Years ago, before I entered the media game industry, I had a job that required me to drive around Kansas a lot, sometimes at night. If you’ve ever driven back to a Midwestern state at night, you know the surreal experience of it – the darkness, the lack of cars, the eerie, peaceful shows airing on public radio stations. late at night, the quiet buzz of a roadside vehicle shop with its eclectic drink selection. In the Midwest, in the distance, there is also a sea of red flashing lights hauntingly. By day, the truth about them will be obvious: the turbines on one of Kansas’ many wind farms. But at night, they look like small alien ships landing in the distance.
I never thought I’d see this experience recreated in a video game, but here we are with Glitchhikers: The Spaces Between. Glitchhikers recall the exact type of road trip I took in my early 20s, while also reflecting what turned out to be a common experience when traveling at night. In it, you’re behind the wheel of a car, or riding on public transport, or walking alone at night, listening to the eerie tunes that come out only during those odd hours. As you travel, you encounter other wanderers who join you to cast spells, drawing you into discussions about life, love, and everything else that comes at 2 a.m. when both can’t sleep, the stars are gone, and the mood is fine. for the big questions.
Creative director Claris Cyarron and studio director Lucas JW Johnson seemed pleased to know I recognized the exact vibe they and the team at Silverstring Media were trying to capture with Glitchhikers. They told me they wanted to encapsulate every type of late-night drive, while still hitting on a specific emotion that each audience member could recognize. It’s no surprise that the entire team has a lot of experience driving at night.
“I was driving around Texas late at night as a teenager,” says Cyarron. “I have a lot of insomnia, and in that window frame, I have a deep sleep loss, but still not exhausted, just can’t sleep and need to spend hours driving alone and listening to NPR and getting my first breakfast from a quick meal. food place when they open.”
Although The Spaces Between came out just over a week ago, Glitchhikers themselves have been around for a while. Eight years ago, Silverstring released Glitchhikers (since republished “First drive“) with the aim of recreating the eerie, present experience of driving at night. First Drive is short and fun: just driving, six different conversations with hitchhikers and a small set of tracks Despite its large scale, First Drive did well and received a positive critical response, especially over time.
So, with a little funding and support, Silverstring was able to return to Glitchhikers for The Spaces Between and expand the idea dramatically. The Spaces between includes new journey types, such as walking in a park or airport on the way to the red eye and traveling on a commuter train to ensure that even non-drivers can have a Surreal late night transportation experience. It includes 71 different tracks by conductor Devin Vibert with audio assistance from A Shell in the Pit, with different styles for each journey, effectively capturing the different tones of the sound late-night music on a public radio or airport sound system, or even the kind of personal playlist someone might put on on a midnight walk.
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They also extended the dialogues with the travelers across 50 different conversations on topics like weirdness, technology, friendship, relationships, war, hope, etc. It’s pretty short and choice-based, and while choices affect the tone of your chat and future conversations with the same hitchhiker, there’s little judgment about how you respond. They are discussions for their own reasons, rather than finding the right or wrong answer.
“Something really important to us… myself as a transgender woman and a lesbian, but we wanted to create these intellectual concepts,” says Cyarron. “And some of these really thorny complex issues, the existential questions of our time, we want to make them accessible. I think there’s a lot of intellectualism that’s a bit too restrictive. ridicule or slightly dismiss those who try to wrap up complex issues, but these problems belong to everyone on the planet and they affect everyone on the planet.
“Moreover, philosophy and existentialism and stuff… There’s an appropriate way to approach this in a philosophy class. And there are big, important people that you should know and you should. know how to interpret their extremely erudite writings.Step through all of that and just say that these philosophical questions belong to everyone who’s ever looked up at the night sky and wondered, “Really? pretty. What does it all mean?”
If “driving at night and talking to strangers” sounds like an alien concept to a game, a better way to think of Glitchhikers as a game of title, exploration of the concept of transitional state or at a threshold – subtitles “Mid Spaces”. Johnson and Cyarron say that’s what’s very appealing about nighttime driving as a concept for a game. It’s quite an activity. mundane if you just describe it simply, but if you’ve ever driven at night even once, you understand the weirdness they want to capture.
“When you’re tired, you’re almost halfway between waking and sleeping, especially on the driveway,” says Johnson. “You don’t really notice when there’s no other car on the road and you can just go. And so I think all of those things work together really well to create spaces where the reality of the vehicle is. You don’t care about your particular destination and what you will do when you get there You don’t care about the work you have to do, the appointment you have to meet or whatever You’re just this kind of in-between space that allows you to clear your mind and think about more general issues you may be facing in the world or broader topics that make sense. very specific to you and your life.”
As Cyarron adds, that space allows for meditation — but not the kind we often hear in health conversations. It’s not “mindfulness as we know it,” she says, where you’re trying to quiet your brain and stay still. Instead, Glitchhikers suggest a space to house thoughts as they come and go, and observe them from a distance that allows for new perspectives or new insight into old perspectives.
“There’s a quality to the architecture of a car,” she said. “You’re enveloped in. It’s so familiar. You’re watching the world go by. You’re in this empowered state. You have the means to be this companion, which promises to be banishable. obstacles and take you away, but you also have to wait you’re moving away from traveling from actually traveling, and instead you’re entering the mindset of travel and you’re transporting yourself mentally and conceptually, and perhaps looking at the person of you. I think these are all really cool things to be able to do with the game.”
Rebekah Valentine is a news reporter for IGN. You can find her on Twitter @duckvalentine.
