The Wreck Preview: A Little Bird Told Me...

The Wreck is the work of The Pixel Hunt. Already Bafta-nominated for Bury Me, My Love, it’s evident of their storytelling abilities. In the short playtime of the demo, I immediately wanted more.

In some respects, it’s a love letter to arthouse cinema – not necessarily an intentional choice, but the cinematography here is wonderful and takes the visual novel one step forward to being a more indulgent experience. At least for someone such as myself who isn’t the biggest fan.

You play Junon – a failed screenwriter, which you’ll see in most of the write-ups as a way of establishing her status in life. It’s not that she’s failed at her profession, but that she’s living in the shadow of someone else – her mother, a successful, well-known artist.

After heading to the hospital to check in on mum, Junon is given some life-changing news that affects them both. As her power of attorney, she has to make the business decisions, and now Junon will be making far more important choices. It’s pretty damn overwhelming, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

As you might surmise, The Wreck involves a car crash, though the title isn’t exclusive to that one event. When we see the car roll, Junon has a flashback to her childhood where she can interact with some clues to help shape the present. It’s all done in a super stylish aesthetic, with big, bold text filling one area of the screen for you to select.

This also applies to the dialogue as keywords are highlighted in red, which I believe you can interact with and help shape her path? I’m not entirely sure if this is the case as the story, while already excellent, feels a bit on rails. To be honest, even if there wasn’t the choice (which I’m confident there is), the story is superb.

It took me a few moments to get used to Junon and to decide whether I liked her or not. The Wreck is in French by default – as seen in signage in the game, but there’s an English audio track for those who aren’t fluent. Likewise, English text graces the screen, but halfway through, it switched to French, and I had no idea what it said. If it weren’t for Junon speaking in English, I’d have missed a key scene, perhaps.

The Wreck is even better than I had anticipated. As someone drawn to narrative-driven games and having a passion for world cinema (that’s vague, isn’t it?), this indie title has leapfrogged a wealth of titles in my wishlist. The game was already on the list, but I’m one of those who like to organise them into priority, and this is now in the top ten.

Check out The Wreck demo for yourself during the Steam Next Fest.