It makes the survival elements of this game seem undercooked, making for a largely shallow gameplay experience. I used it often but had no idea if it helped. This is a technique elephants use to help block out damaging sun rays, but at no point does the game mention or emphasize this. When I reached a desert area, I could grab some dirt and spread it on my back. The survival elements could have been expanded upon to add more enjoyment. They didn’t even move as my elephant posse completely clipped through them as we passed. Later I came across a herd of deer as they stood next to each other, motionless. I tried calling what looked like a sleeping wildebeest to see if it would react, and nothing happened. Besides the food resources, there isn’t much else to interact with to help enrich the experience. Even the environment is lacking in interactivity. I wouldn’t mind the walking from point A to B if the other elements of the game were more engaging. Yes, it’s a more accurate simulated elephant experience, but ultimately not as fun for a video game. The issue is that it doesn’t make for a particularly exciting game to play. Granted, that’s a large part of an elephant’s life, so I think it was the developer’s goal to simulate this aspect of it. Most of the game is walking from one point to another.
It all has the base mechanics to create a compelling survival experience – replenish the energy bar while avoiding obstacles – which is fine but ultimately flawed because the environments are not very compelling or interesting to traverse through. The bar can be replenished by drinking water or eating dropped fruit from trees I could ram into. When depleted, it can cause starvation, It also depletes faster when sprinting, so walking most of the time is highly encouraged. There is also an important energy bar, which isn’t explained fully. For example, I could call out to my herd to see where they were and if they were unhappy. Elephants on the Marchįrom a gameplay standpoint, the game doesn’t explain much but wanted me to figure things out as I played. I feel like Shelter 3 didn’t do enough to make its theme hit home. The screens of text fleshing out the narrative are also too sparse to be engaging. Since the game was so short, I didn’t gain any attachment to the other elephants I was caring for. There is an overarching theme to Shelter 3 and it’s meant to be a guided emotional adventure, more philosophical in nature, which is appreciated but ultimately didn’t gel with me. I did feel like that linearity is a large part of the game’s goal. Don’t expect expansive survival systems at play here or memorable sequences.
I don’t mind linearity, but in Shelter 3, the linear nature sacrifices player agency, making for less unique scenarios and fun gameplay-driven stories in the process. I’ll just say that it’s very much still a game about survival but from a more linear – and less captivating – approach. It’s hard to get into much detail because Shelter 3 only takes about an hour to complete. For the most part, it does that, but differently from its predecessors. There isn’t much of a traditional narrative it’s instead meant to be an approachable simulation that aims to recreate some of the obstacles elephants face. Much like the first two games in the series, this game tells a short narrative about survival. In order to accomplish this, I had to lead them through rough varied terrain while battling starvation.
In Shelter 3, I played as an elephant helping lead her fellow elephants to reunite with the rest of their herd.
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