Laughing Hyena
  • Home
  • Hyena Games
  • Esports
  • NFT Gaming
  • Crypto Trends
  • Game Reviews
  • Game Updates
  • GameFi Guides
  • Shop
Tag:

lighthouse

I never expected to become emotionally invested in a lighthouse, but Keeper's surreal artistic direction and dedication to accessibility has done just that
Game Reviews

I never expected to become emotionally invested in a lighthouse, but Keeper’s surreal artistic direction and dedication to accessibility has done just that

by admin August 26, 2025


Some of us absolutely love to push ourselves when it comes to games, and believe the harder the better. Overcoming such challenges can offer an immense thrill and sense of achievement, after all. There are even some among us who won’t reduce the difficulty level in a game if we are struggling, and would actually rather stop playing altogether.

On the flip side (and let it be known, I really don’t think there is a right or wrong way to enjoy a game as long as the player is happy and not being unkind to others), there are also those of us who want an experience that is less about an onslaught of rock-hard enemies that relentlessly grind us into the ground, or puzzles that require a Mensa membership to decipher. Many of us take pleasure in games that offer up an easy-going, stress-free escape for a couple of hours at the end of a long day. This flexible approach is something that is also important for Psychonauts and Brütal Legend developer Double Fine.

The studio’s most recent title – Psychonauts 2 – featured a range of accessibility options, including an invincibility mode, on release. This meant that those that wanted to could dial up the difficulty to max, while others could make their way through the game without any fear of ‘failing’. This accessible approach will remain for Double Fine’s next release, which is known as Keeper and follows the story of a sentient lighthouse and its bird companion.


To see this content please enable targeting cookies.

Manage cookie settings

Speaking to Eurogamer at Gamescom, studio head Tim Schafer said accessibility is a “big thing” for Double Fine, and something Microsoft – which acquired the developer in 2019 – has supported. “[Microsoft] has a lot of testing that you can do for all sorts of levels of accessibility, and Keeper is a very accessible game that is very easy to control – there’s not a lot of buttons to get used to,” Schafer said, before adding:

“Something we always emphasise with our games is accessibility, and for all different types of players, because I always believe you don’t want to tell someone how to play your game. If they want to turn the difficulty down, they can do that.

“Some people just like the character design, and the world. We don’t want to lock them out.”

When asked if Keeper has any peril, the studio founder said you “can’t fail and you can’t die” during the game’s run time, which is roughly six to eight hours. “It’s more about the flow, and wandering through the atmosphere,” Schafer explained.

Image credit: Double Fine

As I’ve said, Keeper will chronicle the adventures of a lighthouse which quite unexpectedly comes alive, complete with tendril-like legs that allow it to walk around a mysterious island along with its bird companion, Twig. Think that all sounds a little bit odd? Well, good. That’s exactly what Double Fine is going for. “[Creative lead Lee Petty] was like ‘I want to get really weird’,” Schafer said of Keeper. “We wanted to make something we probably couldn’t have gotten signed with a publisher [when Double Fine was independent]. It’s really artistic, and it doesn’t make sense at first, but it is really engrossing.”

In terms of gameplay, Keeper will boast a mixture of exploration, puzzle solving and in the words of Schafer, plenty to surprise and perhaps even shock players. During the Keeper presentation, which showed off sections earlier in the game, I watched the lighthouse use its beam to manipulate the world around it, opening up pathways not previously seen. Meanwhile, Twig could perch on switches or place items that were beyond the lighthouse’s reach to allow the twosome to progress.

Purely from a more aesthetic point of view, inspirations for Keeper include surrealist painters such as Salvador Dali and Max Ernst, as well as films like The Dark Crystal. It all marries together to make for a striking and already oh-so-charming combination of colour and creativity.

Image credit: Double Fine

Something Keeper won’t have though, is any dialogue, with the game described as “a story told without words”. During an additional group Q&A about the game, I asked Schafer what it was like for the studio to create a narrative without using any actual voices.

“It’s interesting, because I am not even on the team or it would have tons of dialogue, like the lighthouse would say ‘I’m too old for this shit’,” he joked, before adding that Keeper’s development was all about working to the strengths of those involved. This includes Petty, who Schafer said is a wonder when it comes to telling stories through visuals. Along with work on Keeper, Petty has also served as art director for Brütal Legend, and acted as creative lead on numerous other projects at Double Fine including the matryoshka doll-themed puzzler Stacking, sci-fi side-scroller Headlander and post-post-apocalyptic roguelike RAD.

