(Note: Most of the pictures scattered throughout the body of the article are concept art from the Pathologic remake, but included at the end is screenshots from Pathologic Classic HD)
This is one of the most interesting video games of all time and I refuse to let it go unnoticed into obscurity. For people who get tired of “Civilized” video games, I invite you on one interesting ride into the gaming wilderness; Pathologic Classic HD. Most of what I have to say on Pathologic Classic HD is critique on the Pathologic base game and not of it’s minor 2015 revisions. The cause of Pathologic’s falling to obscurity in western culture was the poor translation to English. Russian gaming websites praised the game, but due to the unsuccessful localization to North America and other gaming markets, it flopped elsewhere. Pathologic Classic HD might turn some away with the high difficulty and 2005 graphics, but the game experience itself compensates for that many times over.
The game developers described what exactly Pathologic Classic HD is in a blog post, and it’s not the remake of the game they raised money via crowdfunding for. Pathologic Classic HD is a revision of the original Pathologic game that features better translations, gamesave features, and other basic modernizations. This resurrection of the original game from 2005 was a move meant to appease as many fans as possible. If they don’t like the Pathologic remake coming next year, they at least have an updated product. Pathologic is a gothic RPG horror adventure. The town Pathologic Classic HD‘s story takes place in doesn’t have a formal name, the closest reference is “The Town-on-Gorkhon”, or the town settled upon the Gorkhon river. The atmosphere of the town is dark and gloomy, but in a beautiful way. If you want a gameplay comparison, we can use Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion as a base. Take every aspect of Oblivion, from story to gameplay to atmosphere, and crumble it up like a piece of paper. Then flatten the piece of paper. Then crumble it again and flatten it again. Pathologic is the result of that process by about a thousand times.
The game takes place over twelve in-game days. You’re tasked with trying to uncover the source of the sand plague. The location takes place in a small desolate countryside town of no importance. But the meek nature of this setting goes to hell as an unknown virus ravages it. You can choose from three protagonists who take their own approach to solving the plague. The handsome bachelor – a man of logic and reason behind his thoughts, along with the brutal Haruspex who is loyal to tradition and rituals, and finally, the changeling, a mystical woman that the people believe to be either an angel or demon. The entirety of Pathologic takes place on this map. It’s not Middle-Earth, Skyrim, or Velen, yet Ice-Pick Lodge fits a coherent story woven in that simple space. The game abstains from recycling dialogue between these characters, in fact, Pathologic takes the opportunity to present its arcing story three different ways. Each protagonist has their own thoughts and ideas of the unfolding sand plague insanity.
The world of Pathologic enforces a central idea. You are not the center of the universe, and not everything revolves you. Pathologic doesn’t take from modern games such as Dragon Age and Mass Effect. That’s not to say that kind of storytelling is wrong, the tales that Bioware tells have merits of their own. What I’m trying to say is – Pathologic is different. There’s choices of how to complete main quests and side quests. But there isn’t a big flashing blue PARAGON or RENEGADE stamp. Reality isn’t all black and white and neither is Pathologic‘s story. Pathologic has an intricate class based struggle, as the town has different working classes and political hierarchies feuding with each other. This conflict interweaves into the main story’s events. I had encounters with mimes, children in dog masks, and amorphous beasts lurking in the underworld. You have to see these colorful characters yourself to understand how it works together.
Pathologic creates a powerful enemy in the plague itself. It’s the mechanism that drives store prices skyrocketing up and down day after day. Omnipresent death that creeps into this innocent town that was tending its own business. The sand plague tyrant overthrows the local politicians and enacts law of its own. The sand plague forces the village to isolate “contagious” and diseased districts. Adherents are key characters that give you main quest objectives during an in-game day. Most of the time the relevance of their task is parallel to the plot. But also manages to entangle with an aspect of the sand plague disease research itself. Any incomplete quest you have left over gets labeled as a “failure”. But failing doesn’t immediately mean game over. Which actually makes sense. In real life, if you fail a task it’s not a matter of life and death. You just fucked up. The event of an adherent falling ill reinforces how the gameplay and story work together. If you fail a main quest on a given day, that adherent quest giver themselves falls ill. The game allows you to “patch up” some of your failures from past days before the final day. To get a good ending in Pathologic you don’t need to get everything right. You just need to make sure you check your work before the end.
Your protagonist has several stats to take into account, divided into two categories. You and the clothes on your back (weapon included, kind of). You have your health (hit points) and hunger, as you need to eat food during the day. On top of that is exhaustion which defines your character’s need for sleep. Along the balance of basic needs, your character has to fight off the sand plague too. Careful players will be able to avoid catching the plague much longer as they’d only need to worry about their immune system stat. But if the disease infects you, the sand plague’s influence on the player has a stat bar of its own. You can take antibiotics to fight off the plague infections, but then the drugs might make you more tired. Whatever herbal remedy you get to solve that dilemma presents more stat effects of their own. So on and so forth. Five external stats co-exist with the ones that focus on aspects of your health. The others focus on clothing and armor your character wears. Softening blows, projectile protection, fire-proof (there are flamethrowers) and protecting from infection. Additionally, your reputation in the town of Pathologic is a factor. The people view each protagonist in different lights from the story’s beginning, but all are bound by the same laws of basic society regardless. If you go around and kill innocents, people will notice and be afraid of interacting with you.
Use of your inventory and bartering with NPCs in Pathologic is critical to survival. Pathologic stores aren’t a one stop shop unlimited supply of hand outs for you. The stores specialize in a certain type of good, but even then, they may or may not have it in stock, depending on the supply and demand of the town. Almost every NPC in the town has the ability to exchange their personal goods with you. It serves as a solid foundation to make everyone you see in the game useful and worthwhile to interact with. They aren’t just resigned to window dressing for Pathologic’s storyline. Instead, trading goods with NPCs is the key means to preparedness. An example of that is that by grabbing an empty jug from a rubbish bin; as it is, there is not much value to that container, but fill the glass with water and it’s liquid gold to certain townsfolk.
Pathologic manages to capture the pressure of time, time is your enemy. There’s no opportunity to be lazy about the mission you’ve embarked on. Pathologic doesn’t get any magic time turner powers like Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask. In-game time marches on and stops for nobody. Pathologic will have you clinging on to dear life by your array of save files that you need to plan out. But even then, time will still be watching you. Pathologic shows a true struggle for survival in the combat system. Real life fighting isn’t as glorious and choreographed as the movies portray it. Video games in recent years have been just as guilty of this. Flashy shooting and finesse between both sides – when real fighting is impromptu and abrupt. The citizens of the town grow desperate and savage. But they’re actually fighting the same inner battles as you. Do you beat down a few peasants to get enough money for medicine?
The atmosphere of Pathologic ties everything together. Watching the blue sky on Day 1 grow sick and brown as time passes. Seeing the lives of the simple inhabitants of a countryside village annihilated by nature. This 2005 game can make the gamers of 2015 think for themselves. Based on how strong the gameplay and story work together to deliver a solid experience. The gaming audience is human and the definition of a “perfect game” is executing that.
Buy the game on Steam if you have the brass balls for it.
