Demo floated for In Orbita the month before final launch

• Announcements by Jack Allin
• Published:

Full version of "funny, bittersweet" adventure due out next month on Steam

For many of us, adventure games are a welcome form of escapism, allowing us to set aside our worldly troubles and lose ourselves in fictional worlds. But what if game characters themselves need to similarly escape? This is one of the main themes of In Orbita, the upcoming point-and-click adventure from indie Italian developer ParacausalitySystems.

Vincenzo (Enzo to his family) seems to have it made. As a middle-aged man he owns a small company, has "a wife and a son who love him," and visits his parents every Sunday for a family lunch in Naples. But Enzo isn't happy. The company is "about to lose its biggest client" and he feels alone, even around other people, and can't bring himself to tell anyone "how he really feels." This Sunday starts out like any other, with a drive through traffic, the "ragù simmering for hours, Mom running the show, Dad glued to the TV, his son glued to his phone." Just when it all starts to feel overwhelming, Enzo is suddenly sucked into the TV of his childhood bedroom. When he awakens, he's no longer an adult but his 8-year-old self, trapped "inside the 1980s cartoons he watched when he was little." Now, in order for him to escape, Enzo will finally be forced to confront the emotions he's been suppressing. 

In Orbita is a classic-styled point-and-click adventure "like they used to make," though it can be controlled with either a mouse or gamepad. Both the familiar world of the protagonist's family home and the TV program settings, such as a city populated by fellow humans and robots, are presented in a charming hand-drawn art style, accompanied by an original soundtrack with "cartoon theme songs included." The mechanics are simple and intuitive, allowing even inexperienced players to perform the usual genre fare: "explore, talk to everyone, collect and combine items, solve puzzles." A journal will help you keep track of objectives, including a to-do list and built-in hint system if you get stuck.

It's the unvoiced conversations that give this game its most unusual twist. There will be standard dialogue trees to select from, including "the easy joke" to help Enzo deflect from dealing with his true emotions. And yet the "sincere line" representing his real feelings will be present as well, but "it won't come out." Try to select it and Enzo "freezes, trembles, and each attempt costs the line a word" until nothing is left. In the cartoon world, on the other hand, the protagonist will "think like a grown-up, talk like a kid." Here you can "choose what a 47-year-old man would say, and hear what comes out of an 8-year-old’s mouth." With no inner filter holding him back, perhaps the kid version of Enzo will finally be able to express himself clearly and honestly. In doing so, gradually you'll uncover a "funny, bittersweet" story "about family, about fathers who never have time, about children growing up, and about the things we can’t manage to say to the people we love."

The full version of In Orbita, projected to take about 8-10 hours to complete, is due to launch on Steam sometime in November for Windows, Mac and Linux. In the meantime, a playable prologue is available to download, itself providing about 45-60 minutes of gameplay. 

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