IF Comp Review: Summit

[healyg]

Hello, all and sundry! For the next couple weeks I'm going to be reviewing a game from this year's IF Comp every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Up next, it's Phantom Williams's Summit.

Summit is an interactive travelogue through many strange and metaphorical landscapes. The obvious comparison here is to Porpentine's games (although the vignettes here are more developed and melancholic), although parts of it also reminded me of Alan DeNiro's Solarium in the 2013 Comp, and also Ghost Highland Way, the Scots ghost walking-sim from last year.

The setting is ambiguously post-apocalyptic; there are references here and there to a previous, more glorious civilization, although these are kept rather vague. The world Summit takes place on might not even be Earth (but I'm prepared to admit I might have missed a reference or two). The focus of the game is the titular summit, which is the object of the player character's desire; it's said that those who reach the top can achieve immortality. The Summit may represent heaven or enlightenment, and the protagonist's journey could be wise or folly, depending on your interpretation of events.

I don't think understood everything there was to about the game, and I might need to replay, at least to see some alternate paths. But here's my hot take on Summit: I really liked it! I found it a bit draggy near the end, but I loved all the dream/nightmare details, and the music really helped to set the mood. If you haven't already, you should take the chance to play it, as it's one of the strongest entries I've seen in the Comp so far.

Conclusion: Summit is a gloomy fable that you shouldn't miss if you have any taste for surreal dreamscapes. One of this year's top 3 contenders for sure.