When it comes to games that are built on the back of walking simulators, I’ll admit that on a general level I’m typically not going to be thrilled out of the gate. While I’ve seen some that have worked out in the end, more often than not my tendency is to be a bit bored by them, but that would be my ADHD talking. In the case of One Step After Fall, I quickly had another concern, and that’s tied to games that try to tackle issues with mental health. Again, there have been those that have done it well, and others that haven’t. Unfortunately, aside from a number of other issues I had with the game, I feel that it’s in the latter category.

The premise revolves around you playing the part of an author who has hit a run of bad breaks, now returning to familiar places in order to try to figure out where it all went wrong. Walking through a total area with maybe 10 buildings in it, this isn’t a particularly long journey at least, but it can certainly be a confusing one. As you explore, your hope is to find notes that are strewn about that will give you some sense of direction for where to go, or what to do next. Aside from that, you’ll find items that range from sensible, like different books you’ve written and will have thoughts on, to what appear to be zombie figurines which honestly feel completely out of place and pointless, outside of simply satisfying a need to find them all. 

I suppose part of what’s intended to be the game’s hook is tied to the character’s obviously depressed state, and how you may choose to deal with it. One of my issues, considering I have multiple friends and family members who have been through severe depression, is that the handling of mental health in this game feels more like a gimmick used for flavor than being taken seriously. Unlike many games of this kind, whether intentional or unintentional, death is an option, which isn’t great and should have been noted with a trigger warning. Worse, while I can understand that the scarecrow can represent depressive thoughts, trying to undermine your confidence and feelings of self worth through its repeated harassing words, I’m not sure personifying those thoughts is a great move for some people who may play it, again without a trigger warning.

Unfortunately, this game isn’t alone in approaching mental health in a way that feels more like a convenient gimmick than an attempt to take it seriously. I understand that some titles have tried to represent depression and other problems in an interactive way to help people understand the issues, or to even try to help people work through their trauma, but I don’t see clear signs of that approach here. Perhaps there could be a limited audience who somehow sees some value in this experience, but for a variety of reasons I’d say that there are simply better examples of just about every element of this game out there on the eShop.