“He’s an artist, and the animators are used to an aesthetic where they’re trying to tell a story even if you have the volume off,” Double Fine’s chief said. “The bird, Twig, he’s very expressive. You can tell how Twig feels about everything, you can how the lighthouse feels. The lighthouse seems to have facial expressions. It’s still an emotional storyline. The characters still have character arcs, they have feelings, they have a bond, they have a companionship.”

“We approach these creative topics with the tools that we have,” Schafer closed. “I’m a writer, so that’s where I start. Lee and his team started from a different place, and that’s one of the strengths of the studio.”

Keeper – Official Announce Trailer. Watch on YouTube

Alas, I did not get to go hands-on with Keeper during Double Fine’s Gamescom presentation, but even so, this is easily one of my most anticipated games coming out this year. I honestly never expected to become emotionally invested in a lighthouse, but even from just a few short snippets of gameplay and trailers, I am already deeply invested in the wellbeing of Keeper’s lighthouse, with its characterful beam illuminating and affecting the surreal but beautiful world it has found itself in. Oh yes, Keeper is definitely one I will be keeping a very close eye on.

Keeper is set to release later this year, on 17th October, across Xbox Series X/S, PC, and Game Pass.



Source link

August 26, 2025 0 comments
0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail
Keeper Is A Salvador Dali-Inspired Surrealist Adventure With No Dialogue, No Combat, And A Walking Lighthouse
Game Updates

Keeper Is A Salvador Dali-Inspired Surrealist Adventure With No Dialogue, No Combat, And A Walking Lighthouse

by admin August 21, 2025


It’s not often I’m thrown when previewing a video game. But thrown is exactly what I was when I stepped into the unassuming Xbox Room #10 in Xbox’s business hall booth during Day 1 of Gamescom 2025. There were six seats, a small table, and a television showcasing Keeper, the upcoming adventure game from Psychonauts developer Double Fine Productions centered around a walking lighthouse and a bird. Oh, and the studio’s CEO and games industry legend, Tim Schafer. 

Nobody told me the person showcasing Keeper would be Schafer, and it’s kinda wild to walk into a room and be surprise-greeted by a developer you massively respect. Of course, Schafer is a true gentleman, kind, and genuinely hilarious, so the nerves quickly disappear as he walks me through three previously recorded gameplay segments of Keeper. 

 

I promise I’ll talk about those segments, but everything Schafer told me beforehand was just as interesting (possibly more). First off, it’s his first time doing press since 2021 with Psychonauts 2, so Schafer explains that he’s nervous – ahhh, even ground – and his first time at Gamescom in 16 years! Though he was here in person to talk about Keeper, he mostly speaks about Lee Petty, the game’s director (and Brutal Legend and Broken Age art director) and the person behind the wild idea that is Keeper. 

Schafer says Keeper wouldn’t exist without Double Fine becoming an Xbox studio. “Around the time we had just joined the Xbox family, we were wondering what we should make next,” Schafer says. “We have support; we have money; and we don’t have to worry about going out of business every day, and we don’t have to pitch to publishers, ‘Please make our game, it’s very commercial.'” 

At the same time, Petty was busy thinking about his time during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic. He was locked in his home like the rest of us, but he found solace in nature hikes amongst the hills around San Francisco. He couldn’t get an idea out of his head: what if humanity didn’t survive this, but nature did and took over in our place? It’s here that Schafer explains Petty is a “weird dude who loves strange images, and grew up loving Dark Crystal and Salvador Dali.” 

The result of all that pondering is Keeper – weird and chill, like Petty and his interests, Schafer says. He then describes the game as an adventure game with puzzles – light puzzles, though, because Keeper is about the “atmosphere and vibes and companionship between these two.” The two he’s talking about are Twig, a sea bird, and an unnamed lighthouse. After a violent sea storm isolates Twig from her flock, she perches on a lighthouse. For some reason, this awakens the lighthouse, it tips over, and in the resulting crash, it grows legs. Typical lighthouse behavior. 

Awakened and the new owner of legs, this lighthouse feels immediately called to a giant mountain peak atop the island it’s on. So, it begins heading that way, with Twig in tow. Controlling the lighthouse consists of moving through surrealist and fantastical landscapes and shining your beam on things. You can shine your beam on plants and sometimes they’ll grow; you can shine your beam on gears and sometimes Twig will fly to them and rotate them to unlock gates; you can shine your beam on strange pot creatures that crash to the floor beneath them, sometimes revealing objects for Twig to interact with. 

Your primary method of interacting with this world is your beam, and second to that is Twig. This might just be a me thing as someone who lives a couple hours away from Disney World and has a fondness for the technology of animatronics, but Keeper most reminds me of a Disney dark ride. If you’re unfamiliar with that term, dark rides include Pirates of the Caribbean and The Haunted Mansion. It’s less about thrills and more about experiencing the things around you, watching animatronics move to tell a story, and soaking in the vibes. That’s Keeper. 

