Quiet Thoughts (PC) review "Silent but deadly"

Platformers have come a long way since the '80s. They evolved from single-screen affairs into lengthy adventures where plumbers and knights alike rescue maidens from the clutches of grotesque villains. Then the inevitable happened: those of us who played these games grew up. Some of us were inspired by the journeys of yesteryear and wanted to recreate them while also bringing our own fears and concerns that cropped up during adolescence and adulthood. Sure, there were plenty of newer games out there that panned out to rescue missions or save-the-world fare, but lately we've seen a lot more soulful titles pop up.

Case in point: Quiet Thoughts, a freeware platformer on Steam that stars a teenager named Asha. Our heroine isn't out for revenge, to recover a stolen artifact, to rescue a beautiful princess, or anything like that. Rather, she just has a lot on her mind, as many teens do when hormones start to kick in and they begin to make intellectual connections. She figures the only way she can alleviate this angst is to leave the relative safety of her forest home and venture into the mysterious world beyond the trees.

The game strikes a whimsical tone early on, dropping you in a gorgeous, dreamlike forest filled with cartoony beasts. Massive talking animals relate to you their everyday life and worries, while anthropomorphic berries dance around the place like actors in an old Fruit of the Loom commercial. A multi-layered background comprised of massive, ancient trees creates the impression that the forest stretches on forever and reinforces the notion that you dwell in a wonderland. In other words, Quiet presents you with a refreshing fantasy realm that doesn't feel like the umpteenth medieval world or Mario rehash. It brings its own distinct vibe to the table, which beckons you to keep playing and see what other kinds of strangeness ensues.



Outside of the few villages you visit during interludes, you run afoul of dangerous woodland creatures and killing traps. Bat-like monsters flap toward you and angry toadstools impede your progress. However, those nasties are nothing compared to instant-death brambles that crop up every now and then, taking scores of your lives with each missed step.

Here's the thing: these obstacles don't merely appear haphazardly scattered throughout the regions you explore. They're placed with care, allowing the kind of precision platforming you get from modern genre entries like Super Meat Boy. You must be as careful as possible while guiding Asha, often requiring you to land from a jump with needle-point accuracy while using a little foresight. For instance, you might need to drop onto the very edge of a platform to avoid murderous thorns while taking into account oncoming threats. Time becomes a major factor because sometimes you have little wiggle room and you need to cook up a way out of whatever predicament you're in on the fly. Holding still during these moments spells doom, as projectiles and roaming foes easily dispatch those who stand in place. However, you occasionally need to take your time in order to survive because rushing could cause you to run headlong into a patrolling critter. This is why fast observation is key to survival.

As with most modern challenging platformers, you get infinite lives and you die a lot. You press onward, eventually learn the patterns and placement of all of your woes, and stages become muscle memory after so many deaths. Soon enough, you triumph and you move on. Quiet provides that simple, addictive "one more try" kind of experience you get from more well known platformers, and it executes it with more or less the same level of effect--all while instilling you with a sense of wonder.



For the most part, levels provide optimal challenge without coming across as overly cheap. You get two blows before you die, and occasionally come across healing hearts to keep you going. However, you do sometimes run afoul of foes that lie just outside of your view, where you could never anticipate them. During one stage, I remember dying because some black, oily mass fell from the ceiling, and there was no way I could have expected it or dealt with it in a timely manner.

Eventually, the contemplative Asha makes a few more mental connections during her adventure, but then finds herself in the depths of an abyss. Right here, Quiet's style and tone shift while remaining in line with the game's premise. You arrive at an intentionally jarring portion of the quest, because sometimes that's how life rolls, isn't it? Here, the mechanics transition from a simple "run to the right" piece into a non-linear fetch quest while maintaining its obstacle-course nature.

You're no longer venturing through a cute fever dream at this point. Now, you're in a world of unseen terror and downbeat backstory. Tormented souls and hungry beings linger in the dark, devouring each other and losing their grip on their own minds. However, the most terrifying parts come when you interact with restless spirits in the caves, giving way to cutscenes where Asha stares into the white static of a television screen while a humongous, spidery specter dispenses heavyhearted flavor text. The music stops at this point, segueing to a nerve-shattering stillness broken only by the shush of the white noise and the constant, hefty breath of the beast in the room with you.



Eventually, you make it out of the cavern in one piece and enter the final phase of the campaign. You return to a fantastical backdrop, but without the touch of innocence the forest provided. Instead, you enter a more thoughtful, grown up world similar to Ancient Greece, with marble statues and flying hydras running amok. This segment provides the greatest challenges that see you weaving through scatters of slow-moving bullets, wandering enemies, poisonous bubbles belched by killer plants, and irritating winged shields that mosey about in circular patterns. At this point you need to bring your A-game, finding out precisely where to land on a jump, how long to wait, and when to move. Timing is everything now more than ever, and you need to be at least close to spot on if you're going to survive.

Finally, things wind down. You don't get an epic clash or big showdown because there is no hideous villain waiting for you at the end. However, the campaign settles on a conclusion that fits right in with the style of content on offer. The ordeal is over, and you and Asha can finally rest and think back on your time through this charming, peculiar landscape.

Quiet Thoughts hits all the notes a challenging platformer should, providing a difficult yet fulfilling collection of varied trials to go through. It even features an accessibility mode that makes you invincible (along with a note reinforcing the notion that this game's core concept revolves around its staunch difficulty rating). I know not everyone is impressed with the new style of games storytelling, where derring-do takes a backseat to social and/or existential commentary. However, things were bound to go this way. We all got older, and the genres simply aged along with us. Quiet demonstrates that perfectly.

Staff review by Joseph Shaffer (March 16, 2022) Rumor has it that Joe is not actually a man, but a machine that likes video games, horror movies, and long walks on the beach. His/Its first contribution to HonestGamers was a review of Breath of Fire III.