Episode 103 - Seal Team Six - Heaven's Vault

Podcasts don’t always have a tidy beginning. Welcome back to the
podcast! This week we’re joined by Janelle and are going to be
talking about Heaven’s Vault, an adventure game with a focus on
linguistics that was developed by Inkle. As you can imagine based
on that description, this game has a very different way of engaging
you mechanically than other games, even within the adventure genre.
While the game is designed to deliver on its narrative, the story
of an archaeologist exploring ancient ruins within the game’s
sci-fi setting to discover details about the civilization that once
lived there, one the fulcrum that story is balanced on involves
deciphering a surprisingly fleshed out fictional written language.
While this element of the game can be engaged with in the style of
other puzzles in video games, by finding patterns and using the
in-game context to figure out which symbols correspond to which
words, it still hits on the critical thinking skills many games’
puzzles fail to stimulate. The result is a game that is
surprisingly rewarding and does something that very few other games
accomplish: making you feel like you’re actually doing the same
thing your character is. We’re going to be talking about the
robustness of the translation systems and the overarching impact
that language has on the game, the highs and lows of the other more
video game-y elements of the game, and by which specialty coffee
name you should refer to the state prior to “new game plus.” Thank
you for joining us this week, and thanks again to Janelle for
coming on and sharing her comparable expertise on the subject, as I
think it really helped open up the dialogue beyond what Andy and I
could have mustered on our own. How did this game sit for you? Were
you excited to begin recognizing patterns of symbols and take the
time to figure out what a “morpheme” is? Did you also think that
Aliya moved too damn slow? Was Six your loyal companion and best
friend forever, or an unhelpful trash robot? Let us know in the
comments or on our Discord! Next time, we’re going to be talking
about No More Heroes, because we thought the idea of doing two
games that shared anything in common in a row absolutely repulsive.
So join us then to hear more of what you’re used to from us: games
from over ten years ago!