Pathologic will be the end of me

Ever since that fateful day earlier this week when the Pathologic Kickstarter went live, I have been staring at the launch icon for the original game on my desktop, debating the merits of firing it up and running around in it. I confess, sheepishly, that I was only able to find a pirated version of the game back when I first heard of it, and never felt comfortable playing it (also, it was never meant to run on Windows 7 in the first place). The jankiness and crashing and weird-ass save errors kept me from really diving into the game with any sort of dedication. Of course, then gog.com went and released a version that works--hence the icon staring balefully at me from my desktop. I abandoned my old save, having lost the plot of what I was doing (I believe it was "hiding in a warehouse while bleeding slowly to death because I couldn't find any goddamn bandages," but I could be wrong), and set out to explore just why this game in particular, for its (numerous) faults and, frankly, ugly-as-hell visuals, keeps bringing me back to it when there are other, better-looking, better-playing games out there.

So, beginning the game:

You start in a theater of sorts, watching the three playable characters stride on stage and argue about who should be the one saving the town. The dialogue is a little muddy, and the lack of subtitles makes understanding exactly what's going on difficult, but the gist of it is that each feels they are the best person for the job. They decide they won't be working together, because they just don't agree with one another, and then the lights dim and you walk out a door to choose from the Bachelor, the Haruspex, and the Devotress. Except you can't actually choose the Devotress unless you happen to have already beat the game (I haven't). Based on past experience, I knew the Haruspex shows up wanted for murder (so everyone attacks you on sight), which was perhaps a little more difficulty than I wanted at the moment, so Bachelor it was.

The Bachelor, by contrast, shows up to have a meeting with the head of the town about how, apparently, he can't die. Being a bachelor of medicine, he's of course interested in a guy who can't die (and from the backstory you're given, it seems like he's lost funding because he keeps trying to prove immortality is possible, so this guy is a career-saver).

Except the town leader is of course dead once he arrives, and the townsfolk are giving him some pretty vicious side-eye, seeing as how their beloved leader was alive and well until the bachelor showed up.

So that's where things stand, more or less, when you start playing. Oh, except first you talk to this guy, who is just chilling out in front of the house you're staying in.

The Executor explains the basic mechanics of the game to you--namely, you've got a mystery of sorts to solve, and if you aren't careful, you'll end up dead and so will everyone else in the town. There's also a guy dressed like some kind of jive-ass mime on the other side who warns you that you should probably keep an eye on your health, exhaustion, hunger, immunity to disease, and infection levels (except he does it in a manner far less straightforward. One of the things about Pathologic is that everyone talks in riddles. Another thing about Pathologic is that the riddles didn't necessarily get translated over from their native Russian very well. Maybe not the best situation, although you do get the odd gem of a translation, as seen below).

At any rate, once you discover the first, formerly immortal(?) casualty, it's time to hunt down the killer and the game opens up from there. You quickly discover your only source of reliable information is also dead, because of course he is. He also happens to be the father of the recently arrived Haruspex, who is now the prime suspect in that murder, of course. Unfortunately, you are not able to conduct an autopsy, because of this asshole:

So instead of being able to get a look at the cause of death (which they claim is from a rusty nail, or perhaps from something called a shebnak-adyr, which is a mythical demon. Guess which culprit the townsfolk think is responsible!), you have to take this guy's word for it, which, given his confessed hatred for the Haruspex and his ilk might not be the most reliable source. He also suggests you talk to his wife, who is a clairvoyant, and she delivers a prophecy of your doom, because of course she does. If you express some skepticism, he will send you to talk to Julia, who is apparently the only other person in the town who has attended college. She will initially come across as a voice of reason, before admitting that she privately believes that demons are definitely responsible.

So the Bachelor is pretty quickly left feeling like the last sane man in an insane world, and the town's architecture doesn't do much to dissuade you of that notion.There's a creepy-ass cathedral, a building that literally should not be standing because what the hell, and you're staying with a woman in a house called The Slough. Yup.

