Insurmountable: The Joys of Climbing, Without the Risk of Injury

Insurmountable:

Time to beat all climbs: 13 Hours, 46 Minutes

In 2021, Byterockers, an indie studio based in Berlin, developed Insurmountable. The game begins with the protagonist investigating an island mountain. Supposedly it is an unexplored location. Upon reaching the top the protagonist becomes trapped in a time loop. The only escape, a female stranger explains, is to carry a special crystal to the tops of three mountains. Reaching the third summit will free the protagonist from the loop.

I feel comfortable telling you this, because there isn't a story to the game. The nearly non-existent, skeletal plot is just an excuse for gameplay. There are no final answers, or even partial answers. The player doesn't unearth the nature of the island, or the identity of the stranger. The mission briefings offer no hints. And though the protagonist encounters numerous mysterious and unnamed people on their climbs, these isolated incidents, caused by Events, are delivered without explanation. The player will never understand how dozens of people came to be stuck on this isolated, time looped island. Perhaps they are apparitions created by the island, ghosts of people who died, phantoms of visitors trapped in parallel dimensions, or just hallucinations of the protagonist's brain. All explanations provided by the game are gobbledygook. They are couched in a paradoxical mix of mysterious, fantastic, magical, technobabble descriptions.

With that side trail out of the way, the focus is entirely on gameplay.

Each level is a mountain composed of hexes, like a Dungeons & Dragons' battle map. The hexes have different heights to delineate elevation. It's a cool visual effect, and easy to comprehend. In addition to denoting elevation, each hex also has a terrain marking. There are three base terrain types; rock, ice, and snow. Each base type has a more dangerous sub-type (rubble, glacier, snowdrift), and a treacherous sub-type (ice labyrinth, deep snow). Dangerous terrain costs more Energy and triggers perilous Events. These Events have the chance to injure the character, causing a temporary debuff (like climbs slower, or costs more Energy to climb). The mountain also includes impassable terrain hexes, which the protagonist can't cross.

While climbing, the player must monitor five gauges. Energy is the most important, in that it is the most consumed and refilled. Mountains will exhaust this bar numerous times. It is refilled by eating food, or resting in a Tent or Cave. Sanity, Oxygen, and Body Temperature are bars that should never fall to zero. They will lose points more gradually, and are harder to refill. If any bar reaches zero, and the protagonist moves, there is a chance of an Event which injures the player's Health. If Health is reduced to zero, the player loses the mission. In the end, only Health matters.

At the start of each mission the protagonist starts at the foot of a mountain. They have one of two goals; climb to the top, or find a number of anomalies hidden in the area.

Climbing to the top is self explanatory. But I'm going to explain the mechanics.

In Insurmountable, time only passes when the player orders the protagonist to move. The player has an unlimited amount of time to sit, assess, and plan their ascent. When moving, time spent is determined by the protagonist's equipment, the distance traveled, the terrain they are crossing, the weather, and any bonuses or debuffs affecting them. A clock tracks the time. The clock is divided evenly into day and night times. Traveling at night is colder, but more critically, it shrouds the mountain in darkness. Every morning there is a chance of a change in the weather; clear, cold, or stormy. A stormy night is nearly impenetrable, an awesome experience. It wraps the player in the atmosphere of the game, as if they themselves were standing in a swirling maelstrom of clouds, snow, and shadow. In this a novice player becomes lost, but an experienced one continues the climb.

Climbing expends Energy. Depending on the situation the passage of time during climbing also consumes Sanity, Oxygen, and Body Temperature. Every mountain has a Death Zone, above which the protagonist loses Oxygen. Sanity is lost from events or debuffs, like Eerie Surroundings. Body Temperature decreases slowly, but quicker in cold weather. These losses can be alleviated by skills or buffs, and Oxygen can be restored with equipment.

Even though the player is nominally playing as a single lost mountaineer, they can choose from one of three classes for each climb; Adventurer, Journalist, or Scientist. Each has a unique skill tree that is unlocked by earning experience. Finishing a climb earns experience for every class, so the player can take turns playing all of them. Most skills are passive; a permanent boost to Energy, a passive chance to avoid bad events, or a passive increase in movement speed at night. While each class has unique skills, the characters feel similar enough that I didn't feel they were distinguished enough from each other to have a favorite. I liked the Eagle Eye ability, which allows the player to zoom out farther for a better view, but I can't remember which class had it. Insurmountable encourages the player to rotate through the three classes by giving experience bonus for completing certain levels with specific classes.

Experience also unlocks better equipment, and bonuses for walking on terrain and enduring harsh elements. By the end of the game I had earned the maximum possible experience for all categories; Characters, Equipment, Terrain, and Events.

Before each mission the player equips their character from the possible inventory. There are three limits. One, equipment occupies space, the backpack has only so much space. Also, the player is initially limited to only basic equipment. As they earn experience they unlock improved gear. Finally, in addition to occupying space, gear has a cost. The amount the player is allowed to spend is increased by earning experience.Gear is either a consumable that restores one of the gauges, a consumable that buffs the protagonist for a limited amount of time, a piece of equipment worn by the character for a permanent passive buff, or a Tent. Consumables and the Tent are kept in the backpack, while worn equipment goes in one of the four slots; head, pick, gloves, and boots.

By the end of the game there is a ton of equipment to choose from, but the game is stingy on points that allows the player to pick stuff from the closet. My elite explorer has all this equipment in their base, but is only allowed boots and gloves, and has to venture without a hat or pick?

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