Premium Essay

Gone Home

In: English and Literature

Submitted By esteelauren1011
Words 4180
Pages 17
GONE HOME IS THE STORY EXPLORATION GAME YOU’VE BEEN WAITING FOR by Becky Chambers | 2:45 pm, August 16th, 2013

2

Share on Tumblr

It’s just a house. That’s all the game is, a house full of receipts and cups and boxes of tissues. Mundane and ordinary. You can walk around the house. You can pick things up, turn them over. You can paw around drawers and cupboards. You are alone. You are unguided. You can take all the time you need.
There’s a lot to uncover in Gone Home, the inaugural title by indie studio The Fullbright Company. Love, loneliness, secrets, desperation, sexual identity, growing up, acting out — it’s all there, hidden under beds and shoved into closets. I saw my childhood in there, and my adulthood, too, and the messy, complicated things I feel toward my family. It left me feeling raw, and clean, and quiet.
It’s just a house. It made me cry.
The year is 1995, and twenty year old Katie has just returned home from a year abroad. Not that the house is a home she knows. Her parents moved while she was away, and the house is as unfamiliar to Katie as it is to the player — after all, you are one and the same. No one is there to greet you. The door is locked. The house is empty. The only acknowledgment you are given is a note written by your younger sister, Sam. She apologizes for not being there. She asks that you not go digging around for answers. She says she’ll see you again one day.
And that’s it. There’s no quest log, no directions, no arrow pointing you toward something of use. Gone Home hinges on the assumption that curiosity alone is enough to drive the player onward. It certainly was for me. The farther I went into the house, the more anxious I was to learn what had happened there. Why had no one been there waiting for me? Was Sam hurt? Were my parents hurt? Was I in danger? Was I really alone? A storm raged outside, drumming on

Similar Documents

Premium Essay

Jen Gone Home

...National Cancer Institute U.S. Department of HealtH anD HUman ServiceS Support for People With Cancer Eating Hints Before, During, and After Cancer Treatment national institutes of Health About this Book Eating Hints is written for you—someone who is about to get, or is now getting, cancer treatment. Your family, friends, and others close to you may also want to read this book. You can use this book before, during, and after cancer treatment. It has hints about common types of eating problems, along with ways to manage them. This book covers: u What you should know about cancer treatment, eating well, and eating problems u How feelings can affect appetite u Hints to manage eating problems u How to eat well after cancer treatment ends u Foods and drinks to help with certain eating problems u Ways to learn more Talk with your doctor, nurse, or dietitian about any eating problems that might affect you during cancer treatment. He or she may suggest that you read certain sections or follow some of the tips. Rather than read this book from beginning to end, look at just those sections you need now. Later, you can always read more. Table of Contents What You Should Know About Cancer Treatment, Eating Well, and Eating Problems .........................................................................1 Feelings Can Affect Your Appetite During Cancer Treatment ......................................................................................................

Words: 13988 - Pages: 56

Free Essay

Travel Memoir

...what I could have done differently to change the course of time, life had taken us upon. Since that very day a chunk of my heart was ripped away, and broken into pieces… “Oh how I miss her so much.” It was the morning of October 24, 2010 when I first received the news. I had just come back from a trip to Orlando’s Halloween horror nights, where I had an amazing time and just in a matter of minutes my whole world had turned upside down. That very moment I could feel my face turned bright red with anger and tears started flowing uncontrollably down my chubby cheeks, as my mother gave away the news that my grandmother was on her death bed. I couldn’t believe how just the day before she sounded so perfectly fine, and today she can possibly be gone. I guess when it’s time to go, it’s time to go you really don’t get a choice when it comes to your own life’s destination. I immediately rushed to the hospital speeding to about 70 miles per hour, hoping I wouldn’t get a ticket. As I got closer I could feel my chest tightening as if somebody was squeezing it with their bare hands. The hospital’s smell seemed familiar prior to the months before, where my grandma spent countless times after having heart surgery and battling ulcerous colitis. It was a long walk down the narrow hall to the Intensive Care Unit, where all the patients looked the same. There were so many machines hooked to their fragile and lifeless bodies. Their only chance of survival depended on life support machines, without...

