I gave "Why Am I Dead At Sea" every opportunity to disappoint me. The art felt derivative and simple; the chiptune soundtrack suggested a by-the-numbers approach to game design. I am relieved to report that these initial doubts fell by the wayside after only a little play, and surface concerns of this sort disappeared entirely once I submerged myself in the mystery.

The central conceit is that you're the spirit of someone recently killed, and you can inhabit the bodies of people you know to access their abilities and research the circumstances of your death. If you learn enough about your host, you can take full control, doing things that they wouldn't normally or discussing subjects of which they know nothing. This didn't seem very original in my initial (uncharitable) assessment—Double Fine's "Stacking" treads similar ground. However: "Stacking" is a high-concept artpiece puzzler that I couldn't bring myself to finish. "Why Am I Dead At Sea" is a thriller. It has suspense. It has characters that appear to inhabit straightforward archetypes—and then it challenges you to figure out whether those characters have contradictory depths, or complementary depths, or no depth whatsoever.

I played through it twice in eight hours.

Highly recommended.

I gave "Why Am I Dead At Sea" every opportunity to disappoint me. The art felt derivative and simple; the chiptune soundtrack suggested a by-the-numbers approach to game design. I am relieved to report that these initial doubts fell by the wayside after only a little play, and surface concerns of this sort disappeared entirely once I submerged myself in the mystery. The central conceit is that you're the spirit of someone recently killed, and you can inhabit the bodies of people you know to access their abilities and research the circumstances of your death. If you learn enough about your host, you can take full control, doing things that they wouldn't normally or discussing subjects of which they know nothing. This didn't seem very original in my initial (uncharitable) assessment—Double Fine's "Stacking" treads similar ground. However: "Stacking" is a high-concept artpiece puzzler that I couldn't bring myself to finish. "Why Am I Dead At Sea" is a [b]thriller[/b]. It has [b]suspense[/b]. It has characters that [b]appear[/b] to inhabit straightforward archetypes—and then it challenges [b]you[/b] to figure out whether those characters have contradictory depths, or complementary depths, or no depth whatsoever. I played through it twice in eight hours. Highly recommended.