Following in the footsteps of the great Finnish developers such as Taneli Armanto for Nokia, Sampo Karjalainen and Aapo Kyrölä on Habbo Hotel, and Karoliina Korppoo as well as everyone at Colossal Order, Act Normal Games brings another delightfully depressing Finnish game, Rauniot. A Finnish word for ruin, it is no surprise this isometric point-and-click adventure is set in a post-nuclear world of destruction and ruin. Ultimately taking its aesthetic as far as it will go, something I’d compare to Disco Elysium in that respect, there is nothing quite like Rauniot’s immersive commitment to itself.

For a couple of weeks now, I’ve been trying to wrack my brains on how to talk about Rauniot without spoiling it, as the whole experience can be explained as the most Finnish game you’ll ever play. Its dark humor, dry plot, and maybe even its approach to logic puzzles have that cloud of something depressing but charming and without a filter. Plot-wise Rauniot is quite simple: You play as Aino, a woman from one of the small communities that arose following the nuclear apocalypse, though you’ve been sent out to find a fabled nuclear-powered train after someone failed to return after being sent to find it themselves.

How hard can it be? As it turns out, Rauniot sometimes takes from the 90s adventure game logic and offers up scraps of paper as the “clues” to your puzzles. I will say that there is practically no information wasted. It is one of the more tightly written games I’ve played this year, every detail is a hint or a clue to the next part of the two-ish hour-long puzzle. Though, as I was alluding to, sometimes those scrap clues can feel like just a part of the world-building, a piece of art done during development and thrown in. At least when you initially get them.

At such a short length, I think it is fair not to go into too much detail on the plot or specific puzzles, which makes this review difficult to write. There isn’t any English voice acting, nor are there many options to choose from within Rauniot. The voice acting I “forgive,” even as a dyslexic, as there is something about the strong Finnish setting and all-round feeling that can’t be replicated. Of course, everything is subtitled, but this dialogue and this dour and often graphically horrible world wouldn’t be the same without losing some of that character.

Though as I’ve said, the options are rather scant for a new release. There are no graphical options as simple as windowed mode, or some accessibility like increasing font size on the subtitles. Your options are language for your subtitles, and a few volume sliders that you’ll probably leave as is anyway. There is no resolution drop-down menu or button remapping in sight. Though it would be odd to have control options on PC given everything is controlled with a mouse. Your pause menu, inventory, etc are all brought up with one of two buttons.

None of this has explained why I am so excited to say I enjoy Rauniot. Put simply, I don’t think there is another game like Rauniot. Yes, I could draw comparisons of 90s graphic adventure games, Grim Fandango, Simon the Sorcerer, Star Trek: Judgment Rites, and so on, though I don’t think any of them were quite like this. Animations are slow and labored, and the aforementioned logic can sometimes seem at odds with reality. However, I think the best way I can put this is that Rauniot graphically does what the 90s could only dream of, and oftentimes to dark effects.

While you walk through the world isometrically with your trusty mouse pointer hovering over your head, several “actions” are shown in what would once have been FMV clips in a select few games. You are pulled into the dark, depressing world of Aino with this simple graphical style and direction. That is something modern graphic adventure titles have lost with a sense of uniformity. There is both a sense of originality as well as that dose of revival for that era of adventure titles, something Rauniot captures. Though as mentioned, not without faults of logic.

Rauniot does not escape bug-free either. On this one I get it, I’m not exactly typical, or maybe I am as it’s the same problem a select few games also have an issue with. Whatever headphone source you are using must remain connected at all times. If you are like me and use Bluetooth headphones/speakers regularly, I hope you don’t walk away for a moment or switch your headphones off before walking away for a few minutes. A majority of my time loading up Rauniot has been as a result of this lone audio-centric bug.

The one gameplay bug was, without trying to spoil it, the elevator and walkie-talkie solution. something I had to find a walkthrough to see if I was or wasn’t going mad over. In short: Something that possibly should have triggered didn’t, so I had to drag Aino across the map, through a load screen or two, and only then after talking to someone, I solved the issue. A minor issue, sure, though one that could easily be assumed to be game-breaking.

Despite these microscopic issues and Rauniot’s quite short runtime, its dark and sometimes sex doll standing to watch over a grave-style humor is refreshing in comparison to everything else you’ll play. Ultimately, I enjoy Act Normal Games’ not-so-normal Rauniot simply because of its dark, twisted, sometimes funny world, something that’s practically never broken as the aesthetic is kept true throughout. If I think there is one issue that would need “fixing” to make my opinion more obtusely glowing, it would be to tighten up that logic for puzzles.

A PC review copy of Rauniot was provided by Act Normal Games for this review.

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Rauniot

$17.99

7.5

Score

7.5/10

Pros

• Amazingly brilliant direction for an adventure game.
• Its whole visual style is great.
• A very Finnish game to face a very Finnish world.
• Doesn't overstay it's welcome.
• There are three bullets for a reason.

Cons

• Slightly buggy, but nothing too notable.
• Puzzle clues could be explained a little better sometimes.
• Pixel hunting for interactable objects.