{"id":2736,"date":"2025-07-17T14:00:50","date_gmt":"2025-07-17T14:00:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.satecsite.org\/?p=2736"},"modified":"2025-07-21T10:14:35","modified_gmt":"2025-07-21T10:14:35","slug":"the-drifter-review-australian-adventure-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.satecsite.org\/index.php\/2025\/07\/17\/the-drifter-review-australian-adventure-time\/","title":{"rendered":"The Drifter review \u2013 Australian adventure time"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The Drifter is not necessarily a happy tale (Powerhoof)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

A new point \u2018n\u2019 click graphic adventure is not just a clever nod to the early days of video game storytelling but one of the most satisfyingly dark game of the year.<\/p>\n

It takes some bravery to make a point \u2018n\u2019 click adventure game<\/a> – on the face of it, one of the most anachronistic of genres – in this day and age. That\u2019s doubly true if you use the ancient format as a means of conveying a dark, existential story. But that\u2019s exactly what the determinedly indie developer Powerhoof has done with The Drifter.<\/p>\n

Factor in blocky pixel art graphics, and it would be easy to dismiss The Drifter as another exercise in retro nostalgia affectation. But when you play it, it somehow contrives to feel oddly timeless, thanks to its modern setting and an imaginatively labyrinthine storyline, that inexorably sucks you into its idiosyncrasies.<\/p>\n

The Drifter\u2019s action starts with protagonist Mick Carter stowing away on a freight train, in classic beatnik style. This is appropriate because Carter is essentially a tramp, with a long grey beard and a self-flagellating inner monologue. He\u2019s clearly escaping from a traumatic incident in his past, as he returns to the unnamed city where he used to live, in order to attend his mother\u2019s funeral.<\/p>\n

The city may be a mystery but it\u2019s clearly somewhere in Australia and Powerhoof is based in Melbourne, with all the voice-acting delivered in unmistakably Aussie tones – a rarity in itself with video games.<\/p>\n

Things swiftly go pear-shaped: after opening the freight train compartment\u2019s stuck door (an exercise that demonstrates how The Drifter adheres to the time-honoured point \u2018n\u2019 click gameplay blueprint of finding, combining, and using objects), the other tramp present is shot dead by what appear to be military types.<\/p>\n

Carter manages to escape from them and regroup with another bunch of homeless people, plus a local newspaper reporter sniffing around them, in an underpass below the railway.<\/p>\n

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With his one useful possession, a mobile phone, having run out of battery, Carter\u2019s pressing concern is working out how to get in touch with his sister in order to find out when and where his mother\u2019s funeral will take place. But inexplicable events get in the way of that, culminating in him apparently dying and being resurrected.<\/p>\n

This initiates what will eventually become a time-slipping, sci-fi thread cleverly woven into the fabric of The Drifter. But before a mid-game story change-up it adds a hallucinatory effect, as Carter struggles with more everyday tasks, followed by a period of sleuthing.<\/p>\n

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