The older I’ve gotten, the more I come to appreciate slow-paced games that encourage you to kick back for an hour or so at a time. Coffee Talk and Donut County are among my favorites in this “chill” genre. SCHiM may soon join them if its demo is any indication.
I gave the SCHiM demo a try when I spotted it while perusing the sea of survival crafting games in Steam Next Fest, egged on by the low-key visuals and the promise of a relaxing time. In this hectic life and industry, we can all benefit by giving ourselves an hour to unplug and unwind.
The premise of SCHiM sounds like something out of Studio Ghibli or maybe Pixar. Everything, from living beings to various objects, has a “spirit” called a schim. Losing it is akin to the loss of your soul.
Hop along
SCHiM starts you off teaching you how being a spirit works. Apparently, the rules on losing your schim are a bit fluid, since you can hop out of your host at will and enter other shadows so long as you eventually return. The protagonist schim in question is shown belonging to a young boy, whom you can briefly control while the schim operates in his shadow — as characterized by fantastic googly eyes.
Controlling the schim is a breeze. You can manipulate the spirit in various shadows as if swimming in a darkened pool. A single button tap allows you to leap from the shadow, and you make progress by entering another shadow nearby.
The schim can’t survive on illuminated surfaces, but you are given a short “safety hop” to make it to a shadow that was just out of your reach. Don’t worry about dying; you warp back to the nearest shadow if you mess up. You can swap the isometric camera’s angle around when you need to find another shadow just outside of your vision.
A single button press lets you interact with some objects, usually as a fun way to see how they react. You can cause a tree to shake or a child to sneeze if you hit the button while in their shadow. The moment I learned you can make bicycle bells jingle, it was over. I had to voraciously jingle every bike chime and make each duck I found quack with reckless abandon. For those desperate to know, yes, you can make ducks quack to the “Shave and a Haircut” jingle. No doubt 90% of everyone who plays the game will try it.
Spirit hopping
As suggested, SCHiM does have a story to share. It’s not as subtle as something like, say, Unpacking, where you connect the delicate threads via the environment and the objects you manipulate. The game begins with you paired with the young boy as you view his life in brief fragments. As a child, he plays without a care in the world. Time passes, and you watch him experience high school, heartache, college, and finally, early adulthood in his very own tiny cubicle in the corner of an office. Things quickly go sour for the young man and, at his lowest, he trips and gets separated from his googly-eyed spirit.
That is pretty much the crux of SCHiM: You’ve been separated from your human host, who is now meandering through the city oblivious to what was lost. Your goal is to give chase, navigating your way from shadow to shadow across levels with various hazards. It feels like an environmental puzzler, as you can find yourself needing to cross a street or get over a bridge by only using shadows to progress.
Most times, waiting for a few seconds will solve the issue with a passing human or animal. You can slip into the shadow of a cyclist or a car, which can speed you closer to your destination if you time it right. Shadows from cars can also grab you and carry you away if you’re caught relaxing a bit too hard in the wrong spot.
But the game isn’t tough with its challenges, which is the entire point. Its one-button approach to “solving” the navigational hazards makes moving your shadow frog from one end to another a rather cordial affair. At least, that’s what I picked up from the demo. Based on the game’s description on Steam, it doesn’t sound like SCHiM will ultimately venture into the waters of frustration often, if at all.
Clean styles
It helps that the visuals are so crisp. Purposefully monotone, the game juxtaposes one color against a darker variant for texture, creating a look that’s clean and pleasing to the eye. The calming greens of a neighborhood park give way to a busy street punctuated by rain and light-blue hues. It’s all tied together with a soundtrack in which the tunes match the energy of each stage.
I have little criticism to lobby against SCHiM. The controls are tight, and the visuals and music melt together to create a little puzzler that puts me right in that Zen state I was searching for. SCHiM will launch next month on July 18.
