, depressing, and somber. They make the players feel like they want to cry or their narrative evokes the affect of sadness in the player’s emotions. As Bonnie Ruberg states “though sadness might be imagined as the opposite of fun, it is not necessarily mutually exclusive with games that are commonly considered good”(Ruberg 120).

An example of sad game provided by Ruberg is Gone Home:

Gone Home
Published and developed by The Fulbright Company, this game lets you explore a home in first-person and discover a narrative as you interact with the space around you. You play as a young woman returning from a trip overseas to her family’s mansion. It’s a dark and stormy night, the home is empty. Exploring the home at your own pace, you piece together what happened before you returned home. Gone Home addresses LGBT issues throughout it’s non-linear story and has been praised for it. People have questioned whether Gone Home is actually a game or not. Some have given it the term of “walking simulator” as an insult to the game. Several critics have called the game a great example of video games as art.

The game’s Steam page: https://store.steampowered.com/app/232430/Gone_Home/