The Past Within: An eerie experience for two

First played: February 2022. Total Playtime: 6 hours

The Past Within is a 2 player co-op point and click adventure/puzzle solving game where two players approach the game from the past and the future solving puzzles by collaborating in this spooky and sci-fi game.

NARRATIVE:

The Narrative in this game is interesting as it adds a lot of eeriness to the overall mood of the game. The two players are solving the puzzles together to hopefully revive someone. This process combines dark forces and technology, this as a hook works well for a game that is more about puzzle solving and collaboration, the narrative is deep enough for it to be engaging and mysterious, but not too convoluted so it distracts the players from the actual puzzle solving. 

MECHANICS & DESIGN CHOICES:

The hook for this game comes from collaborating between two players (each on their own device) not peeping one what is on one’s screen. They relay information to each other to help solve puzzles on their screens. In this way, both the players need to communicate to proceed forward on their sides. 

The game asks at the beginning to pick the past or future scenario (Past = when the person to revive has just died & Future = Revivification process is almost complete). So, essentially it kind of has a replayability by picking the two different scenarios but like most puzzle games, the charm is lost fast once you know how to complete the puzzles.

The puzzles itself just use the point and click formula to solve, ranging from fun to slightly tedious, the experience will highly depend on who you play this game with because again, collaboration is key here.

STRAY THOUGHTS:

This is a cool short game to play while chatting with a friend, you can play it 1-2 times before grasping all the solutions by heart. The creepy mood and setting add a nice flavour to the puzzle setting, where you feel compelled to solve faster as you feel on edge with something always lurking around you.