One of the first things I ran across was what I certainly hope was an hallucination of a woman being burned alive (because the townsfolk thought she was the demon golem thing). She disappears in the fire, the crowd disperses, and I learned pretty quickly that my fists are not strong enough to punch every person responsible. In fact, it seems like that is a good way to get killed, so.

I later came across a body which happened to have not only some bullets on its person, but also a gun with which to shoot those bullets. I mistakenly thought this would be the point where I could really start making progress, but my exhaustion peaked and I had to find a place to sleep before I literally died of not sleeping (this all took place on day one, for reference). The gun would wind up coming in handy, as I was later to be attacked by one of the monstrous locals the game refers to as "worms" or "Odong," depending on who's talking. The Odong are usually pretty harmless, but one in particular led me to a hidden house and promptly attempted to murder me. Guns are pretty powerful in Pathologic, however, so a couple of shots later I was staring at another corpse (this becomes a theme).

The gun would later wind up killing a crazy guy from a place called the Apiary, who literally spouted gibberish before trying to murder me with a broken bottle. This was done as a favor to another one of the ruling families in the town (this one happens to be more concerned with the continuation of the town's lone economic activity: slaughtering cattle), and felt like a failure because I was actually trying to get the guy to tell me who actually was responsible for the two deaths. The girl running the shelter in which the man was hiding openly mocked me for thinking I would be able to handle what was going on.

Eventually night fell, and with it came a thunderstorm that may have been scripted and may have been random, but looked pretty hilarious all the same and made the next bit much harder to stomach. I saw a man on the street suddenly put up his fists and charge after one of the female npcs. I pursued to try to save the woman, because of course I did, but you move agonizingly slow and I could only get a few swings of my fists in which did not seem to deter the man in the slightest. I drew my pistol, but then reconsidered that I only had five bullets left, and did I really want to spend a bullet on this guy when it was only the first day and shit was only just now starting to hit the fan--I met the town doctor, who told me he suspected the "immortal" guy was probably killed by plague, and so was my friend! My landlord heard the rumor of plague and subsequently begged me to escape the horrors of the town with her by hiding on the train that transports all the meat produced in the slaughterhouse to the rest of Russia (not to survive, but so that we will die on the steppes instead of in the town, which she promises would be worse)--which made me think that bullets were going to become far harder to come by than I'd been seeing. I resumed chasing, thinking I would cut the guy with my scalpel (the Bachelor starts with a nice pair of gloves, some drugs, and a scalpel, but I couldn't catch up. Because I didn't want to spend a bullet, I'm pretty sure that lady got beat to death. It did not register at the time, but once I stopped playing, having finally made it back to my lodgings and flopped down on the bed to end the first day, I just cold decided that the fleeing woman was worth less than the cost of the bullet it would have taken to bring her attacker down.

Things are only going to get worse. Much, much worse. By the end of this I doubtless will have killed more people, and probably starved to death a couple of times. The end of day one let me know that only two people had died of plague (well, maybe the plague. We can't perform an autopsy until the next day), and that I was not currently infected with plague myself. I have five bullets and a gun which is mostly functional. I also have a cloth soaked in disinfectant to put over my mouth when I am near plague victims that I picked up, and a nice pair of gloves. We'll see how day 2 goes. Probably terribly.

Pathologic has somehow managed to sink its hooks deep into me, probably because I can run it in a window and the soundtrack seems strangely appropriate--for a game set in 19th century(ish) Russia, industrial music works somehow. The translation is pretty bad, but once you get the hang of it things start to make a little more sense. I'm currently toying with the idea of making this a regular check-in sort of thing, partially because I could talk about this game all damn day (I didn't even get into the...questionable wardrobe choices of some of the characters), and partially because it will give me a good excuse for sitting down to play every week. Also, seeing as how the Kickstarter remake isn't slated to come out for another couple years, it's as good of a time as any to finally see if I can't beat the damn thing. I'd love to see more people discovering this game, because it really is a uniquely strange experience, and while occasionally far more frustrating than you'd believe any game has a right to be, enjoyable on a level I can't quite place. It's a punishing experience, but worth enduring, I think.