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A Short Hike

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A Short Hike
Developer(s)adamgryu
Publisher(s)adamgryu
Designer(s)Adam Robinson-Yu
Composer(s)Mark Sparling
Engine
Platform(s)
ReleaseMicrosoft Windows, macOS, Linux
  • WW: July 30, 2019
Nintendo Switch
  • WW: August 18, 2020
Genre(s)Adventure
Mode(s)Single-player

A Short Hike is an indie adventure video game developed and published by Canadian[1] designer adamgryu and released on July 30, 2019 for Microsoft Windows, MacOS and Linux. A Nintendo Switch version was released August 18, 2020. The goal of the game is to reach the summit of a mountain known as Hawk Peak to get cellphone reception. It received positive reviews from critics, who praised its relaxing gameplay and flying mechanics, but were disappointed at its short length.

Plot

The main character is Claire, a young anthropomorphic bird who travels to Hawk Peak Provincial Park, where her Aunt May works as a ranger, to spend days off.[2] However, Claire cannot get cellphone reception unless she reaches the top of the peak, and is expecting an important call. For this reason, she decides to reach the highest point in the park.[2]

Gameplay

The player has the ability to jog, climb, swim and fly through the park. To reach the highest point in the park, the player must find or purchase golden feathers that allow Claire to double-jump and climb rock faces.[3] In addition there are a number of side-quests and activities which include fishing, finding lost items for other visitors and playing a volleyball-like mini game called "beachstickball".

The game has an adaptive soundtrack that responds to the location and actions of the player, changing depending on things such as the weather, or whether the player is flying.[2]

Development

In December 2018, Robinson-Yu took a break from developing his untitled paper RPG to work on A Short Hike and shared a prototype of it on Twitter.[4] Playing The Haunted Island, a Frog Detective Game and Minit, he noticed that short games can be successful, too.[5]

Rendering the game's world using big pixels allowed him to cover up his limited art capabilities. The colour palette for the game is sampled from fall nature photos.[6] To finish the game in three months after receiving funding via the Humble Original program, he tracked his progress using a scrum board, used the plugin InControl for controller support, reused tools and assets from previous projects,[7] and did not fix every bug.[8]

Technology

To prevent distant objects from being rendered as pixelated noise, the game uses fog to hide them and edge detection using post-processing to still show the silhouette of the background.[9] The landscape was made using Unity's default terrain tools.[10]

Game design

To keep players on track in the open-world game, multiple paths lead to the same outcome.[11]

Release

The game was originally released as part of the Humble Monthly program in April 2019, but received a full, official release in July 2019.[12] It was later released on Nintendo Switch in August 2020.[13]

Reception

A Short Hike received an aggregate score of 80/100 on Metacritic.[14] Cathlyn Vania of Adventure Gamers rated the game 4.5/5 stars, calling the game a "relaxing adventure filled with not only humor but the tenderness of personal connections."[2] Matthew Reynolds of Eurogamer called the game one of the top 20 of 2019, saying it was a "love letter to one of the most satisfying things in games". He stated that the density of the island resulted in "an adventure far richer than games many times of [sic] its length".[3] Kevin Mersereau of Destructoid rated the game 7.5/10, calling it a "palette[sic]-cleanser" game that is "relaxed" and "unique", albeit "far from perfect". He praised the game's flying mechanics, but criticized its short length and "anvil-dropped" plot elements.[12]

Awards

Year Award Category Result Ref
2019 2019 Golden Joystick Awards Best Indie Game Nominated [15]
2020 23rd Annual D.I.C.E. Awards Family Game of the Year Nominated [16]
Outstanding Achievement for an Independent Game Nominated
Outstanding Achievement in Game Direction Nominated
Independent Games Festival Awards Seumas McNally Grand Prize Won [17][18]
Excellence in Design Nominated
Audience Award Won

References

  1. ^ "adamgyru". Twitter. Retrieved March 18, 2020.[non-primary source needed]
  2. ^ a b c d Vania, Cathlyn (January 17, 2020). "A Short Hike review". Adventure Gamers. Retrieved March 17, 2020.
  3. ^ a b Reynolds, Matthew (December 23, 2019). "Games of the Year 2019: A Short Hike is a love letter to one of the most satisfying things in games". Eurogamer. Retrieved March 17, 2020.
  4. ^ Robinson-Yu, Adam [@adamgryu] (December 10, 2018). "I've been working on a new side project these last few days, it's been really fun and refreshing to build something new" (Tweet) – via Twitter.
  5. ^ Robinson-Yu, Adam (March 27, 2020). Crafting A Tiny Open World: A Short Hike Postmortem (Speech). Game Developers Conference. Event occurs at 3:00–4:12.
  6. ^ Robinson-Yu, Adam (March 27, 2020). Crafting A Tiny Open World: A Short Hike Postmortem (Speech). Game Developers Conference. Event occurs at 5:03–6:26.
  7. ^ Robinson-Yu, Adam (March 27, 2020). Crafting A Tiny Open World: A Short Hike Postmortem (Speech). Game Developers Conference. Event occurs at 9:01–12:06.
  8. ^ Robinson-Yu, Adam (March 27, 2020). Crafting A Tiny Open World: A Short Hike Postmortem (Speech). Game Developers Conference. Event occurs at 13:39–14:22.
  9. ^ Robinson-Yu, Adam (March 27, 2020). Crafting A Tiny Open World: A Short Hike Postmortem (Speech). Game Developers Conference. Event occurs at 7:53–8:25.
  10. ^ Robinson-Yu, Adam (March 27, 2020). Crafting A Tiny Open World: A Short Hike Postmortem (Speech). Game Developers Conference. Event occurs at 12:06–12:54.
  11. ^ Robinson-Yu, Adam (March 27, 2020). Crafting A Tiny Open World: A Short Hike Postmortem (Speech). Game Developers Conference. Event occurs at 20:35–21:54.
  12. ^ a b Mersereau, Kevin (August 3, 2019). "Review: A Short Hike". Destructoid. Retrieved March 17, 2020.
  13. ^ Calvert, Darren (August 20, 2020). "Nintendo Download: 20th August (North America)". Nintendo Life. Retrieved August 23, 2020.
  14. ^ "A Short Hike". Metacritic. Retrieved March 17, 2020.
  15. ^ Tailby, Stephen (September 20, 2019). "Days Gone Rides Off with Three Nominations in This Year's Golden Joystick Awards". Push Square. Retrieved March 19, 2020.
  16. ^ Chalk, Andy (January 13, 2020). "Control and Death Stranding get 8 nominations each for the 2020 DICE Awards". PC Gamer. Retrieved March 19, 2020.
  17. ^ "Mutazione, Eliza, Untitled Goose Game Are Some of the Key Nominees for the 22nd Annual Independent Games Festival". GlobeNewswire. January 7, 2020. Retrieved March 19, 2020.
  18. ^ "A SHORT HIKE WINS THE SEUMAS MCNALLY GRAND PRIZE AT THE 22nd ANNUAL INDEPENDENT GAMES FESTIVAL AWARDS". GlobeNewswire. March 18, 2020. Retrieved March 19, 2020.
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