Independent game makers can lean into unique art styles and innovative game mechanics, and they can take risks in a variety of ways that high-budget, AAA game makers can’t. That isn’t always such a great thing, however. The new survival-climbing, indie game, Cairn, is a good example.
Cairn has received lots of attention as a creative, mountain-scaling title, but it’s adventurous side then takes players in crevice-crawling directions they might not expect.
Players take on the role of Aava, a world-class climber covered in scars and wrapped in cotton climbing tape and chalk dust. Her goal is to climb to the summit of the legendary Mount Kami, a fictional peak that no human has ever reached.
To guide her there, you need to master the initially awkward task of moving Aava’s arms and legs as she climbs. Your path up the hazardous mountainside is up to you, but so is each hand latch and foot placement. There’s an automatic assistance system in place, but you must control each of Aava’s limbs independently—reaching for outcroppings and protruding rocks and figuring out which stoney crack to wedge a finger into or what slight bump to brace against.
You must also keep track of gauges that represent Aava’s hunger, hydration level, temperature and overall health. If Aava doesn’t eat or drink, for instance, she becomes weaker and climbing gets harder. Managing limited resources, then, is a regular challenge. What you can’t readily measure, however, is Aava’s stamina. There’s no gauge to watch for this precious resource.
As our stalwart climber clambers upward, you must watch the way her legs tremble, the rate of her breathing, how she winces on an unstable hold or whimpers as she’s losing her grip. Those indicators can be subtle, but they’re key to stopping Aava from sliding off a sheer rock face and potentially falling to her death.
Figuring out where to drive in a metal piton for a brief respite or as a security measure is important, too. Where should you camp, cook, eat and tape up your bleeding fingers and toes? How do you manage the limited amount of space in your backpack to maximize your survival? Those are all a part of your ongoing management responsibilities.
Ah, but those interesting climb-management challenges are only a part of the gaming experience of Cairn. There’s a story in the mix here as well, involving lost remnants of a past civilization, a desecrated graveyard, themes of sacrifice and obsession and the hazardous choice between life and death. (More on that in the Content Concerns section below.)
Cairn is a single-player game with no multiplayer or co-op modes, and the game does not require an online connection.
There’s a compelling beauty in the mountainous vistas that are part of Aava’s difficult climbs. The slow progress and struggles of the in-game climbing illustrate (in a small gaming way) the painful challenges of mastering a rocky assent. They also deliver a sweet sense of victory with each small success.
The game offers players three levels of difficulty: “Explorer” presents a lighter challenge, lowering stamina difficulties. “Alpinist” takes a balanced approach. And “Free Solo” makes the climb extremely tough, with all deaths ending the game.
As Aava climbs, she encounters the ruins of a lost civilization: indigenous people who carved their cities into the rockface. It appears these peaceful people were driven out and potentially killed by an inflow of modern civilization.
Aava finds a desecrated cemetery/tomb where the civilization laid their dead to rest. She stumbles over the corpses of fallen climbers who died in various ways during their quest for the mountain peak: some fell, some starved to death, some were attacked by animals.
All of the above plays into the quasi-spiritual symbolism of the game’s two possible endings—which is essentially a choice between life and death. We some meditative poses, and there are hints of an afterlife.
An elderly climber declares that there are only three outcomes to Aava’s quest for the Kami summit: a fatal fall into the gorge below, an ice spike to the head or freezing to death.
Aava meets a young climber who shares a bizarre beverage he found in a cave. This inebriant sends Aava into a drugged dream filled with bright colors and threatening animals. She wakes up later vomiting. During stressful situations, and when she slips and falls without dying, Aava will often bellow out a strong profanity in frustration.
Cairn is a mountain-scaling game that could have been quite challenging and fun without its M-rated content. But as it is, it’s a more difficult climb.
After spending more than two decades touring, directing, writing and producing for Christian theater and radio (most recently for Adventures in Odyssey, which he still contributes to), Bob joined the Plugged In staff to help us focus more heavily on video games. He is also one of our primary movie reviewers.
