Why Amanda the Adventurer is so great because there is no resolution

Amanda the Wanderer is an unusual person. It's a fairly basic game with straightforward puzzles, a straightforward setting, and simple gameplay. However, there is one aspect of it that is not straightforward: the rich, mysterious body of knowledge that forms its basis. Because of this, I've found it very challenging to write a Amanda the Adventurer review. How can you evaluate a game according to standard criteria when its cultural significance and the conversations around it play such a significant role in defining its actual identity?

Because of this, I've made the decision to abandon the notion of a typical review and start the scary season in a new manner. I'll simply cover the essential review elements before delving into my own experience with it and how mythology and outside ideas may help a game grow beyond its original form. similar to Amanda (or Rebecca) in person.

Amanda the Adventurer's name and tale come before the game itself, much like many of the independent horror games that came before it, such as the Poppy Playtime games, the FNAF games, and even Bendy and the Ink Machine.With the help of the immensely popular Game Theory videos and let's plays from well-known YouTubers like Markiplier, Jacksepticeye, or CoryxKenshin, many of you may have heard about the tragic and dark story behind Amanda the Adventurer’s Wooly and the titular character herself, all without ever having the chance to pick up a controller. I was among those individuals. Was, that is, until I managed to get my hands on a copy of Amanda the Adventurer Switch.

Watching hours of information about a game you haven't played, dissecting the mythology in your brain, and scouring frames for tiny clues that could reveal the story's true meaning is an unusual experience. Playing the game after you believe you understand everything about it and putting yourself in the shoes of the content developers makes it much more fascinating.

This procedure inevitably involves having some of the plot revealed to you before you can start reading it for yourself, but it also seems to provide a new dimension of interaction—almost like an ARG. And as you can see, that's my whole speciality if you look at mybeginner's guide to ARGs.

The corruption of the innocent or commonplace—children's media, toys, and other items that are often seen as safe and friendly—becomes the true menace in Amanda the Adventurer, Poppy Playtime, FNAF, and other similar indie games.

This seems to be the flavour of the month—or, more properly, the last decade—along with the idea of "analogue horror," which Amanda fits into so nicely. However, it's interesting to watch how various developers tackle the subject and manage to make their products stand apart. Even while they all have a similar tone and might all be categorised under one roof, these classic IPs—amanda the adventurer included—continue to stand alone on their own.

In the simplest terms conceivable, Amanda the Adventurer is a horror puzzle game that centres upon interactive VHS tapes of a children's programme from the late 1990s to early 2000s that is reminiscent to Dora the Explorer. Naturally, however, a synopsis can never really capture the richness of the narrative, so let's go a bit further. You take on the role of Riley, who finds out about her aunt Kate's passing via a letter. In the letter, Aunt Kate tells you that she hopes you would look into the mystery tape she left in the attic and tells you that she has given you her home. Your aunt clarifies, however, that once you see the footage, there's no turning back.

The attic of the home you inherit serves as the game's location. Though there are many different items all over the place, including a toy oven, an antique grandfather clock, a safe, a toy robot, and more, the focal point of the entire scene is the old CRT TV at the back of the room that has an integrated VHS player. Naturally, there is also an Amanda the Adventurer VHS tape on the table next to the TV. The primary gameplay is a cross between a point-and-click, puzzle, and walking simulator as you navigate the compact, three-dimensional environment, pointing and clicking objects, investigating them, and figuring out how to utilise them to advance.

While progress is mostly determined by unlocking cassettes and learning new information, the sequence in which you see the tapes and work out the riddles sometimes affects what is on them. Apart from the episode recordings of Amanda the Adventurer, there are additional tapes of hidden knowledge that allow you to see the unseen, deeper story. You may also unlock five other endings, each with somewhat different criteria. Some ends need you to complete other endings in order to access the information you find, such secret passwords, PINs, and answers to particular questions.

Even though they're still rather imaginative, the riddles are often fairly simple provided you have the keen eye to notice the intricacies in the cassettes and the attic space around you. The puzzles centred on Blabbot and pork pie, for instance, are really inventive and gratifying to solve once all the parts are in place. Nevertheless, unless you're acquainted with the game or utilising a guide, there are a few rather simple sequences that are necessary to uncover certain mysteries or endings that are simple to miss.

Amanda often pauses the recordings she's viewing to ask you questions or to point out certain objects or places. The tape moves forward if you choose or respond appropriately. Giving inaccurate information, however, may cause Amanda to change her reaction; in some cases, this may enrage her and cause the recordings to malfunction, or she may give you strange and terrifying responses.

Most answers on the PC version are entered by typing them over a string of underscores that resembles a hangman. You may choose from a list of answers on the Switch version. Each variant has advantages and disadvantages. To a certain extent, the freedom to write your responses expands the options, but it also raises the possibility that you may respond incorrectly and annoy Amanda, which would heighten the tension in the scenario. However, by using a process of elimination, the solutions provided in the Switch version are often rather simple to figure out.

Having numerous choice alternatives makes more sense to me, however, in terms of technology. It seems a bit more genuine since, as a child of the 1990s, I vividly recall classic TV games where you could choose answers to questions using your TV remote. In contrast, typing responses doesn't make much sense on a CRT TV and VHS system. Furthermore, there's nothing preventing you from selecting the incorrect options in the Switch version to find out what happens. You may upset Amanda to the point where you see some unsettling visuals, or you could respond with a special phrase that causes the game to show you a new cinematic or lore tape.

How to get one of the hidden recordings is another odd distinction between the PC and Switch versions. When Rebecca asks you in the first "Oh No! Accidents!" film who can assist Woolly, if you answer "nobody," she usually agrees in a sorrowful manner and a new tape emerges behind you. But after a lot of trying, I discovered that the option "nobody" never appeared. Until I finished the birthday part and got the edited copy of the "Oh No! Accidents!" recording with Amanda saying, "sometimes nobody can help," that is.