Words: 814 - Pages: 4

Free Essay

Gone Baby Gone

...Ariana Di Ventura Mrs. Rossi Section 114-5 April 28,2014 Gone Baby Gone The Principle of Utility can simply be stated as, actions are right in proportion to how much they promote happiness, and wrong as they tend to produce the reverse of happiness. In other words the theory is that it determines the rightness or wrongness of an action by its consequences, by the happiness or unhappiness it produces. The more people the outcome makes happy the better or rightness an action is regardless of the actions that took place to achieve this happiness. Capt. Jack Doyel, would play the part of the Utilitarian aspect of the movie. When Capt. Jack Doyel says "Thought you would've done that by now. You know why you haven't? Because you think this might be an irreparable mistake. Because deep inside you, you know it doesn't matter what the rules say. When the lights go out, and you ask yourself "is she better off here or better off there", you know the answer. And you always will. You... you could do a right thing here. A good thing. Men live their whole lives without getting this chance. You walk away from it, you may not regret it when you get home. You may not regret it for a year, but when you get to where I am, I promise you, you will. I'll be dead, you'll be old. But she... she'll be dragging around a couple of tattered, damaged children of her own, and you'll be the one who has to tell them you're sorry." you can see where his position about taking the girl is. He believe...

Words: 1791 - Pages: 8

Free Essay

Gone Baby Gone

...This film explores the concepts of the complexities of legal ethics and grey areas. There were many situations in this film that displayed “grey area cases”. The first example was when Remmy Bressant admitted to planting evidence. Though this is legally wrong, morally, he did what he thought was the best for the child. He said that he only did it because he wanted to give the child another chance at life. Another situation that dealt with legal ethics was when Patrick shot and killed the man who molested Johnny. Obviously, you cannot kill someone who raises both of their arms. However, morally, he did what he wanted to. Morally, he thought that he deserved to die. And finally, the most “grey” of all situations was when Lieutenant Doyle and Remmy Bressant teamed up together. Doyle kidnapped a child. It is against the law to kidnap a child. Just because morally, it may have been the best for Amanda, it does not make it legal. I think that there is a very fine line between always adhering to the rules and going with our morals. The thing is that, our moral are somewhat based on the rules set by society. We form our morals based off societal norms thus, most of the time, by adhering to your morals, you are also adhering to the laws. However, we can see that in some cases this is not true. Therefore, I believe that you should adhere to the rules. Everyone’s morals are different. So, if everyone were to follow their morals over the law, it would all become too chaotic. People would...

Words: 763 - Pages: 4

Free Essay

Gone with the Wind

...Student: Nguyễn Thảo Vi Student code: 11134544 Class: Advanced Accounting 55B “Gone with the wind” ”_ written by Margaret Mitchell, has been one of the famous literary classics of all time when it first published in 1936. The famousness of the novel mostly come from the way Margaret Mitchell created the characters, creating haunting scenes and thrilling portraits of characters so vivid that we remember their words and feel their fear and hunger for the rest of our lives, especially Scarlett O’Hara_ the protagonist and the remarkable meaning hidden within it. Literature, an invisible world created by the infinite imagination of the writers, is where you can meet all kinds of people that could make your heart quivers intensely. Those characters reflect life in a truthful way, and they also show us the deep experiences and the desperate desires in life. “Gone with the wind”_ the famous literary classics, poytrayed excellently the pictures of the contemporary society and the women in the 19th century in a way that no one had ever done before through the charming and frenetic Scarlett O’Hara. Scarlett O’Hara is highlighted character of the whole story, although she was a character who embodies all of the negative stereotypes attributed to women throughout history. She is narcissistic, shallow, dishonest, manipulative, amoral. At the beginning of the story, Scarlett was described to be self-centered, and spoiled by her wealthy parents. Scarlett is very intelligent...

