The controls require some getting used to. Climbing is not as natural as pushing a joystick to walk. You move each limb individually, jamming each one in turn into a nook or a cranny. The game then chooses the next limb for you. Usually, it\u2019s a logical choice, but not always. At first, your limbs wriggle uselessly, like an inexperienced octopus reaching for third base. The comparison with clumsy simulators like QWOP and the sadistic climbing games mentioned above seems appropriate initially. It does start making sense eventually. Try the demo if you have doubts.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The final test of the tutorial is climbing a real rock face. You\u2019re now in charge of screwing your own pitons into the rock. Basically, a piton is a place to tie your rope. Instead of falling down to your doom, you can climb back up to it or take a rest. Putting a piton down requires passing a little timing minigame. Get the timing wrong and the piton will break when recovered. It\u2019s exactly the kind of thing you\u2019ll mess up if you wait too long and attempt to use a piton right before falling. Basically, you\u2019re in charge of your own checkpoints, of your own survival. I\u2019m starting to like Cairn more already!<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Once you get to the top of that final tutorial wall, you realize it leads directly outside. Bam! You\u2019re out there in nature. It\u2019s a neat little wow moment. It confirms that the player is in good hands with The Game Bakers. There will be other wow moments. In fact, the weather\/time of day system creates lots of great screenshot opportunities. Photo mode is really earning its keep here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Another thing that had me worried is that you basically spend most of the game just staring at a wall. When climbing, you don\u2019t see anything but the rock face. However, when you can\u2019t see much, you start to hear<\/em>: the birds, the wind and, perhaps more importantly, the subtle grunts of your character indicating fatigue or her feet slipping on the rock. You can also jam to the sound of the electronic soundtrack, whose presence makes itself felt at important moments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n One last thing about the beginning of the game. You know how most games have a special name for their hardest difficulty level? Nightmare, Veteran, Insanity, that kind of stuff.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Cairn calls its hardest difficulty level \u201cFree Solo\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n If the very mention of Free Solo doesn\u2019t put you in a state of sphincter-loosening terror, maybe you don\u2019t know what it means. It\u2019s basically rock climbing without ropes, harnesses or any kind of security. It\u2019s do-or-die (By the way, Alex Honnold climbed a skyscraper free solo in a Netflix live special the other day. My mind could barely process what was happening onscreen.). When it comes to Cairn, Free Solo mode basically does the same thing: no harness, no pitons, no save points and permadeath. Anyway, if the name of a difficulty level itself elicits a response, Cairn is already doing a better job than most horror games I\u2019ve played.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The protagonist of Cairn is Aava. \u201cHero\u201d isn\u2019t the right word here. She\u2019s not here to save anybody or to help anyone, she just wants to climb her damn mountain in peace. If there\u2019s ever a time to bring out the word \u201cmonomaniac\u201d, it\u2019s now. There\u2019s an obvious disconnect between Aava\u2019s high-minded introductory narration about finding her place in the world and the cranky lady you meet right after that. She doesn\u2019t reply to her agent, she hates interviews, she ignores her loved ones. Her encouragement to a fellow climber rings hollow. You know the kind: \u201cIf you even think about defeat, you\u2019ve already lost. There is no I in failure!\u201d In fact, it doesn\u2019t seem so obvious that Aava is going to find what she\u2019s looking for on top of that big rock. Hubris and anomie are a dangerous mix in a mountain climber. I respect The Game Bakers for not just making a game about a \u201ccool, fun person who has a big dream and has lots of fun achieving her life goals while discovering the power of friendship.\u201d (As an aside, Alex Honnold displayed nothing but placid confidence during his skyscraper ascent. His wife\u2019s face, however, was a much more complex mix of emotions.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n The mountain in this game is Kami, a fictional mountain that makes Everest look like a walk in the park. The game states that Kami is a killer, but that\u2019s really not true. The true villain of the game is something else. It was there when you fell off your bike and scratched your knee. It was there when you dropped your phone in the toilet and never told anyone. Gravity. It\u2019s always been there, pulling you down. And if you dare to get off the ground, it now has a chance to get you good.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The point is that the fear of heights requires no explanation. It\u2019s not some evil sorcerer whose powers you have to demonstrate to the player. Oh no. When Aava\u2019s limbs start wriggling furiously and you realize you forgot to put in a piton, you know what comes next. No jump scare will ever be more effective than knowing what happens if you slip up. Don\u2019t look down.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Once you start on your real journey, you have a certain amount of control over the route you take. You can even get a bird\u2019s-eye view of the terrain to plan ahead. That freedom is still limited, however, since eventually you will reach the same important landmarks.