Yesterday I was going through some of the stories I’ve written on Aftermath about indie games, and was struck by how many of them said something along the lines of “this is the chill game I need right now.” I can’t imagine why I would crave so many chill games these days, but anyway: Short Trip, originally a browser game that’s now on Steam, is another one that slakes that insatiable thirst.
Short Trip is a very short game about being a cat who drives a train. You rumble along the track picking up other cats and moving them between stations. When you get to the end of the line, you turn around, and when you get all the way back to where you started, you can turn around again. You can also ring the little train bell.
Creator Alexander Perrin says the game took him five years to draw by hand, born out of a curiosity for how he could illustrate a game with pencil. The game was originally–and still is–playable for free in your browser, but the Steam version adds controller support and a scored mode where you have to run the train on a schedule, synced to your computer’s clock. I liked this mode, but I most enjoyed the game when its chill pace let me take in the intricate scenery: stopping to admire a windmill or row of market stands, rolling back and forth over a section to listen to the way the wheels sound different on different surfaces.
The art is lovely and detailed, and you can change the kind of paper the game models to change its look and mood. One of my favorite things to do on trains or in cars is to stare out the window and imagine what it would be like to live in the towns I pass; Short Trip lends itself incredibly well to that tendency, and to telling little stories about my passengers. I imagined myself taking an old cat up the steep hill to the market, or moving another between their job in the forest and their home in town.
But primarily I liked moving the train back and forth, listening to the noises and looking at the pretty pictures, like a kid playing with a train set. Short Trip is a lovely little experience that I came away from feeling way less panicked from my day than I did when I booted it up, which is high praise given the level of panic I am able to sustain on a daily basis. Check it out if you’re looking for some chill too.
