2019-04-01 PC Gamer

As his granddaughter, Sarah, you’ve

decided to take on the mammoth task

of sorting all his old stuff. That means

examining documents, manhandling

drawers, and generally prodding every

interesting-looking

thing you come across,

with Sarah narrating

your exploration at

nearly every click. For a

free game, it’s

impressive how much

voice-acting has been

crammed into such a

small space, and that it

compares favourably to many

commercial indie games.

SECRET STASH

You’ll learn about your grandpa, but

also about yourself as you walk

around the beautifully sunlit roof

space, investigating an old N64 with a

ridiculous made-up console name,

admiring an elegant typewriter that

Y

our grandpa has died, leaving a lifetime’s worth of

possessions in his dusty attic: piles of empty Werther’s

Original packets, stacks of Reader’s Digest magazines, and a

third stereotypical granddad thing. Except, in this

accomplished first-person puzzle game, it’s not like that at all.

Turns out your granddad was a rad dude – an explorer and occultist with a

collection of mystical doodads to uncover, and a library of magical research

just waiting to be rifled through by yours truly.

has mysteriously ended up in the loft,

or delving into your inventory to look

at your student ID, discovering what

your character looks like.

There’s more story and more, well,

stuff here than there

strictly needs to be, but

the result is a world that

feels fleshed-out and

well-developed, despite

being constrained to

one small room.

That room, by the

way, has been rendered

expertly, with the aid of

some lovely lighting effects and the

occasional reminder of the player

character in the form of her arms –

appendages you don’t find in many

first-person puzzle games.

It’s those arms, I think, that

separate What Never Was from, say,

Myst or The Witness. You’re an actual

character here, rather than a faceless,

puzzle-solving stranger – and, you

know what? It’s a comfortable fit. This

is Gone Home meets The Room – or it

would be, if only there was more to it.

Of course, this is a free game made

(largely) by a single person, so while

the production values are through the

roof, this is a fairly brief experience as

a result. It never quite blooms into a

fully-fledged walking sim or a full-fat

puzzle game, telling an unresolved

story and abandoning your brain, just

after it’s been warmed up.

However, there’s still enough to

this puzzler to keep you busy over, say,

a lunch break. You’ll need to combine

in-game research with hands-on

mechanical fiddling to get to the

bottom of its mystery, and see your

grandfather’s magical obsession

through to the end. That end is just as

lavish as the rest of the adventure, the

game surprising even in its final

moments with a sequence that hints

at more What Never Was to come. I

hope there is a follow-up, and that I

return to the attic, as I didn’t manage

to clear out any of Grandpa’s stuff...

NEED TO KNOW

WHAT IS IT?

A first-person puzzle

game set in your

grandpa’s attic

EXPECT TO PAY

Free

DEVELOPER

Alexander Hallgren

PUBLISHER

In-house

REVIEWED ON

AMD [email protected],

6GB RAM, GeForce GT

610

MULTIPLAYER

None

LINK

bit.ly/WhatNeverWas

82

A snack rather than a

full meal, this first-

person puzzler still

impresses with its

detailed, tactile world.

VERDICT

CLOCK AND KEY

There’s a cache in the attic in puzzlerWHAT NEVER WAS. By Tom Sykes

There’s more

story and more,

well, stuff here

than there

needs to be

What Never Was

FREE GAMES REVIEW

If this is his attic, I can’t wait to

see the rest of his house.

Sadly, the N64 doesn’t factor

into the mystery.

Grandpa leaves you a tape

asking you to solve the mystery.