Furi and Haven developer The Game Bakers has always been hard to pin down, and the reveal of "survival-climber" Cairn, a game about climbing a mountain using rationed supplies and realistic animations and physics, has only made that harder. It's the third game in a loosely defined trilogy with the theme of freedom, and it looks unlike any survival game I've played.
In an interview with 12DOVE, executive producer and designer Audrey Leprince, along with creative content director and designer Emeric Thoa, walk me through the origins of what seems like an improbable game for the studio. Well, I say that, but thanks to Jusant, this somehow won't be the first modern mountain climbing-focused game from a French developer. (Thoa says they were already years into Cairn's development when Jusant was announced.)
Furi had a clear rhythm to its frenetic combat and Haven almost feels like an actual rhythm game at times, but Cairn "is something different." It shares some DNA with meme-y physics games like Octodad, only it's been taken a step further, and then another step further, and then so far that it eventually becomes grounded in a proper, polished control scheme. The idea is to sell the feel of every carefully outreached arm, shaky leg, and desperate search for grip as you ascend. Physical strain is a core mechanic, and there's also a mental component in the form of climbing supplies – ropes and anchors and so on which must be placed with care and forethought.
"You control your character and their limbs, and if you are in the flow, you can climb in a good way without too much effort," Thoa says. "You really feel the pace of the timing, which is slow, but still different from other games, and because we decided that early, it gives you a completely different game in the end."
"I think the signature of The Game Bakers games is that we try to make games that are outstanding and go very far in one direction," Leprince adds. "It's always been the case. Furi was just boss fights. This one is almost just climbing. The idea is that people will notice them, and hopefully they will remember them. We have a lot of meaning and a lot of importance given to the story and the emotions that the players are going to go through. And ideally, the gameplay is the same as the meaning of the game. It's hard. You climb. It's difficult. You push yourself, then you succeed, and you feel that joy. You go beyond your limits."
In some ways, the mountain in Cairn fills a similar role to the bosses of Furi, but you engage with it in a totally different way. In fact, the initial idea for Furi was one long boss fight. "Now it's one mountain," Thoa says, "and I think it's very similar. There is no other game like Cairn, it's just a climbing mechanic that doesn't exist, a climbing game without fighting or a survival timer. It's hard for us to compare to any other games, so it's hard to find references.
"I initially tried to compare it to survival horror games like Resident Evil, but with climbing. A wall is a zombie, and you have to manage your resources the same way you have bullets and health items in Resident Evil. Here you have pitons and stuff for your health and climbing gear. But we go a little bit deeper, I think, in the survival elements, as we also have to manage our hunger, thirst, cold, we have to rest. These things are more climbing and hiking and alpinism."
Leprince, Thoa, and other members of the dev team actually got into mountain climbing to get some literal hands-on experience, and likewise consulted with mountaineer Élisabeth Revol, who has managed 8,000-meter climbs. Revol made headlines in 2018 after sadly losing her partner on Pakistan's Himalayan mountains.
Cairn is due in 2025, and the more distant future of The Game Bakers remains unpredictable. "To be honest, we don't have the next game in mind yet for sure, because we are 100% into Cairn at the moment," Thoa says. "We have lots of things we want to do because there is nothing we like more than making games. Ideally we will try smaller games, games in the same kind of budget and mind."
"We like action adventure in general, and I think we want to have a lot of gameplay. I don't think we're ever going to do too much management or too much narrative," Leprince adds. "We'll always be some kind of gameplay that's interesting, that makes the meaning of the game and what you actually do in the game fit each other, and then it creates very strong experiences." Music to my ears.
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