Our Lady of Thorns (Joel Burton)
I was about 8 when I became obsessed with Redwall, which I blame (along with the Benedictine Monks of Santo Domingo de Silos and with their trippy, vaguely Magritte-esque1 cover art) for my long fascination with monasticism. I wasn’t Catholic, I just liked the idea of monastic life. I no longer want to be a monk, unless it’s of the Redwall variety2, but I’m still fascinated with monasteries and nunneries as hubs of literacy and ecclesiastical politics, contradictory sites of extreme restraint and opportunities that were hard to find elsewhere, and settings that make for great stories. Name of the Rose and Pentiment were my biggest touchstones going in, and I was interested in what OLoT’s take on religion would be, particularly after learning that the author has not played Pentiment. How would it use its setting?
The setting
Beautifully, for a start. What an astounding debut. The world of this parser is an achievement by any standards, but for a first game… you could retire satisfied after this. Examine a shelf: you find linens, robes, and a generic set of vestry items. Examine vestry items and you’re given several specifics, including some objects that can be taken for a puzzle that you wouldn’t know about otherwise. So much of the gameplay is rooted in attention to this world and its layers of detail, attention that is a delight to give. I appreciated the map, but ultimately didn’t need it, in part because I found this to be vividly but straightforwardly described. There’s a perfectly calibrated style, not too wordy but not at all vague or spare. Really excellently done. I can’t speak highly enough about how good it feels to just inhabit this world.
The gameplay
Spoilers and a general misunderstanding of cats below!
Going to start this section off with my own shortcomings: I’m bad at parsers! After about 15-20 minutes, the game turns you loose and tells you to just Try Stuff. I wrote in an earlier review that the Try Stuff phase is my least favorite part of games because I’m bad at making the connections, and I made some very silly mistakes playing this game that are all on me, though. An example: I had to restart, and in my second game I mis-remembered what herb Remigio liked and took his nonreaction to rosemary as indication that the herb thing was story flavor, not function.
Another example: I forgot that cats are animals you can pick up. I’m very, very allergic to cats, so I haven’t spent much time with them. The encounters I’ve had with them have been polite, even friendly if the cat is outgoing, but no cat has ever given my any indication they would enjoy being scooped. It sounds like it’s different for some of you, and I’m very jealous. For me, this meant that after feeding, petting, and giving a little kiss to Pax, I was out of ideas for how to interact with this cat. Picking him up never occurred to me; Tabitha had to clue me in there. So this is the filter we’re working with; my perspective is clearly flawed.
I did have some real points of friction with the game that I think weren’t my own quirks but rather signals that contradicted what the game meant you to do. A big one: I got a hard-fail at one point because I’d left too many doors open and then got spotted with candle and had to restart the game (remember to save, baezil!). Later, I needed to light a candle to access the crypt. The fires to light the candle are in the scriptorium, occupied by Wilfred (who’s described as being close to the fire), or the kitchens, occupied by Martin & Remigio. Normally I’d wait until everyone was in the quire before using my contraband candle, but you need to pass through the quire to get to the crypt, so that wouldn’t work. I was stymied; apparently the solution is that Wilfred simply doesn’t notice you light the candle, despite noticing other indiscretions I’d committed. Writing this I realize I should’ve tried to put Wilfred to sleep again, but at the time I felt that the game had told me to be very cautious but then asked me to do something quite risky.
Another example: some interactions with items—taking or manipulating—are shut down by the game with a response that warns you about getting caught or that emphasizes it’s disrespectful/against the rules; others, though not outwardly different, are allowed because they’re part of a puzzle. With the candle, the game just says “somehow, you justify it.” Again, you’ve got to Try Stuff—take, climb, touch-- and endure a certain amount of the game scolding you until you find something that you can take/climb/touch.
One more: talking to people got me shushed so often at first that I assumed talking to them wasn’t really a part of the game play. Clever, I thought, to make everyone bound by the Rule to be silent and avoid dialog without blocking the action entirely. Then I hit a wall and was told that you’ve got to chat with specific brothers. Fair enough, you’ve got to Try Stuff, and the game hints that Wilfred is amenable. Still, when I tried to tell people (even Wilfred) about my suspicions, they dismissed it. The game signaled that general topics (ask about cat, about other brothers, etc) were alright, but the specifics of the case, no matter how compelling, weren’t fruitful avenues of conversation.
This meant that near the end, when the game told me it was now time to accuse Hugh during an office or consult a sympathetic brother, I didn’t realize it was really a choice between “justice” or “mercy.” For one, everyone was pretty hard on me for that business with the candle/key, so mercy was not the overriding sense I got from anyone, including ol’ Wilf. For another, Wilfred scolded me for gossiping when I told him about compelling evidence. I didn’t consider Wilfred a trusted confidant in murder-related intel. The weight of that choice, and why Aldwin would try to go to any one brother after being shot down even with evidence in hand, felt unclear.
Nearly all these puzzles felt solvable, though. These mixed signals were fairly minor hiccups. (I nabbed the candle without issue, the issue with talking to people was fairly minor, and crypt is optional), and my overwhelming impression was that this game is a huge flex. I wish I’d had more patience and solved more of this without hints, both for the satisfaction and because the price of asking Tabitha for a hint (at least for me) is that the it’s given with juuust a dash of smugness. Any frustrations were quickly forgiven because of how lovely it is to step into this world. I almost wish there was no murder and we could just work in the garden and sing. (Hm, do I still want to be a monk?)
The Religion
So with our muder solved, what is OLoT doing with its setting, with religion? It’s not NotR 2, and it’s not really about the church being changed by a shifting secular world like Pentiment. Here it’s structural. Religion is the clock and the schedule, determining who can be where at what time, setting limitations on what you can and can’t openly carry or touch. It’s baked into the physical walls, with Gordian’s precepts literally locking one door.
The walls are porous, though. The monastery is struggling financially, not selling enough candles or manuscripts, buying flour from the nearest town to get through the winter. Holy isolation is not materially feasible, and the day-to-day needs are a constant mundane worry.
Similarly, for these characters, the religious rhythms and duties are often at odds with what they feel or need as individuals. Religion is not a personal matter for them so much as the structure in which they try to live. This feels fittingly historical, and it means they’re often motivated to break the rules. Aldwin wants justice for his kind mentor and will steal and snoop to achieve it. Remigio will facilitate your rule-breaking in exchange for a reminder of the home he misses. Hugh will steal from and kill his holy brothers to help his earthly nephew. The space of the monastery is beautiful to explore and examine, but as a player there’s a claustrophobia, a feeling of surveillance.
I don’t think this game is anti-religion; Hugh’s mundane ties are what caused the murder. But he had to kill and steal because the walls of the monastery and the restrictions of his vows keep him from being there to help his sister. The strictures of a holy life are incompatible with human needs, no matter how much the monks may try to isolate themselves, and that tension between the impersonal structures of your order and the very personal needs of you and your brothers are what makes this game tick. That was an interesting focus, and an interesting tension to center when, like I said, this place is so much fun to inhabit as a player.
[1]
Tell me I’m wrong:
[2] Redwall monasticism involves seemingly no dogma or formal orders or actual religion, focusing instead on being a woodland critter, throwing lavish community meals, microbrewing seasonal alcohol, and helping youth with elaborate, sword-themed puzzle quests.
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sounds~ (ASMR) (LOOPED)” soundtrack. Like its setting, the narrative has more branches than you’d think at first glance. I like how it gets a little freaky with it (I was erotically eaten by a spider, which isn’t My Thing in that way but is my thing as a player).
(I wrote about this briefly in the 
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