A NEW PEAK

Following on from the wild success of Untitled Goose Game, House House returns with a multiplayer open world unlike any other

- BY ALEX SPENCER

ou surely don’t need to be told that 2019's Untitled Goose Game was a surprise hit for its developer, House House. Nor, most likely, do we need to describe how that game managed to perfectly capture the essence of an English village, in its hedgerow-delineated serenity and simmering resentments alike. But did you know that its creators were adapting this place from the far side of the globe, in Melbourne?

House House’s followup, Big Walk, brings the developer back home — specifically, to Wilsons Promontory, a national park at the southernmost tip of mainland Australia. “It’s a big granite isthmus that sticks out into the ocean, so it’s got quite a unique biosphere,” says Jake Strasser. His full explanation includes terms such as “Lower Devonian granite”, underlining just how seriously House House takes its silliness.

The developer has recreated Wilsons Prom (as the locals call it) at a 1:20 scale using lidar scans of the real place, and populated it with authentic flora based on photographs the team have taken on research trips. Now we find ourselves on a field trip of our own, being guided through this virtual recreation by its four primary architects.

Strasser delivers his geography lecture from a thin bench on one side of a train, his legs dangling precariously as scenery whizzes past. Wilsons Prom has personal significance to all four developers, who grew up a couple of hours' drive away, but to Strasser in particular. He gestures to a point on the coast, revealing — somewhat shyly — that this is where his partner proposed to him.