Playing as a fallen fighter named Alta, you’ll manage a tea shop within a magical forest and tend to the customers who pass through. But Alta does not want to be here. And if she gets her way, the tea shop will be nothing but a brief and painful memory.
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GamingTranscript
00:00Hi, my name's Davey Wreden, and along with the rest of the team at Ivy Road, I've been
00:05creating Wanderstop, a narrative cozy game about making tea.
00:09You'll play as a former tournament fighter named Alta who has to put her past aside in
00:14order to tend a charming shop and brew tea for its various customers.
00:20Years ago, I wrote and directed The Stanley Parable and The Beginner's Guide, and after
00:24finishing those games, I was unbelievably burnt out.
00:28Like, I seriously thought I might never write another narrative for games ever again.
00:33And so I decided that I wanted to make a cozy game, something simple and peaceful that could
00:39heal me and restore balance to my life.
00:42And I discovered very quickly that I didn't actually know how to design a cozy game, and
00:47so suddenly the stress was piling on exactly the same as before.
00:53Something had to change.
00:54And so very slowly, piece by piece, I began taking elements of my burnout and my feelings
01:00of hopelessness, and I just put them right into the game's narrative.
01:05And then suddenly the coziness became this really interesting creative constraint.
01:09Like, how do you tell a really unpleasant, uncomfortable story in a format designed around
01:15comfort?
01:16Typically in games like this, the protagonist is cheerfully excited to do the work.
01:21And so what if instead, our protagonist absolutely did not want to be here?
01:27If she was broken and beaten down and starving for answers, could this charming little environment
01:33help heal her?
01:34And this became super interesting to me because that's what I had wanted.
01:39I had wanted to just do some pleasant work and then become all better.
01:43But healing is way more complicated than that.
01:47Healing is messy, and it's bitter, and I want to know how to do it.
01:51I want to believe it's possible to leave your old self behind and become someone new.
01:57Someone better than I am.
01:58Someone more capable of rest and calm and inner peace.
02:05But god, it's so, so hard to do.
02:17I'm not sure I can do it.
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