Main Menu - Mitchell Pasmans (From the 'The Drifter' Soundtrack)
prompt: play a game released in 2025
date started: january 14th, 2026
date completed: january 28th, 2026
time played: 17.3 hours
(This is the first page of my '26 in 26' challenge for 2026! I've been enjoying customising my pages recently so this one is pretty crazy. I'm gonna attempt to do customisation like this for all 26 pages but I think it depends on how fast I get through them.. no chance i'm doing this more than twice a week it takes forever. check out the banner ad on the left if ur on desktop!)
This challenge is off to a great start because I really loved this one! I initially heard about it on the minnmax podcast and it sounded like something i'd like so I wishlisted it and picked it up in a sale a couple months later. My relationship with point and click games is weird because i've never played any of the classics but I always really like the contemporary ones I play. Especially The Drifter! Where other point and click games tend to lose alot of steam in their later half due to pacing, difficulty and weird narrative tropes The Drifter does the opposite. It's one of the only point and click games i've played thats able to keep it's momentum all the way through to the finish line.
In The Drifter you play as Mick, a man with a troubled past whos returning to his hometown after a long time to attend his mother's funeral. Upon arriving he discovers some kind of conspiracy occuring in town, and discovers that whenever he dies he loops back in time to just before his death. The game is loosely centered around investigating these two plot points but it's never burdened by them. Sometimes they get a little sidetracked and it feels really refreshing to not get locked down one narrative path - one sequence has you get kidnapped by (who you assume to be) the local serial killer, and you're tasked with escaping. Each chapter has a really unique goal and you always feel like you're working towards something new.
There's an impressive variety of characters and locations, with some of the most interesting in both areas being introduced right at the end of the game. The voice acting, especially from Mick, is really good. I had no problem with hearing every single thought he was having with his gruff australian accent. The puzzles are really well balanced, and I never had to check a guide (I did try but there wasn't any.. i got it like 3 mins later anyway). Some of them felt a little generic but others (especially the death-loop ones) are super unique. The death-looping mechanic is utilised really well within the narrative, too. Mick is a character who wants nothing more than to go back into the past, and his ability acts as a kind of monkey's paw version of that wish. They do some super interesting stuff with it towards the end too which I won't spoil.
The Drifter feels really unique in the point and click genre for it's high quality, providing an engaging narrative, beautiful pixel art, fun puzzles and interesting characters all at once. Like i said before i tend to only engage with the more contemporary stuff, but this is probably the most solid game i've played in the genre so far. Super cool and fun! check it out if you like this kind of thing.
