In Hitchhiker, we are a hitchhiker with no memories who wakes up in an unfamiliar car, so we have to solve our own mystery in an impoverished limited investigation with little agency.
Hitchhiker , developed by Mad About Pandas and edited by Versus Evil, comes accompanied by a subtitle that makes it clear what we can expect from it: ‘hitchhiker’ means in English ‘hitchhiker’ , so to give the player some more context they put it to the project the last name ‘A Mystery Game’ . That is, we are not only a hitchhiker, but we are one wrapped in a mystery that we will foreseeably have to solve. As soon as we start the game, which is already available on PS4, Xbox One, PC and Nintendo Switch , we discover that we are indeed a kid who wakes up without memory in a car driven by a stranger and trying to discover how we got therewe realize that there is something hidden beyond our amnesia .
What is the mystery of this mystery game?
Unlike many other titles that happen inside cars, at Hitchhiker we always take the perspective of the passenger . We go from vehicle to vehicle without really knowing how or why, but on each trip we will have the opportunity to speak with the driver to try to elicit answers that give meaning to everything that is happening to us. We will do it in dialogues with several available options , choices that will not change the meaning of the conversation or the investigation at all , but that will help us to get to know the other better and to feel that we are giving life to the main character.
In each dialogue there are several phrases to choose from, but they rarely involve a substantial change in the plot.
Not only will we be able to get clues from the dialogues, but from time to time puzzles will also appear whose answer can be anywhere, from the glove compartment of the car to on the road . The possibilities of posing an interesting challenge from the passenger seat are quite limited and Hitchhiker accuses this difficulty by making the logical or intellectual challenges he proposes too basic to be attractive. In the end, the moments in which the game asks us to do something beyond talking are like small milestones on a path that is too guided, obstacles that must be overcome but that do not leave a mark on the plot.
ADVERTISING
Between the real and the imaginary
The best thing about this aspect, and the game in fact, is that the aesthetics of the work oscillate between the purely real , focusing on that decadent ideal of road trips in the United States (loaded with clichés, by the way), and the surreal. , with fantastic touches that give the plot an insufficient extra interest, yes, to save it completely. There are moments in which Hitchhiker seeks to surprise the player with impossible situations (the radio interacting with us, the car being driven by crows) that almost manage to give substance to the moment, but that do not finish curdling due to the lack of spectacularity, due to the absence tone or because of the poor construction with which they are presented.
The objects that we find will serve as a clue, but only when it is time to use them.
To this lack of charisma must be added an investigation impoverished by the lack of agency in it . From a mystery game a certain crumb is expected in the phase of discovering what is happening, but Hitchhiker plants the story in front of our noses and barely lets us get out of it to really investigate: the objects with which we can interact are they activate only when necessary, the dialogues do not change when we choose one option or another, the situations are always the same and there is hardly any room for error. There is no mystery because they do not introduce us to it , they only pose an unknown story that unravels as we progress through it and solve the odd puzzle.
(Very) guided research
It could also be added that the structure of the script is quite repetitive and leaves little room for imagination. There are a couple of surprising moments, but in general we play from a very static point of view, always performing the same actions, with the puzzles always marked at the same points of the conversation and with a very similar distribution on each trip with each of the six drivers with whom we spoke.
The ‘low-poly’, the color palette, the landscapes … The graphic section of ‘Hitchhiker’ is the best of the work.
Not everything is bad: its strengths, which it has, lie in its audiovisual section : on the one hand, the actors who have played each of the characters (in English, but with subtitles and texts translated into Spanish ) have made a perfect job bringing it to life and honestly they’re the ones who carry the brunt of the whole game. On the other hand, the visual aspect of Hitchhiker , leaving aside its rigid animations, is quite attractive and leaves beautiful prints in certain landscapes . In addition, it plays with different graphic styles, although it is something in which it is better not to go too far to avoid spoiling. As a final detail we highlight that Hitchhiker hastouch controls on Nintendo Switch , a small addition that is appreciated when playing on a laptop.
Conclusions
Perhaps if we take Hitchhiker as a visual novel rather than a mystery game we could be less disappointed when we realize that the investigation barely exists in its curious premise : yes, we are a hitchhiker who suddenly appears in a car with a stranger and without memory, but from there our agency is based on chatting with the conductors and touching certain objects that make us advance in the plot to continue witnessing a story that, on the other hand, does not have much fabric to cut. At an artistic level , their intention to give the game surrealism, the great interpretation of the actors and a graphic section that without being anything of the other world, leaves the odd beautiful picture.. For everything else, a game that has missed an interesting idea.
