Baby Steps Features Among the Most Significant Choices I've Ever Experienced in Gaming

I've faced some challenging decisions in video games. Certain choices I made in Life is Strange continue to trouble me. Ghost of Tsushima concluding moments made me pause the game for a good 10 minutes while I considered my choices. I am the cause of numerous Krogan demises in Mass Effect that I wish I could undo. Not a single one of those situations compare to what possibly is the hardest choice I’ve had to make in gaming — and it involves a enormous set of steps.

Baby Steps, the recent title from the developers of Ape Out game, is hardly a choice-driven game. Certainly not in typical gaming terms. You only need to explore a vast game world as the main character Nate, a onesie-wearing manchild who can hardly stay upright on his wobbly legs. It looks like a setup for annoyance, but Baby Steps game’s strength comes from its unexpectedly meaningful plot that will sneak up on you when it's most unexpected. There’s no situation that showcases that quality like a pivotal decision that remains on my mind.

Alert: Spoilers

Some scene setting is necessary here. Baby Steps game starts when Nate is transported from the basement of his home and into a fantasy world. He soon realizes that navigating this world is a difficulty, as years spent as a sedentary person have deteriorated his physical condition. The humorous physicality of it all arises from users guiding Nate step by step, trying to prevent him from falling over.

Nate needs help, but he has difficulty expressing that to other characters. During his adventure, he encounters a group of unusual individuals in the world who each propose to give him a hand. A composed outdoorsman seeks to provide Nate a map, but he clumsily declines in the game’s most hilarious scene. When he plunges into an trapping cavity and is presented with a ladder, he strives to appear nonchalant like he can manage alone and genuinely desires to be confined in the cavity. As the plot unfolds, you experience no shortage of annoying scenarios where Nate makes life harder for himself because he’s too insecure to accept any assistance.

The Defining Decision

Everything builds up in Baby Steps’s key situation of choice. As Nate nears the end his adventure, he realizes that he must ascend of a frosty elevation. The unofficial caretaker of the world (who Nate has actively avoided up to this point) shows up to let him know that there are two routes to the top. If he’s prepared for difficulty, he can opt for a particularly extended and risky path dubbed The Obstacle. It is the most formidable barrier Baby Steps game provides; attempting it appears unwise to any human.

But there’s a second option: He can simply ascend a massive winding stairs as an alternative and get to the top in a few minutes. The sole condition? He’ll have to call the groundskeeper “Master” from now on if he chooses the simple path.

An Agonizing Decision

I am very serious when I say that this is an agonizing choice in the game's narrative. It’s the totality of Nate's self-consciousness about himself culminating in a particularly bizarre situation. An element of Nate's story is revolves around the truth that he’s insecure of his physical appearance and manhood. Every time he sees that handsome trekker, it’s a difficult memory of all he lacks. Attempting The Challenge could be a moment where he can show that he’s as competent as his unilateral competitor, but that road is bound to be laden with more humiliating failures. Does it merit striving just to prove a point?

The staircase, on the other hand, give Nate another big moment to choose whether to take assistance or not. The user doesn't get to decide in if they decline guidance, but they can choose to give Nate a break and opt for the steps. It might seem like an simple decision, but Baby Steps is devilishly clever about making you feel paranoid each time you see a simple solution. The environment includes planned obstacles that turn a safe route into a setback suddenly. Could the steps yet another trap? Will Nate get at the peak just to be fooled by a final joke? And more concerning, is he ready to be diminished another time by being forced to call a strange individual as Master?

No Perfect Choice

The brilliance of that instant is that there’s no correct or incorrect choice. Either one brings about a real situation of personal growth and catharsis for Nate. If you choose to tackle The Challenge, it’s an personal triumph. Nate eventually obtains a chance to prove that he’s as able as everyone else, voluntarily accepting a challenging way rather than struggling through one that he has no option except to pursue. It’s hard, and perhaps unwise, but it’s the moment of strength that he craves.

But there’s no embarrassment in the staircase as well. To choose that path is to finally allow Nate to take support. And when he does so, he discovers that there’s no real catch in store for him. The steps are not a joke. They continue for a while, but they’re simple to climb and he doesn’t slide completely down if he stumbles. It’s a simple climb after lengthy difficulty. Partway through, he even has a chat with the hiker who has, of course, selected The Obstacle. He tries to play it cool, but you can see that he’s fatigued, quietly regretting the unnecessary challenge. By the time Nate gets to the top and has to fulfill his obligation, hailing his new Lord, the arrangement scarcely looks so bad. Who has energy for shame by this odd character?

My Choice

During my game, I chose the staircase. Some part of my reasoning just {wanted to call