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are also the usual survival sim elements to manage: health, hunger, thirst, and cold. You collect items in your backpack, like food and drink, to meet those needs. Very standard stuff. I have to say these RPG elements feel very pro forma<\/em>. There\u2019s so much stuff lying around that these needs barely seem to matter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Stamina is by far the most important resource in the game, but it\u2019s a hidden variable. I suppose the developers wanted it that way to make the game \u201cimmersive\u201d, they wanted you to listen to the subtle cues mentioned above. I\u2019m not sure it\u2019s working. Why am I told in detail that raspberries are worth ten hunger points, but I\u2019m told absolutely nothing about how stamina works? Does it matter if I climb fast or slow? How \u201cgood\u201d is a good grip? Are there \u201cbetter\u201d grips? What do the food buffs do, numerically speaking? How do you take a good rest mid-climb? Why does rest work sometimes but other times nothing happens? Can you have unlimited stamina by taking breaks? When Aava moves a limb by herself, should I trust that she\u2019s chosen a good hold?<\/p>\n\n\n\n On top of that, some enormously important options aren\u2019t activated by default. There\u2019s an option for visual feedback when you grip a good hold. The little extra visual feedback isn\u2019t \u201cimmersive\u201d, but it\u2019s very hard to predict with certainty what the game is going to consider a good hold. You should probably remap the controls for manual limb selection as well.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Don\u2019t worry, says the game, I have plenty of assist options too. I don\u2019t want assists, I want you to help me understand the game.<\/p>\n\n\n\n It\u2019s actually frustrating that Cairn is so unconcerned about teaching you its nuances. For a while I thought it wouldn\u2019t matter because it\u2019d mostly be a \u201cnarrative experience\u201d. Oh no. At about the midway point, the gloves come off. There\u2019s a particularly terrifying bit of vertical wall with no breaks and no solid footholds. I ended my session there that evening and it literally gave me nightmares at night. I left my character right there on the rock face. It\u2019s irrational, I know, but in a sense I too<\/em> was still on that rock face. That section is impossible, I don\u2019t have enough pitons, no one can do it, I\u2019m going to fall, it\u2019s all over, don\u2019t you see?<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n I ended up taking the assists. No game is worth losing this much sleep before a work day. But in a way, I suppose that means the game is doing something right.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019m happy to report that the rest of the game went without any sleepless nights, even with the assists off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n There are a lot of environmental details to find on Kami. There\u2019s a little subplot about the natives of the mountain. They\u2019ve built an impressive vertical rock-carved city, but there\u2019s nothing \u201cmagical\u201d about them. They\u2019re just a declining local population abandoning their traditional way of life to go \u201clive with the horizontals”. It\u2019s like leaving the Amazon forest to get an office job at, I dunno, Amazon. Your fellow climbers have also left a lot of things behind. Their old stuff to loot. Messages about their hopes and dreams and what the mountain means to them. Some have left their mortal remains. It seems that the smarter climbers have found what they were looking for early and turned back. The more stubborn climbers paid the ultimate price for their perseverance. Cairn is a game about the virtues of giving up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n I\u2019ve heard that mountaineering can be a meditative experience. Basically, you either have complete focus or you die. That doesn\u2019t sound very relaxing, but okay. I suppose there\u2019s something of that paradox in Cairn. It\u2019s a slow game, but it\u2019s not cozy. It\u2019s a simple game, but it\u2019s not forgiving. It\u2019s a terrifying game, but it\u2019s not horror. Or is it? A tiny part of my soul is definitely going to stay stuck on that rock face forever.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" You know what\u2019s my favorite level? Sea level. Still, I can understand the allure of mountain climbing. It\u2019s the feeling of being literally and figuratively on top of the world. A selfie on top of a mountain is that one photo everyone has on social media. That being said, there are not that many mountaineering […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1724,"featured_media":53699,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-53693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-games"],"yoast_head":"\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.quartertothree.com\/fp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Cairn_2-1024x576.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.quartertothree.com\/fp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Cairn_3-1024x576.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.quartertothree.com\/fp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Cairn_4-1024x576.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.quartertothree.com\/fp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Cairn_5-1024x576.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.quartertothree.com\/fp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Cairn_6-1024x576.jpg\")
<\/figure>\n\n\n\n