Tunic : Le jeu qui en cachait un autre

Tunic is a game that radiates a particular aura from the very first minutes, with an atmosphere of intriguing mystery and nostalgic ambiance between exploring ruins and the last days of summer.

• Spawn at the water's edge with no dialogue or explanation • Impressive temple at the center of the island, sealed and mysterious • Adorable little houses whose history remains unknown • Seemingly peaceful mill but surprising inside

Late afternoon light with yellow hues and lengthening shadows, creating an ambiance between intriguing and nostalgic.

The game creates a sense of mysterious exploration in the player from the start, promising a memorable experience.

The pages of the manual are scattered throughout the game and must be reassembled. It's an extraordinary nostalgia machine that emulates the era when video games seemed mysterious to children.

• Detailed illustrations with coffee stains to the edges • Written 90% in guardian script but important information readable • Playing with blur to create a period sensation • Turning pages is extremely ASMR

The manual contains everything you need to finish Tunic completely. It's the most important object in the game, not just a nostalgia machine.

Even for those who didn't grow up during the era of video game manuals, the nostalgic power of this object is extraordinary and incredible.

After opening the temple by ringing two bells (East Bell and West Bell), the second part of the game consists of bringing back three gears: one red, one green, and one blue so that the temple's mechanism does something.

• First bell found in the Eastern forest • Second bell discovered after exploring different areas of the island • Both bells must be rung to access the temple

The network of areas is impressive: the sewers connect four different levels of the game. It's real civilization behavior that builds things on top of each other, making the map very authentic.

• Red gear: jealously guarded in a temple within the Eastern forest • Green gear: stolen from the highest heavens, accessible by a gigantic teleporter in the ruined sheet metal • Blue gear: locked at the root of the world, in an underground quarry

Once the three gears are activated at the temple, nothing happens. This is when you understand that the fox mother you saw at the beginning was the real objective, but she was betrayed and freed too late.

• The player is killed by the fox mother (the Heir) • Loss of all stats accumulated during the game • Now the player understands what happened: the Heir was lending strength at each level

The game reveals that the manual contains annotations left by someone who went through the exact same adventure before. The player is now trapped in a loop, becoming the Heir for the next person.

Tunic's publisher found this ending too cruel for players. Andrew Ice responded that a perfectly hidden secret is useless: players must suspect something is happening to feel the thrill of mystery.

After the twist, the player becomes 100% committed to a quest to save the little fox, which involves finding all missing manual pages and discovering how to open the black door in the mountain.

• Manual pages are found by entering sequences of directions (up, down, left, right) on different objects • The player first learns this mechanic with a fountain and a page showing directions • This mechanic works on the mill, garden walls, floor carpets, ghost movements, and other elements

The game reveals that some puzzles are more complicated than others: some have about 20 directional puzzles minimum, some require returning to every inch of the map to find them.

• Manual cover and back cover • Missing pages containing crucial clues for the final puzzle • A chart with a mathematical sequence called the golden route

On the back cover of the manual, there is writing in fox script with objects beside it. This is a Rosetta Stone that provides the basics for understanding this hidden language of the game.

• A Reddit user (Oppose Waters) found that the two sentences above the bell are nearly identical in English • The bell simply says to ring the bell to sound it • The language uses a new alphabet to speak English, not a separate language

• The language creates complex sounds by merging vowels and consonants into the same symbol • A dot under a rune indicates you pronounce the vowel before the consonant • This is why the Rosetta Stone shows runes separately to help us understand the grammar

Once deciphered, the chart page says the golden route on the left and the greatest of spells on the right, revealing it's a sequence of directions to open the door.

The golden route is a sequence of directions the player must enter facing the black door in the mountain. It's the greatest puzzle in the game, hidden in plain sight on the most-watched object in the game: the manual itself.

• The manual has 55 pages total • Each page contains a different route to follow • You must assemble all routes into one logical sequence to get the complete golden route

Page 9 of the manual doesn't display a visible route. After several attempts, you discover you must quit and reload at that moment, leading to the understanding that this is the page where you learn to save.

When you finally enter the correct route, the door opens and the manual is completed. The player has now found the little fox and the game reveals its true heart: a story about secrets hidden in plain sight.

Andrew Ice explains that a perfectly hidden secret is useless. Secrets must give players the suspicion that something is happening to create the thrill of mystery.

• A point: secret found in one location on the map, which makes the player happy but doesn't change the game • A line: secret that runs through the game and changes how you view it • The golden route is a line that runs entirely through the gameplay experience

The designer conditions the player for 30 minutes to think they can activate objects by entering directions, then suddenly transforms the entire map into a puzzle based on this mechanic.

The only true reaction an author wants when creating a mystery is: oh my god, it was right under my nose the whole time.

The critic remembers finding the three legendary Pokémon in Pokémon Ruby, hidden behind a series of impossible puzzles. It was the first time he stumbled upon something instead of seeking content designed for him.

This experience of accidental discovery in Pokémon explains why the critic loves exploring video games and finding hidden things so much.

When he finally saw the golden route and the door opened, he felt again like that young child finding legendary Pokémon in the depths of the desert. It was really good.

After all this effort and time invested, he's almost certain there's at least one other major puzzle somewhere in Tunic, hidden as well as the golden route.