Jamie Hughes
Associate Photography Editor
“Harold Halibut” opens with a very average scenario: the titular character has received a fine from the transit system due to an unannounced fare change, and is brought down to the headquarters to resolve it. Halibut is established early on as clueless but not unintelligent, which was an accurate portrayal of my own feelings on the matter, due to the game thrusting you into Halibut’s shoes with almost no explanation of where to go or what to do.
Despite the player’s initial cluelessness, the game is designed in such a way to not be overly stumping. Early in the game, you are tasked with draining a large filtration tank. The controls for the tank come with absolutely no tutorial, and an interface made up entirely of pixel icons. Relying solely on the context the icons provide, I was able to complete the task.
The real headline feature of this game of course is its art style. “Harold Halibut” is a game that took more than a decade to develop, mostly due to the path taken with its art design. The game was originally going to be hand-animated using clay stop-motion, and while that, unfortunately, didn’t work out, they instead chose to digitally scan their clay models to be animated by computer, and the result is a smooth game with an entirely hand-crafted look, which one can easily say looks like staring into a lovingly crafted diorama.
Also on display is the worldbuilding. The world of “Harold Halibut” is a huge starship, called the Fedora I, trapped in an alien ocean, that left Earth hundreds of years ago. The inhabitants of the ship believe that Earth was destroyed when the Cold War turned nuclear. This means the technology aboard the Fedora is based on the technology of the ‘80s and ‘90s, such as the delightfully retro mini-computer called the “PDA” which forms the game’s mission tracker system.
You have your typical corporation running the ship who is the source of much of the game’s plot; they’re the reason you receive your fine at the beginning of the game and it is shown very early on that there is a heavy amount of mismanagement and bureaucratic intrigue that bogs down the ship’s culture. A mysterious group known as the “Lightkeepers” is self-described to be exposing the corporation’s corruption, and you will eventually run into them over the course of the story.
Halibut works as a lab assistant for one of Fedora’s scientists but also completes odd jobs for just about everyone aboard the ship. The primary goal of Halibut’s superiors on the Fedora is to get the vessel back into space to find a better place to live. This is complicated by several factors, including a lack of enough power on the ship and dangerous space weather above.
Overall, this game is made for people who want to take a break from breathtaking action or overly complex intrigue. “Harold Halibut” deliberately takes things slow, and while there are occasional moments of excitement, this game can be described as “relaxing.” Think “Animal Crossing” but without the life simulator elements and with more focus on the story. Your goal as Halibut is to interact with everyone, complete every side quest, and explore every corner of the game’s world. It will even award you with an achievement for taking as long as possible to complete the game, going to show you that video games don’t always have to be intense or fast-paced.
“Harold Halibut” is available on Steam, PlayStation 5, and Xbox.