Words: 980 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Faulker & Mitchell

...Faulkner and Mitchell both write about the South in its antebellum, during the Civil War, and the outcome post-Civil War. However, Faulkner examines the unseen South with Absalom, Absalom! while Mitchell writes about the South that most readers are already familiar with in Gone with the Wind. Faulkner’s difficult read can be seen as the elite counterpart to Mitchell’s popular fiction novel. In Faulkner’s Absalom, Absalom! an odd story is told. It is not just the plot that is unusual, but the writing style is quite different as well. Faulkner uses these long, winding sentences and the story being told follows a peculiar order. Faulkner even summarizes the whole plot in the first chapter, telling the story of the rise and fall of the Sutpen house in a few sentences, versus Mitchell’s 1000 page saga that makes Gone With the Wind. Faulkner was praised in his writing style, but his style can be confusing for many. If a book is hard to read, does that count as an elite characteristic? Gone With the Wind, like Uncle Tom’s Cabin, is a long book, but it is an easy read. It is not complicated in the sense where a reader might have to read a passage three or four times in order to understand it. The same cannot be said for Faulkner’s Absalom, Absalom! Elements that make Faulkner’s novel problematic to read are his long, wordy sentences. A reader can get lost in a single sentence if they are not reading carefully. Another element is his chronology, or lack of it. The story and narration...

Words: 1053 - Pages: 5

Free Essay

Gonewith the Wind

...“Gone with the Wind” is a story about life of Scarlett O’hara living down south during and after the Civil War. Written in 1936, by author Margaret Mitchell. Only being eighteen years old in the beginning of the book, Scarlett is still a very strong, stubborn, young woman who gets her way. Scarlett lives a very simple life, in the south with a lot of money on a plantation named Tara. When the civil war begins, Scarlett’s mother dies of disease and her father goes insane because of her death. All the slaves are then freed, leaving the plantation empty, and Scarlett to do all the work. When the taxes rise 300 dollars, Scarlett is desperate to find a way to pay them. She promises herself that there’s only one way to make money; she must lie, cheat, steal, or kill to make sure no one goes hungry again There is talk of a Barbecue at Twelve Oaks, the Wilkes’ plantation, down the road from Tara. Scarlett meets Gerald O’hara on the road to ask if the rumor Mammy, her slave, had told her is true. That Ashley Wilkes is going to ask his cousin Melanie to marry him. Scarlett is heartbroken that the man of her dreams is marrying someone else. When she arrives at Twelve Oaks, Scarlett is the center of attention, all of the men, even those who have girlfriends, talk to Scarlett. She is the most popular girl there. Melanie and Ashley talk of their marriage as they overlook the garden. Scarlett is sitting beneath a tree with all the men surrounding her, enjoying her time until she spies Ashley...

Words: 1451 - Pages: 6

Premium Essay

Scarlett O Hara's Transformation

...The civil war affected not only the society of the South, but also the civilian’s values. As the war developed, the South and Scarlett O’Hara transformed. O’Hara was once a naïve child, but at the end of the novel, she is a strong-willed woman. In Margaret Mitchell’s novel Gone with the Wind, Scarlet O’Hara’s transformation is a compelling journey. Sixteen-year-old Scarlett O’Hara lives on a large Southern plantation named, Tara. The young naïve girl focuses on her numerous suitors and desired love from Ashley Wilkes. Wilkes is to marry his frail cousin, Melanie Hamilton. In spite of Wilkes, O’Hara marries Charles Hamilton, who shortly after dies in war. Scarlett O’Hara gives birth to Wade Hamilton and moves to Atlanta with Melanie Wilkes and her...

Words: 509 - Pages: 3

Free Essay

Strong-Minded Women on Screens

...In Gone with the Wind, there is a second main female character behind Scarlett O’hara, Melanie Hamilton. I believe she is a brave dame as well. I am going to present my reasons to my point from 6 scenes in the film as follows: 1. In the Atlanta Bazaar, Melanie had no valuable jewellery to donate, because she and Scarlett were in mourning for Charles, so Melanie decided without any hesitation to donate her wedding ring to the confederacy for the noble cause. In this scene, we can see a brave dame is willing to face moral and physical challenges (Isaacs, 12). When there is a conflict between a notable cause and her own benefit, she would sacrifice anything from herself for the cause. She gave the wedding ring real value off her finger. What a brave dame! 2. After Melanie was back to Tara with Scarlett after delivering a baby, one day a Yankee soldier broke into their house to rob and even intended to rape Scarlett. Scarlett shot the Yankee to death. Melanie was so brave to hold a sword in hand ready for fighting against the soldier at the same time. She was so brave without any scare when she saw Scarlett shot the soldier saying: “you killed him. I am glad you killed him.” She just delivered a baby not long ago and was very weak. In such a situation, she behaved like a fighter without any fear facing the enemy. What a brave dame! 3. One day, Belle Watling, a well-known prostitute, came to Melanie intending to donate part of her weekly earnings to the local hospital. Belle had...

