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Many people instinctively resist the idea of putting a loved one in a home, because it is often believed that doing so is taking the вЂњeasy way outвЂќ by making their care someone elseвЂ™s problem it is often perceived as a form of abandonment. As JuliaвЂ™s dementia becomes more severe, a doctor suggests putting her into a full-time care facility. This is where the choices become more difficult. But as the years come and go, it becomes clear that something is wrong, and soon you discover that Julia has developed Early Onset AlzheimerвЂ™s.

Firewatch background talk how to#

You decide how to handle fights in the relationship and whether or not Julia moves across the country for a career opportunity.

The choices begin innocent enough you choose the first thing Henry says to Julia and what kind of dog you adopt together.

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Firewatch forces players to contend with a few of these decisions in the beginning of the game, when you are given a series of choices to make that will determine the details of HenryвЂ™s backstory.

When someone you love develops dementia, you are often forced into the position of deciding between equally terrible and heartbreaking options. As a result, FirewatchвЂ™s shortcomings also show the care thatВ developers must takeВ in order to successfully achieve this impact. However, the game falls short by failing to fully immerse players in the reality of loving someone with dementia, which results in the game encouraging judgmental beliefs about families of dementia patients. Firewatch offers an excellent look into how games can encourage increased empathy by offering players a better understanding of othersвЂ™ experiences- namely by immersing them into the psyche of a man who is struggling to cope with his wiveвЂ™s dementia. It seems to me then, that choice-based narrative games could likely have the same effect if they are done well.

Firewatch background talk windows#

Studies have found that reading literary fiction increases our ability to feel empathy for others because it immerses us in experiences that are not our own and gives us windows into the psyches of the characters presented. The game is primarily focused on exploring questions about human psyche, and as such is in many ways perfect for starting a conversation about dementia. And the more you and Delilah attempt to figure out what is going on, the more sure you both become that someone is watching you. Everything in the forest seems normal until two teenage girls go missing, someone cuts the phone line to your stations, and your lookout tower is ransacked. The game falls under the unfortunately named walking-simulator genre, and isВ more psychologically oriented than it is action based.

(If you havenвЂ™t played the game, prepare for spoilers.)ДЇirewatch puts players in control of Henry, a middle-aged man who, in search of an escape, has taken an isolating job as a fire lookout in Shoshone National ForestВ after his wife, Julia, develops dementia.В Your only human interaction during the summer is Delilah, another fire lookout whom you regularly talk to via walkie-talkie. Instead, I want to look atВ a central aspect of the game that the countless articles online fail to really discuss (or at least discuss well): loving someone with dementia. (Wondering why it took me so long to play a game I was so desperateВ to dive into? Read this post from last week.) I know I am late to the party, and that tons of people have written about the game already, so I am not going to talk about all the reasons I loved the game (I did) or how visually stunning it is (it really is). After months of staring longingly at the trailer and all the gorgeous screenshots online, I finally got to play Firewatch this past weekend.