Rosewater review — Friends made along the trails

Throughout the year, there are plenty of games you hate to miss. Since January, I can point to plenty I’d like to have at least tried. One such game is Rosewater, a point and click made by Grundislav Games. I’ve kept my eye on it, and now that I’ve finally found time to play it, I have discovered a hidden gem in the midst of a deluge of gaming goodness.

You are Harley Leger, journalist extraordinaire, heading to the 1850s western town of Rosewater. A paper has a position open, and she feels good about the prospect. After arriving and seeing the deserted main street, almost getting robbed by a street urchin, and watching a man get thrown out of the second-story window of the Rosewater Post, most would turn tail and run. Harley marches right up and grasps this job by the horns, and is immediately accepted by the editor to do a piece on a washed up showman named Gentleman Jake in hopes it will make the town look appealing.

It’s after all of this transpires that the story really gets going. The journey can be a whirlwind at times, with a ton of locations to visit. Everything is separated into several categories: vignettes, excursions, and the main scenes. The vignettes are different from the main scenes, randomized moments you’ll get to spend with party members that affect a hidden (in your first playthrough) relationship rating that changes certain outcomes. While Act 2 does linger a bit, I found the overall pacing for the game to be great, with a good mix of different locales and missions.

I didn’t expect how attached I’d become to this troupe of characters. Harley feels like your proxy, engaging with this peculiar crew as you track down a disgraced professor who’s supposedly sitting on a large investment his benefactors don’t expect to get back. As you travel, you get to know each one of the group, and it makes you care about their backstories.

Phil – General Filomeno Márquez – is a passionate general forced to run from his homeland, and it comes through in every line. Danny Luo is a young guy who has been following a showman for quite some time, but is dealing with his past misfortunes. Nadine Redbird is a lovable native herbalist that you’d do anything for. Gentleman Jake… well, he’s a bit of an egotistical jerk, but even he has moments where his humanity is laid bare on the screen. Every interaction draws you closer to them, a testament to the intentional writing the team has done.

This is driven home in the storylines the writers have given. For example, Danny goes off to think at one point, forcing you to go look for him to tell him you’re getting back on the road. You find him reminiscing about a lost friend by a river. While you could push him towards the road, Harley can also help him through this tough moment by assisting in creating a memorial. Danny responds quite favorably to this, which of course raises your relationship with him. Although it is a bit obvious which choice of dialogue does what, the heartfelt exchange is just one instance of many that make the events of the game more personal to you. I occasionally did save scum to see if I could undo certain scenes, which isn’t an action I’d take if the team hadn’t done a phenomenal job making me care about this band of misfits. This is also because of some outstanding voice acting, with a cast that nails their personas.

Even outside of the main crew, there are a ton of characters along the trail that make an impact. Emissary Paul from the local cult of Chrysalis is one, a man building a castle for a woman he loves is another, and especially a stay with a sea captain during a sandstorm. The sea captain fighting his demons in the night is an experience of a quest, and thankfully, has a happy ending available. There are a lot of sincere narrative threads inside of Rosewater, like the O’odham tribe in Act 1, who are being persecuted by the local militia. None of it feels forced or heavy-handed, delivered in a respectful tone that allows you to ingest what’s here and feel the plights of each individual story. There are also several twists that will leave you mouth agape, using your immersion with these characters against you.

In a game like this, dialogue has to be done right, and it is. There is a lot of fun banter between characters, along with serious moments that leave the room quiet. Never did it feel like the conversations felt like they outstayed their welcome. You have options in which way to go in certain situations, allowing you to hold the outcome in your hands. I’ve not dealt with this as much in point-and-click games. Here, the branching narrative is more akin to Pentiment. In my mind, that’s high praise to include Rosewater in the same breath.

Many point-and-click games can be unforgiving in pressing you to figure them out, but Rosewater sits on the easier side. Some purists may find this lack of challenge frustrating, especially as the puzzles aren’t that intricate. This one is more my speed, allowing me a hint or two in the dialogue and making the story threads be the puzzle in most instances. Each scene is compact, meaning you rarely get lost, and if you need to figure something out, there isn’t much incessant clicking in hopes of accidentally accomplishing your tasks. 

Only so many things can be clicked on, and interactions are clearly marked. Usually, I just needed to take the information from a recent conversation and talk with others about it, leading to a new piece of intel that led me further along the narrative trail. It can be a bit handhold-y, but I didn’t mind the method chosen by Grundislav. Less is more, and limiting my need for carrying a bunch of random stuff in inventory that I’d picked up assisted in my enjoyment of Rosewater. There’s still a decent amount of finding useful items in the scenes and using them in fun ways to advance the story. You’ll also occasionally find multiple ways to accomplish a goal, like using a lockpick to open a door shortly after the game starts, or finding a brick to smash the padlock.

As funny as this will sound, Rosewater is less Western than it lets on. The setting is perfect, reminding me a bit of Wild Wild West in the weirdness of some of what comes later with aethericity and a steam-powered wagon. But, this isn’t a romp across the prairies on horseback. Most of the western-ness is in the tropes and dialogue, or in the very beginning in the Rosewater section. Beyond that, your travels are anything but cowboys and six-shooters.

Complementing this perfectly is the stellar choice of artstyle. Again, rivaling one of my favorites in Pentiment, the bit-like painted visuals are wonderful, lending itself to the setting brilliantly. It doesn’t just look great, but is animated fluidly, without any stiffness that befalls many a point and click game. With tons of terrific detail, this is a beautiful example of modernizing a classic genre.

I was surprised to find a New Game+ option available once Rosewater ended. Given the different outcomes available, this is an appreciated choice, but it’s the implementation of it that’s nice. In this mode, you’ll be able to choose the vignettes that come up and track your relationships with your companions. Given that level is built off of the vignettes especially, it’s great that you can trigger certain events intentionally, whether to see them occur or grab an achievement or two.

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