Words: 810 - Pages: 4

Premium Essay

Gone With The Wind: Scarlett And Doctor Meade

...Prissy Introduction According to the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Science (2016), the classical movie, Gone with the Wind was nominated for fourteen Academy Awards and won nine of it’s categories, including Best Picture. Gone with the Wind is a historical film about the American Civil War and the life of a wealthy, southern plantation owner’s daughter, Scarlett O’Hara. Scarlett is given permission by her mother to visit family friends in Atlanta. Prissy, a young, house slave companies Scarlett with her travels to Atlanta from the beloved Tara plantation, just south of the city limits of Atlanta. The Burning of Atlanta Prissy’s opening scene occurs one hour into the movie. In the scene, Scarlett and Doctor Meade are discussion the importance of Scarlett staying by...

Words: 1123 - Pages: 5

Free Essay

Gone with the Wind

...Gone With the Wind ENG 225 Gone With the Wind Gone with the Wind is a movie its own rarity. It is one of the few movies that has stood the test of time and remains a classic that cannot be compared to some of today’s movies. I doubt the screenplay writer, Sidney Howard, producer, David O. Selznick, and director, Victor Fleming knew what timeless piece of history they were creating when this movie completed. This masterpiece of film has had an impact on viewers ever since it was created and will have for many more. The movie was nominated for numerous awards at the 1939 Academy Awards even though it wasn’t released until January 1940. The movie ran away with eight of those nominations, winning Supporting Actress, Actress, Director, Screenplay, Color Cinematography, Art Direction, Editing, and Best Picture (Ten Films that Shook the World). It has been said that if the income for the movie was adjusted for inflation, it would be the most successful movie of all time. The films begins with the chronicling of the splendor of the Old South. We watch how it is reduced to crumbs by the Civil War and the how the New South rebuilds itself during the reconstruction. The final results makes one wonder if the Auteur Theory applies to this film which says that the director is the one with the overall films artistic merit. The characters are living their lives in a very simple way until everything is shattered by the Civil War. None of the characters expected the devastation...

Words: 2613 - Pages: 11

Free Essay

Literary Analysis of Gone with the Wind

...Literary Analysis of Gone With the Wind by Margaret Mitchell Gone With the Wind is the only novel written by Margaret Mitchell for which she won the Pulitzer Prize in 1937. The novel follows Scarlett O’Hara, a spoiled sixteen year old just before the start of the Civil War through the war and Reconstruction (1861-1870). Major themes throughout the novel are: The importance of land; love of money; survival; wanting what you cannot have; and the change of a culture (Mitchell, 1936). Scarlett’s life revolved around the parties she would attend at neighboring plantations, flirting with the young men of the county and pursuing her childhood crush, Ashley Wilkes. Scarlett was a spoiled. In 1860 sixteen year old Scarlett O’Hara lived on Tara, her father’s plantation in Georgia. She is self-centered girl who seemed to care little for the feelings of others and who was used to getting everything she wanted. Her father, Gerald was an Irish immigrant who had prospered in his new land. Her mother, Ellen was from an aristocratic French family. Scarlett had two sisters, Suellen and Careen to whom she paid little mind. Mammy was Ellen’s house servant and the girl’s nanny. Mammy was always concerned that the girls be proper ladies like their mother. The O’Hara plantation had many slaves and was prosperous (Mitchell, 1936). In the spring of 1860 Scarlett was looking forward to the barbeque the Wilkes’s family would be having at Twin Oaks, when the Tarleton twins Brent and Stuart...