The "nobody" response appeared when I had to view the original "accidents" footage on my subsequent gaming loop. This first annoyed me as I knew I needed to have all the tapes in order to receive one of the endings, and I was unable to figure out why the solution wasn't appearing after searching through many walkthroughs. But looking back, I consider it to have been a really astute choice.It's comparable to attempting to input codes into Blabbot in a game when you still don't have the cake and cards; instead of allowing you to continue, Blabbot responds, "Yes, but where did you find that?" These limitations function as a kind of test to make sure you're really examining all the stuff instead of just inputting codes and web information.

Anyway, enough about reviews. Now let's talk about the major topic I want to cover, which is how the game's story goes much beyond the straightforward gameplay loop. Even outside of the hidden lore cassettes, there are other nuggets of knowledge scattered throughout the game. These consist of books, letters, newspaper clippings, and more. That's what, in my view, makes this game so effective: these beautifully created bits of knowledge do a terrific job of addressing certain issues, then replace them with even more ones. Right, so bear in mind that there are spoilers ahead.

It's not difficult to piece together a rudimentary grasp of the story if you pay attention. Amanda the Adventurer was born and raised in a town where Riley's aunt, Kate, worked as a librarian. The original idea for Amanda the Adventurer was a live-action programme that a guy by the name of Sam developed. Rebecca, his adoptive daughter, served as Amanda in the programme.

When the programme became so popular in the community—probably in large part because Kate recommended it to all the kids and parents who came to her library—a big corporation contacted Sam and requested the rights to adapt the show into a cartoon that would air on television throughout the country. Sam nodded, clearly thrilled that his cute little craft was getting so much attention. Rebecca kept doing Amanda's voice, and the programme took off. However, it seems that Hameln, the business behind the recently redesigned Amanda show—a reference to the Pied Piper, who lures kids to their demise—had darker thoughts. This is further reinforced by the rodent emblem and motto, "follow us to fun."

We hear brief excerpts after that; Amanda began to make improper remarks and discuss depressing subjects, and the programme began to shift. It also seemed to put kids into a trance-like state after a time, which caused a number of kids to disappear. In one scene, the director of Hameln has Rebecca repeat phrases that sound like demons from the Ars Gotier: pie man is Paimon (no, not Genshin Impact's Paimon; she has a completely different relationship with the demonic), bye yell is Bael, and baa lamb is Balam. Sam is shown growing more and more agitated at this point. Additionally, Sam vanishes, leaving Rebecca alone herself and perhaps exacerbating her outbursts in the programme.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, but it appears to be a pretty large allegory for the idea that "corporation = bad." It implies that Hameln hijacked Amanda the Adventurer with the intention of using it to attract children and possibly even call forth demons, as evidenced by the distorted Amanda that appears in the Gruesome Ending. There are also several hints that Hameln killed Sam when he began to ask questions and that the actual Rebecca is either dead and decomposing or in a coma, with her spirit imprisoned in the cassettes.

Nevertheless, most of the issues remain unanswered even with what seems to be a tonne of information explaining the game's background. Does Amanda still exist? Are the children in the presentation the moving objects with eyes, or have the demons stolen them? What happened to the kids? Does the creature really look like Rebecca/Amanda, or is it just posing as her? Woolly is who? How did Sam end up? There's just no resolution. And that's precisely why this game is beneficial.

One of my best writings from college, I seem to recall, discussed the need for closure in human beings and if reaching your own conclusions and leaving problems unresolved may really provide satisfaction. Nearly ten years later, I never would have imagined that issue to be relevant to my work, but I believe that idea is precisely what's at work here.

There isn't much to talk about in games when you are given all the answers. Though open endings and the ability to speculate and draw your own conclusions—whether it be by foretelling what will happen in subsequent entries or by attempting to tie up loose ends to satiate your own sense of curiosity—are what really make games like Amanda the Adventurer, and, of course, the legendary FNAF and Poppy Playtime series, so successful. This raises the involvement even more and expands the game's scope beyond a straightforward horror puzzle game.

Amanda the Adventurer caught the attention of many people from its early itch.io demo from the Found Footage Game Jam (that's a whole other story that I won't get into today). Big content creators were drawn to the character and began to speculate about the meaning behind each element, which spread to people all over the world. People are still debating things like whether Sam is Woolly or Amanda's long-lost brother, what the heck is going on with the butcher shop, and whether the strange white blobs covering Amanda's eyes are wool or an EEG headset, even years after Amanda first made her online debut.

It's not simply a game, therefore no, I can't give it a typical review score. It's something to discuss. It's a narrative. And whether you will benefit from it or not completely relies on the kind of person you are. The gameplay of Amanda the Adventurer is straightforward to understand and works well across all platforms. It's attractive and does a great job capturing the style. However, the real terror of this game lies in its masterfully crafted story, which shows how it infiltrates our homes via YouTube videos, forums, and other online content, just as the devil does via the cassettes. And it merits every accolade possible for it.

I'll stop being lyrical now, however, since horror games can have such a profound effect on us. Perhaps in a year or two, we will return to this discussion about the Amanda the Adventurer 2. You never know.

Amanda the Adventurer may be purchased for a few bucks on Steam or the Switch, and playing it yourself yields a very unique gaming experience. Apart from that, don't forget to peruse our selection of the top Halloween games for Switch and mobile devices, or peek at some terrifying phantoms in our walkthroughs for FNAF characters, Poppy Playtime characters, and Poppy Playtime Chapter 1 and Poppy Playtime Chapter 2.