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Typically, when a bird discovers an deserted lighthouse, it may land, relax briefly, make a deposit, and take off. That's not the case in Keeper, an forthcoming over-the-shoulder puzzle adventure game developed by Double Fine Productions; here, the lighthouse sprouts little legs, becomes BFFs with the bird, and sets off on an daring hike.

While a latest preview at the gaming convention clarified a few questions, it also ignited a curiosity to learn more about this surreal lighthouse-meets-bird tale. Thus, we connected with the creative director, the creative director behind Keeper, to shed light on his team's colorful creation.

An Unconventional Journey Gameplay

Although at its core built as an exploration title, Petty states that Keeper aims to deliver a distinctive gameplay through a blend of dreamlike graphics, enigmatic setting, approachable puzzles, and, importantly, the absence of words. He calls the game a “refreshing break,” a short adventure unlike any title gamers have experienced before.

“Keeper communicates fewer details than a standard game,” he says. “It was important for us to let the player unwind and not worry about making mistakes; just pause to attempt and accept the unusual aspects.”

As a result, Keeper isn’t just a series of challenges, nor is its exploration very goal-oriented. Set in a post-apocalyptic realm without humans, players traverse the world as a sentient lighthouse joined by a bird sidekick named Twig, but you can’t die, the game lacks skill trees, and there is no need to grind for items.

Gameplay Mechanics and World Integration

“When we began to create the puzzles, we aimed to develop puzzles that felt very integrated into the world and the inhabitants there. In a typical adventure game, you may encounter a problem first,” Petty explains. “For instance, oh, I cannot enter through this door, and you typically grasp that, because there are people there explaining so with dialogue.”

“But in our game, we aimed to really create this sense of an peculiar, atmospheric world and not tell you exactly what it's about. Our puzzles work a bit uniquely, so you often kind of wander into them without understanding what you're supposed to be doing.”

Artisanal Feel and Minimalist Controls

To impart the game a “handmade” feel, Keeper avoids using numerous variations of the same concept. “We do that to some extent, as it's not like everything is done only one time and thrown away,” Petty explains, “but there is a great deal of distinct setup. Every few steps away, you see something very different from the rest of the game.”

When asked about maintaining player’s interest without of failure and defined objectives, Petty is adamant: “I believe we engage the player's attention through the unexpected. Players aren’t entirely sure what's going to happen around each corner.”

This thoughtfully designed method is additionally evident in Keeper’s limited set of interactions. To find your way through its surrealist world, you don’t need more than a handful of buttons, as the lighthouse’s main way of interacting with the world is through its beacon, which has a default mode and a focused mode. For instance, you can aim it at plants to make them grow, beam toward a creature to make it squint, and use it to reveal secrets and solve puzzles.

Partner Dynamics and Gameplay Variety

Twig, the lighthouse’s reliable bird friend, is typically perched on the lighthouse, from where he’ll sometimes fly off to indicate the path forward or trigger secrets. Apart from these scripted movements, the lighthouse can also command the bird to perform things like lifting objects, pulling levers, or — perhaps the most interesting one — attaching itself to creatures.

The last example is a great illustration of how Keeper’s streamlined design to the input scheme still provides a wide variety of gameplay mechanics. The diverse environments, items, and creatures open the way to distinctive interactions, and especially metamorphosis.

“For example, there's a moment where a sort of rosy dust, which looks like cotton candy, gets attached to the lighthouse, rendering it lighter. For that portion of the game, the lighthouse can jump, float, and move around,” Petty explains. “A breath of fresh air from being stuck to the ground. So we try to vary the pace up in a many different ways.”

Narrative Devoid of Words

But hopping around and fiddling with their environment is not the sole task bestowed upon the lighthouse and its bird; they must additionally convey a story of friendship, companionship, and overcoming obstacles as a team as they travel toward a breathtaking mountain peak. To make matters more complicated, they must do so without using words — and without the type of gestures and emotional cues a human character could have used.

Although Petty assures that gamers will get to sense greater emotion than one would expect from a lighthouse, it’s the bird, specifically, who plays a major role in conveying emotions. “When they're riding along on the lighthouse, you actually have a whole button dedicated to just emoting with the bird, and a lot of times it will reflect the mood of that location,” he states.

“For example, when you get in a kind of unsettling or darker area, the bird will hunker down and curl around the top of the lighthouse. And if you press the emote button, instead of a playful tweet or guiding you, it'll kind of glance about and hide.”

Dangers and Friendly Inhabitants

By “darker area,” Petty is talking about the menace that derives from something called the “Wither,” a malevolent ecosystem. As the lighthouse and Twig continue their journey, they encounter increasing amounts of this purple, corrosive substance, which may occasionally appear as of brambles, creepers, and bugs. “It's what Twig is flying away from,” Petty clarifies.

Unlike the Wither, most creatures in Keeper are in fact amicable. When Twig expresses at one of the odd critters, for instance, it may respond and perhaps create an ambient noise — without of words, audio cues and music are an additional tool used to tell Keeper’s story.

Story Closure and Inspiration

This method of wordless storytelling raises the question if Keeper’s narrative concludes in a cryptic ending, but Petty reassures that there will be a middle ground. “It's not a complete mystery, but because it's without dialogue, it's inherently subject to interpretation. We purposely want to leave space for that as that's my favorite thing about art; the discussions that happen after people play something,” he says, “But we do provide defined narrative arcs and closure.”

One glance at Keeper’s snowy mountaintops, elaborate cave systems, and unusual rock formations will reveal that natural scenery formed one of the primary inspirations for this human-less tale. As Petty tells, the scenery is not only inspired by any old place: “I live in California and there's a plenty of really cool mountains in this region,” he says. “Near where I live, there's an old Mercury mine that was left like a century ago, and it has been converted into hiking trails; that's one of my big inspirations. It's nothing super remarkable, but what adds intrigue is the numerous hills, and as you're climbing up, you sometimes come across remnants of machinery that you can’t identify what they were for.”

“They kind of resemble weird monuments, just resting within nature, with nature reclaiming the space. When I reflect at the game and the artifacts of humanity in there, I can see the clear connection to me hiking around all that stuff.”

Metaphorical Significance and Final Thoughts

While Petty jokingly refers to the lighthouse protagonist