It has been a common joke on the internet since that game Firewatch was announced to say “what is Firewatch?”. The game (made by Campo Santo) was released last week and I’m still unsure if I could give you an accurate statement as to what the game is.

Since it is a very heavily story-based game, I won’t talk to much about that, but I will say this: the game is set in a canyon and you play as a man whose job is to watch the wilderness and make sure no fires start there. This sounds simple enough, but the story takes the game on a very different path than you would expect from that.

The story of the game is good. It is well-written and interesting. The major problem is that the ending is hugely unsatisfying. It feels like the writers had a great idea for the setting and they kept adding more and more cool ideas until they couldn’t think of a decent payoff for the major mystery.

This is very unfortunate and a major negative on a game that prides itself on a well-written story. I don’t normally talk about this kind of thing, but I do have to say that the voice acting and character design in this is superb. Both of the two major characters are incredibly real and believably and the actors do a fantastic job of bringing these characters to life.

There is not much to be said about the gameplay. You pretty much just walk from point A to point B, all the while the other character, Delilah talks to you on the radio. When you get to point B you will have to look around or interact with something. There are no puzzles or anything harder than just finding a hidden object. Occasionally you will have to jump over a log or attach a rope to a rock and rappel down a mountain. None of these interactions are challenging in any way. As I said before, this is a heavily story based game. The only other reward you get for playing this game is that you get to see the absolutely gorgeous world they have designed.

While a pretty game, Firewatch never really makes it past the traditional problems other games in this genre have. They rely to heavily on the story and have no real pay off. Gone Home has this problem. Everybody’s Gone to the Rapture had this problem and Firewatch may be the worst culprit because of most of the games in this genre. Yet Firewatch has one of the most unique and interesting settings.

If you liked Gone Home then play this but otherwise only play it if you can deal with the lack of emotional pay off.

This writer can be reached via Twitter: @EthanNathe26.

For more from this blog, read Checkpoint: Why the new Halo isn’t as good.