The Old City: Leviathan

The Old City: Leviathan is a first-person adventure game entirely focused on exploration. The game is divided in eleven chapters and it is set in a decaying city in a post-apocalyptic environment. The protagonist is a sewer-dwelling isolationist and an unreliable narrator as the game warns you at the start: "You are about to inhabit a broken mind. Not everything you see or hear is trustworthy". The game mixes scenes of the abandoned metropolis with memories of the people who died there, a lost society based on three types of religions, water as an important source and a catalyst for insanity, religious themes most notably tied to the story of Jonah and the whale, and dreams of the protagonist's childhood.

Just like Dear Esther there are no puzzles and the player just needs to explore, optionally establishing the story by piecing together different pieces of information. There are sometimes branching paths but ultimately only a single path. Reaching a certain location often triggers musings by the protagonist. Other clues are provided through the environment and many notes left behind by various people. It is possible to jump and sprint but those are not needed to progress. It is also possible to zoom in slightly using the left mouse button. The only interaction required in the game is opening doors. Optionally seven extensive notes by the character Solomon can be collected in hidden locations and these provide even more background information.