Last Stop is almost everything I want from narrative games. An anthology of well presented short stories, each with a solid thematic throughline. It falters slightly with the wrapper story that the whole game comes in, but the experience is a delight for the most part.
Created by Variable State, who have prior form in fascinating narratives with Virginia. Their latest title was created in collaboration with Publisher Annapurna Interactive. Last Stop is described as “a single-player third-person narrative adventure game set in present day London, where you play as three separate characters whose worlds collide in the midst of a supernatural crisis. An anthology drama, Last Stop is three stories in one”
Virginia was an argument for the use of more cinematic technique in games. Last Stop is a spirited conversation between the two mediums. The result is something both beautiful and deeply engrossing.
Much like Virginia, Last Stop is a story driven game where your character maneuvers around 3D environments from various fixed camera perspectives. Occasionally there’ll be a minigame or conversational dialogue choice. That’s the base you’ll be starting from. And then the developers just keep experimenting from there. Changes in perspective from third person to first person heighten tension as mystery builds. The camera pulls out all the way to an isometric view to allow for the illusion of significant travel. Rapid cuts track your character as a chase scene plays out.
I’ll add, all of this is scored with a spellbinding soundtrack from the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra. It adds Incredible texture and depth. Charming comedic melodies in Paper Dolls. Becoming grandiose and Bondlike in Domestic Affairs Switching to Close Encounters/Twilight Zone like refrains for The Stranger.
It’s a clear understanding of how cinematic technique and convention can enhance the experience. There’s the same heavy usage of cuts and sweeping camera movement that injected every scene in Virginia with deliberate meaning.
Variable State understand not just how to tell a story through the script, but through the scene composition, though the cinematography.
In the case of Last Stop, the team are telling four stories in one. Though I’d maybe argue that Last Stop is three good genre stories in the wrapper of an okay sci fi anthology. A prologue and epilogue provide a wraparound narrative that doesn’t land quite as well as the three individual stories. One is a body swap comedy, the next a Bond style thriller and the final being a Twilight Zone esque horror. It’s a bunch of ordinary people encountering something deeply strange. But having their lives interrogated and changed as a result.
Arranged in descending order based on how much I enjoyed them;
- 3. Domestic Affairs
This is the pseudo-spy/cop story. A dual life for Meena Hughes as a hard nosed intelligence operative trying to land the mission of a lifetime, also trying to keep her family together as she carries out an affair.
It’s tropey and arch, but the core of the story is about a woman having difficulty maintaining her various different relationships, while not really knowing herself. The brilliance of Last Stop is how well this is communicated through gameplay.
One of the first things you do as Meena is enter a cool sequence where you “Sherlock scan” a coworker to get a feel for them. It’s presented as a computer readout of various flaws and foibles that sums up both her and Meena in a single sequence.
As a spy story, it has twists, it has turns, it has a lot more action and drama than the other two stories. But as a result it’s also a lot more reliant on hiding story elements from the player so they can unpick the mystery. Which doesn’t play quite as well as the other two.
- 2. Stranger Danger
Donna is a teenager in London. She likes hanging out with her mates, doesn’t care so much for her copper sister or family trying to keep her around so much.
One night while hanging out, the group of friends see something weird happening in the middle of London and get caught up in a drama that far outstrips their teenage capacity, putting their friendship to the test.
Stranger Danger probably ends up being the most conventional young adult style story, and conventionally designed game. Which is no insult. There’s minor mini games around throwing bottles, taking selfies/deleting photos, which do have a subtle narrative influence. But the core here is in choosing dialogue options with your friends and family.
They have a character of their own, but you can change your approach to them through dialogue choices, which leads to some interesting readings as to what happens in Donna’s story.
- 1. Paper Dolls
Body swap action! The run down, stressed out single parent John and the hyperactive, youthful inconsiderate Jack. Neighbors who keep accidentally getting each others mail, and accidentally get each others bodies.
In line with the Variable State formula, there’s an excellent change in perspective from third person to first person when the body switch happens.
But the reason Paper Dolls is the best is that it’s so honestly, deeply funny. Especially made so because of some wonderfully directed dialogue, especially by Lulu Simpson who brings an incredibly honest performance to the 8 year old Molly that had me in stitches the whole time.
It also features a self aware extended sequence making fun of overblown emotional indie games and game development culture.
In all three stories though, it’s the tiny things that matter the most. The verisimilitude that comes from exploring the same vignettes over and over again, building up not just a sense of place, but a sense of being lived in.
This is a distinctly British adventure, with the London of Last Stop having a depth and texture that soars beyond other England set games of recent fare. It’s the variety of accents present, the little bits of slang or class based vernacular. As you go through an episode of Last Stop, this texture builds and develops, feeling like this is a fuller world rather than simply a staged setting. This feeling of building up is a narrative trick, but also a structural one.
Last Stop is structured in an intriguing way, especially considering the nature of the anthology. You play a single chapter (out of six) of each of three stories, then you can move to the next set of three. So you can play Meena, Donna then Jack, then switch around for the next time if a particular story had a moment you’re desperate to see resolved.
For the most part, there didn’t feel like a “correct” order to play through the chapters. Instead, the interconnectedness came from sometimes seeing one of the other protagonists wandering through a scene. Sometimes it’s supporting cast members appearing for another protagonist. Other times its references that now make sense in a different context. As the stories build, having played all three narratives, the player will be able to draw upon the connections and inferences to understand what is happening in the final sequences. The only issue is that the denouement doesn’t necessarily give a great answer for why this is happening.
The denouement ties all three stories together in a fashion that’s much more classic sci fi. (Mostly very Doctor Who)
It’s visually impressive and has some stunning art design as well. It doesn’t quite stick the landing on meshing the three themes so well.
The finale loses a lot of the metaphor and artifice of the rest of the anthology. It ends up not really taking advantage of the stories of the three characters. Instead the finale shifts the focus and instead relies on more straightforward action.
As this is a narrative game though, you the player, get to decide what each of the three protagonists will actually have learned from their stories as a whole.
Unfortunately, this comes in the form of a binary choice as is often the case with Interactive Dramas. (See Firewatch, Life is Strange)
Fortunately, it’s (mostly) a much better written choice than in other Interactive Dramas.
It did feel (based on my reading) like there was a “correct” outcome for each of the stories. A more satisfying end based on the themes of the relevant character narrative.
However, both endings are written in such a way that they offer different yet plausible interpretations of the character.
For Meena and Donna, both endings were satisfying in their own way. Neither undermined or short changed the narrative in comparison to the other choice.
John’s is slightly less positive. One of his endings definitely appears to be more slight in content. It feels like they didn’t quite know what to do if someone took a last minute swerve from the existing story. I think the agency of player choice is baked in. I don’t think that narrative worked out for it.
This is by no means a deal breaker. 5/6 narrative resolution options feeling meaningful and appropriate is a hit rate that many other games designers would kill for. And the wider anthology narrative is a gamble that mostly pays off.
But when I think back on the joy of playing Last Stop, i don’t think about that. It’s the stories themselves and the presentation that makes them worthwhile. The expert design and narrative construction that engrosses the player in this world and these characters. The texture and detail of these stories, and the thematically meaningful explorations of these characters. A slightly scuffed ending doesn’t come close to undoing that.
Last Stop is available right now on Steam, Playstation Consoles, Nintendo Switch eShop and on the Xbox Store for Windows and Xbox Family of Consoles for purchase or through Gamepass.