Forest Introduction:
"The Forest" is a survival horror video game created and published by Endnight Games. It unfolds on a secluded, densely wooded peninsula, where players assume the role of Eric LeBlanc, who must fend off cannibalistic creatures while searching for his son Timmy following a plane crash. This game offers a non-linear experience in an open-world environment, presented from a first-person perspective, with no fixed missions or quests, granting players the freedom to make their own choices for survival.
After a four-year early access beta phase beginning in 2014, the fully polished game became available for Windows in April 2018 and for the PlayStation 4 in November 2018. It achieved commercial success, with over five million copies sold by the end of 2018. A sequel, "Sons of the Forest," launched in Early Access for Windows on February 23, 2023.
Gameplay:
In "The Forest," players control Eric LeBlanc as he struggles to survive on a forested peninsula, desperately searching for his son Timmy after a devastating plane crash. Survival necessitates the creation of shelters, weapons, and various survival tools. In addition to the diverse wildlife inhabiting the peninsula, a tribe of cannibalistic mutants resides there, both on the surface and deep within caves. While not always hostile, they typically display aggressive behavior, especially at night.
However, the game's developers intended to blur the lines between the player and the cannibalistic tribe's roles, encouraging players to question who the true enemy is. Initially, the cannibals may observe the player from a distance rather than immediately attacking, attempting to communicate through effigies and sending patrols around the player's base camp. During combat, they employ tactics such as protecting each other, extinguishing torches, encircling the player, seeking cover, rescuing wounded tribe members, maintaining distance, making tactical decisions, avoiding uncharted territory, and occasionally surrendering out of fear. They also fear fire and may avoid approaching the player if there is a campfire or torch nearby. While there are no set missions, the game does offer an optional conclusion.
As players progress and explore the caves beneath the forest, they encounter increasingly bizarre mutations, including deformed infants and mutants with extra appendages. The game follows a day-night cycle, allowing players to build shelters, traps, hunt for food, and gather resources during the day, and defend against mutants at night.
Players receive a survival guidebook with information on the peninsula's wildlife and a basic to-do list to aid them. The guidebook allows players to place blueprints for various structures like bonfires, walls, treehouses, and traps in the game world. After placing a blueprint, players must gather the necessary resources, such as rocks and logs, to complete the structure. Most shelters also offer the option to save the game, as there is no automatic save feature.
Items collected in the world, such as herbs, animal furs, or tools, can be stored in the inventory. The inventory includes a crafting system based on the player's knowledge and experimentation. For example, crafting a basic axe requires combining a stick, rock, and rope. The HUD displays the player's health, energy, stamina, hunger, and thirst levels. Water sources in the game are often contaminated, requiring purification by boiling or using a water collector to collect rainwater. Food can be obtained from animals, plants, and other human characters in the game. The survival/crafting book also contains stats such as strength, weight, athleticism, and sanity. Lowering sanity unlocks the ability to build specific structures (effigies) available when sanity drops to a certain level.
Final Words:
The game's storyline commences with Eric LeBlanc, a survival television personality, and his son Timmy aboard an airplane before it suddenly crashes on the remote, densely wooded peninsula. Although they are the sole survivors, Eric witnesses Timmy being abducted by a red-painted man before losing consciousness. Upon awakening amidst the wreckage, Eric embarks on a quest to find his son, only to discover that the peninsula is inhabited by feral, cannibalistic mutants. Forced to defend himself while relying on the land for survival, Eric uncovers clues about Timmy's whereabouts through crayon drawings in various caverns. He may also spot the red-painted man from a distance, who flees if approached. These drawings ultimately lead Eric to an abandoned underground research lab owned by Sahara Therapeutics, a major research corporation that experimented with creatures on the peninsula. Inside the lab, Eric encounters deceased personnel and learns about their study of an artifact called the Resurrection Obelisk, created by a mysterious group known as the Ancient Ones. This artifact has the power to revive the dead but requires a child sacrifice. Eric discovers that Timmy's kidnapper, Dr. Matthew Cross, was a lead researcher at the facility who lost his daughter Megan to an escaped mutant. Driven mad by his daughter's death, Cross turned to the artifact and kidnapped Timmy as a sacrifice to bring Megan back to life.
Eric eventually finds Cross dead and the artifact containing Timmy's corpse, already sacrificed to resurrect Megan. Despite being too late to save his son, Eric realizes that the machine connected to the artifact can still be used to resurrect Timmy. He delves deeper into the facility in search of a live sacrifice. Along the way, Eric encounters the revived Megan, transformed into a cannibalistic mutant, and is forced to kill her as she mutates further. He then attempts to use her body as a sacrifice to bring Timmy back, but this effort ends in failure, as a live sacrifice is required. Finally, Eric reaches the facility's observatory and discovers a second artifact known as the Power Obelisk, capable of bringing down planes when activated, suggesting that Cross used it to cause the plane crash. Eric faces the choice of either activating the artifact as a passenger flight passes overhead or deactivating it.
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