I love that shining your light on objects causes them to emote or come to life with animation. It might not affect your journey forward or be part of a puzzle every time, but that’s okay – it’s about the vibes! It’s about watching the animatronics of this world, as it were, do things that make the surrounding area feel real, like it has its own story to tell. 

The puzzles I see seem simple and quick, but I can’t help keeping an eye on the things outside the primary focus of these gameplay videos. I see sunflowers dance as light grazes over them, carrots come to life and dive bomb into the soil below, and more. It really feels like a Double Fine dark ride in the most complimentary way. 

Of course, I see some other things that catch my eye. At one point, Twig becomes a giant egg atop the lighthouse for some reason. I see a village of tiny lil guys that are rusty watches. I see the lighthouse prance through pink pollen that gives it a light, low-gravity effect when it jumps. Everything I see looks vastly different from what I witness moments before, but it’s all oozing with Double Fine and surrealist Salvador Dali-inspired charm. 

Some areas are more linear, designed around puzzles, Schafer says. Other areas are more open, prime for exploration. Regardless of where you are in the lighthouse’s journey to the mountain peak, Schafer says Keeper is ultimately about change; how nature changes, how Twig changes, how the lighthouse changes. Every character, including Twig and the Lighthouse, has a story arc, he adds. 

When I ask Schafer why Petty decided to have players control a lighthouse, Schafer laughs – he doesn’t actually know. He says the lighthouse was one of the game’s side characters, but when he saw it walking with legs, he told Petty that needs to be the game. “It was compelling,” Schafer says. “It really looked like something from a surrealist painting.” 

Schafer ends my presentation further explaining Double Fine’s love of nonsense and the bizarre, the type of work directors David Lynch and David Cronenberg are interested in making, he says. I see the vision. 

Keeper is a weird game, but it has that undeniable Double Fine charm. I can’t wait to actually play it when it launches on October 17 on Xbox Series X/S and PC. 



Source link

August 21, 2025 0 comments
0 FacebookTwitterPinterestEmail

Categories

  • Crypto Trends (1,098)
  • Esports (800)
  • Game Reviews (772)
  • Game Updates (906)
  • GameFi Guides (1,058)
  • Gaming Gear (960)
  • NFT Gaming (1,079)
  • Product Reviews (960)

Recent Posts

  • This 5-Star Dell Laptop Bundle (64GB RAM, 2TB SSD) Sees 72% Cut, From Above MacBook Pricing to Practically a Steal
  • Blue Protocol: Star Resonance is finally out in the west and off to a strong start on Steam, but was the MMORPG worth the wait?
  • How to Unblock OpenAI’s Sora 2 If You’re Outside the US and Canada
  • Final Fantasy 7 Remake and Rebirth finally available as physical double pack on PS5
  • The 10 Most Valuable Cards

Recent Posts

  • This 5-Star Dell Laptop Bundle (64GB RAM, 2TB SSD) Sees 72% Cut, From Above MacBook Pricing to Practically a Steal

    October 10, 2025
  • Blue Protocol: Star Resonance is finally out in the west and off to a strong start on Steam, but was the MMORPG worth the wait?

    October 10, 2025
  • How to Unblock OpenAI’s Sora 2 If You’re Outside the US and Canada

    October 10, 2025
  • Final Fantasy 7 Remake and Rebirth finally available as physical double pack on PS5

    October 10, 2025
  • The 10 Most Valuable Cards

    October 10, 2025

Newsletter

Subscribe my Newsletter for new blog posts, tips & new photos. Let's stay updated!

About me

Welcome to Laughinghyena.io, your ultimate destination for the latest in blockchain gaming and gaming products. We’re passionate about the future of gaming, where decentralized technology empowers players to own, trade, and thrive in virtual worlds.

Recent Posts

  • This 5-Star Dell Laptop Bundle (64GB RAM, 2TB SSD) Sees 72% Cut, From Above MacBook Pricing to Practically a Steal

    October 10, 2025
  • Blue Protocol: Star Resonance is finally out in the west and off to a strong start on Steam, but was the MMORPG worth the wait?

    October 10, 2025

Newsletter

Subscribe my Newsletter for new blog posts, tips & new photos. Let's stay updated!

@2025 laughinghyena- All Right Reserved. Designed and Developed by Pro


Back To Top
Laughing Hyena
  • Home
  • Hyena Games
  • Esports
  • NFT Gaming
  • Crypto Trends
  • Game Reviews
  • Game Updates
  • GameFi Guides
  • Shop

Shopping Cart

Close

No products in the cart.

Close