The Longing (2020)
Released in 2020, The Longing is an idle game built around slowness, patience, and deliberate waiting. The king of the underground has fallen into a sleep that will last 400 days, and his servant, Shade, is left alone to pass the time with no obvious purpose. The game arrived at a fitting moment, during the COVID-19 pandemic, and many players found points of contact with their own situation. Shade lives as if in quarantine. He has no access to the surface world — or does he? The player’s task is to explore the vast cave system and uncover its secrets. I have nothing against The Longing, but little to argue strongly in its favour either. It is nevertheless a memorable experience, quite simply because its slowness places it in a category of its own.