Words: 1674 - Pages: 7

Free Essay

Plot

...Plot summary Gone with the Wind takes place in the southern United States in the state of Georgia during the American Civil War (1861–1865) and the Reconstruction Era (1865–1877) that followed the war. The novel unfolds against the backdrop of rebellion wherein seven southern states, Georgia among them, have declared their secession from the United States (the "Union") and formed the Confederate States of America (the "Confederacy"), after Abraham Lincoln was elected president with no ballots from ten Southern states where slavery was legal. A dispute over states' rights has arisen[10] involving enslaved African people who were the source of manual labor on cotton plantations throughout the South. The story opens in April 1861 at the "Tara" plantation, which is owned by a wealthy Irish immigrant family, the O'Haras. The reader is told Scarlett O'Hara, the sixteen-year-old daughter of Gerald and Ellen O'Hara, "was not beautiful, but"[11] had an effect on men, especially when she took notice of them. It is the day before the men are called to war, Fort Sumter having been fired on two days earlier. There are brief but vivid descriptions of the South as it began and grew, with backgrounds of the main characters: the stylish and highbrow French, the gentlemanly English, the forced-to-flee and looked-down-upon Irish. Miss Scarlett learns that one of her many beaux, Ashley Wilkes, is soon to be engaged to his cousin, Melanie Hamilton. She is stricken at heart. The following day at...

Words: 2917 - Pages: 12

Free Essay

Asds

...Ibrahim Kamit (apply key concept to film) Jurassic World (2015) Release: 12th June 2015 in USA Action, Adventure, Sci-Fi IMDB 7.1/10 (380,350 votes) Rotten Tomatoes 72% (critics) 79% (audience) Metacritic 59/100 CinemaScore (poll) ‘A’ grade from A+ to F scale Director: Colin Trevorrow Main stars: Chris Pratt Bryce Dallas Howard Irffan Khan Vincent D’Onofrio Ty Simpkins Nick Robinson Jake Johnson Budget: $150 million Box office: $1.670 billion Opening Weekend:  $204,600,000 (USA) (12 June 2015) Reviews: There are about 600 external reviews on the web Fans from Jurassic Park have reviewed the film rather negatively due to the change in cast however the feeling of nostalgia was brought to a lot of the fans.  "Jurassic World can't match the original for sheer inventiveness and impact, but it works in its own right as an entertaining – and visually dazzling – popcorn thriller" – Rotten Tomatoes Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian gave the film four stars out of five and felt that it was "terrifically enjoyable and exciting summer spectacular" "savvy, funny, ridiculous in just the right way" Media platforms/merchandise: The film has several platforms that attracted the audience: websites, games, social media accounts, toys, shirts, mugs and many more. Fans: -There have been fan made trailers and remakes -There have been parodies made -Fans have made websites Jurassic World (2015) Release: 12th June 2015 in USA Action, Adventure...

Words: 1007 - Pages: 5

Free Essay

Scarlett O’hara as a Complicated Heroine

...Seminar Paper on the Topic: Scarlett O’Hara as a Complicated Heroine INTRODUCTION Gone with the Wind, a popular romantic novel by Margaret Mitchell, differs from most Civil War novels by glorifying the South and demonizing the North. Other popular novels about the Civil War, such as Stephen Crane’s The Red Badge of Courage, are told from a Northern perspective and tend to exalt the North’s values. Mitchell’s novel is unique also for its portrayal of a strong-willed, independent woman, Scarlett O’Hara, who shares many characteristics with Mitchell herself. Mitchell frequently defied convention, divorcing her first husband and pursuing a career in journalism despite the disapproval of society. Gone with the Wind was published in 1936; ten years after Mitchell began writing it. A smash success upon publication, Gone with the Wind became—and remains even now—one of the best-selling novels of all time. It received the 1937 Pulitzer Prize. In the late 1930s a film version of the novel was planned, and David O. Selznick’s nationwide search for an actress to play Scarlett O’Hara captivated the nation’s attention. The resulting film starred Vivien Leigh and Clark Gable as Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler, and it quickly became one of the most popular motion pictures of all time. My research paper discusses about the character of the protagonist. No doubt Scarlett O’Hara is a complicated heroine in the story. But there is nothing to say...

Words: 1315 - Pages: 6