Keeper review

For the second time this year, an indie game that’s light on explanation and heavy on art and originality has hooked me. First it was Sword of the Sea from the creators of Journey. Now it’s an even stranger adventure: Keeper, from Double Fine, the studio behind the much-loved Psychonauts series.

At only about 4 hours long, Keeper never wears out its welcome. It mixes a linear climb toward the top of a mountain with simple but enjoyable puzzles and some hidden statues to find. I literally couldn’t put it down.

You are… a walking lighthouse?

I’m honestly not sure what you are. Something like a spider-legged walking lighthouse. And by the end of my adventure, I still had no idea what the game is about.

As far as I can tell, your life and power come from your light. You focus it to burn away a strange, evil-seeming overgrowth, set vines on fire, grow plants that attract other equally strange creatures, and even melt the eyes off dead sea monsters. Yes, this game is weird.

Your only other puzzle tool is a bird companion who joins you early and points you to highlighted objects: orbs to lift, crankshafts to turn or move, and that’s about it. Keeper isn’t about complex ideas. It’s about a beautiful adventure.

Four forms

Keeper keeps reinventing itself:

1. The lighthouse, crawling along on land.
2. After the midway point, a boat with a light, zooming across and even under the sea.
3. In the third act, just your light, flying around like a possessed fireball.
4. A fourth form that I won’t spoil, which was by far my favorite.

I won’t spoil the ending either, though I still don’t know what it meant when I finally reached the top of that figurative and literal mountain.

The real star: the art

The puzzles aren’t the point. The star is the sheer creativity on display. Keeper has some of the prettiest art I’ve seen in a game all year. It feels like walking through a painting: vivid colors, rich detail and great little characters. It’s a gorgeous game.

Like Sword of the Sea, it had me enthralled the whole time. It lacks that game’s smooth, zen-like flow, but it’s still a calming, mesmerizing adventure.

Verdict: an artistic and strange journey

There’s nothing remarkable about Keeper’s simple gameplay and puzzles. The heavy lifting is done by its endless sense of wonder, its art direction and its mood. At about 4 to 5 hours, there’s no reason not to spend an afternoon exploring this wonderful world.