I?m not exactly sure what to say about That Dragon Cancer.?The pipe-smoking, tweed-jacket-wearing games journalist brigade will likely stumble all over themselves to tell the world that this game is a brilliant masterpiece and game-of-the-year material.?I was told breathlessly by a colleague that if I did nothing else on the showroom floor at PAX Prime, I should go play the bizarre indie title hidden away at the back of the Indie booth.
?Well, what?s it about?? I asked.
?Oh, you play a father and your son has cancer.?
?Well, that sounds like a treat.?
We had a good laugh before she came around again, ?No, seriously, you need to play this game, but you?ll be in tears when you do.?
So with that kind of recommendation, I worked my way over to the booth. I was under the impression That Dragon Cancer would be some kind of touching story of a six-year old running around with a cardboard sword fighting some kind of mythical dragon in a game. Nope, not that at all. You play as coping father Ryan Green, sitting in an intensive care unit with your infant son, Joel, dying of cancer. Sound fun? It gets better. Not only are you playing as Ryan Green, but Ryan Green was literally standing directly behind me doing an interview as I was playing.
You see, the game That Dragon Cancer, is the true and ongoing story of Ryan and his infant son Joel, who has terminal cancer. You?re moving about a hospital intensive care unit from a first person perspective point-and-click ?adventure?, with your child screaming in your ears, and the objective of the demo is to try to put him back to sleep. You see, Joel is in a tremendous amount of pain and appears spends most of the entire ten minute demo shrieking in your ears. Couple that with the overwrought monologue of lead character Ryan when you click on any items in the room on top of a heart-crushing piano tinkling away and I found myself fighting back tears within minutes. I?m not sure if it was the suggestion from my friend telling me that I would be in tears and then me spending the better part of the day getting myself ready to NOT cry that caused me to really have to fight back the water works, but there I was, trying not to cry.
When I stood up to leave, I felt?bad. Ryan?s very brief story laid out in the demo (to be released late 2014) amidst the joyous swag giveaways and cosplaying around me seemed off-putting. It was only a few days later that I started to get a little miffed as to That Dragon Cancer.?It?s a real story about an infant with cancer: no analogy with dragons flying around or Braid-style story where you have to dig deep and really look into the backstory as to what?s going on. What you see is what you get. So, more of an experience than a game, do I really want to sit through 3-4 hours of living through the hells of being a father with a terminally ill child without any shiny colors or leaderboards to distract me? Just orange vinyl chairs in an infirmary and kids throwing up on me from chemotherapy?
And despite That Dragon Cancer being a true story where I could take a break from trying not to cry at the demo to see a professionally-done picture of Ryan and his family to continue to hammer the point home that this is a game but this is by no means a game,?what is the objective here? Sure, cancer awareness. But there?s also a part of me that feels like this is one of those ?Oscar bait? pictures that Hollywood will crank out every now and again; a movie so mired in dramatic performances set around horrific real world events created for the sole purpose of winning awards at film festivals. I can?t imagine Ryan Green woke up one morning and said to himself, ?You know what would take the gaming world by storm?? and immediately started a design document for That Dragon, Cancer. But where do I draw the line on my ?gaming? experiences? Do I want to play a game about a guy going through heroin withdrawal? Maybe a fun point and click adventure about being a rape survivor?
Of course I?ll be playing through That Dragon Cancer with a box of Kleenex next to me, and of course, it will have the added effect of getting me to talk further about the ?game? and in turn talking about cancer?but I?m not sure I?m excited at the prospect.
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