The Game Baby Steps Presents One of the Most Significant Decisions I've Ever Faced in Gaming

I've dealt with some challenging choices in gaming. Certain choices I made in Life is Strange continue to trouble me. Ghost of Tsushima final sequence led me to put my controller down for several minutes while I thought through my choices. I am accountable for so many Krogan deaths in Mass Effect that I regret deeply. Not one of those instances measure up to what possibly is the toughest selection I've faced in gaming — and it involves a giant staircase.

Baby Steps, the latest game from the developers of Ape Out, isn’t exactly a decision-focused experience. Certainly not in typical gaming terms. You only need to walk around a vast game world as the main character Nate, a onesie-wearing manchild who can hardly stay upright on his unsteady feet. It looks like a setup for annoyance, but Baby Steps’s strength comes from its surprisingly deep narrative that will sneak up on you when you’re least expecting it. There’s not a single instance that demonstrates that power like a key selection that I keep reflecting on.

Spoiler Warning

A bit of context is required here. Baby Steps begins as the protagonist is suddenly taken from his parents’ basement and into a fictional universe. He immediately finds that moving around in it is a struggle, as a lifetime spent as a sedentary person have atrophied his limbs. The humorous physicality of it all stems from gamers directing Nate step by step, trying to prevent him from falling over.

The protagonist needs aid, but he has difficulty expressing that to other characters. Throughout his hero’s journey, he meets a group of unusual individuals in the world who all offer to help him out. A composed outdoorsman seeks to provide Nate a guide, but he clumsily declines in the game’s best laugh-out-loud moment. When he falls into an trapping cavity and is given a way out, he tries to play it off like he doesn’t need the help and truly prefers to be stuck in the hole. During the narrative, you experience no shortage of frustrating vignettes where Nate makes life harder for himself because he’s too self-conscious to accept any assistance.

The Pivotal Moment

This culminates in Baby Steps game’s key situation of selection. As Nate nears the end his quest, he finds that he must climb to the top of a snow-capped peak. The de facto groundskeeper of the world (who Nate has consistently evaded up to this point) shows up to tell him that there are two ways up. If he’s prepared for difficulty, he can choose a very lengthy and risky path called The Obstacle. It is the most formidable barrier Baby Steps game has to offer; taking it seems inadvisable to any human.

But there’s a other possibility: He can simply ascend a massive winding stairs in its place and reach the summit in a few minutes. The sole condition? He’ll have to refer to the caretaker “Lord” from now on if he chooses the simple path.

A Difficult Selection

I am very serious when I say that this is an difficult selection in the game's narrative. It’s all of Nate’s insecurities about himself reaching a climax in one absurd moment. Part of Nate’s journey is centered around the truth that he’s self-conscious of his physique and male identity. Whenever he sees that impressive outdoorsman, it’s a hard reminder of all he lacks. Attempting The Obstacle could be a time where he can prove that he’s as competent as his imagined opponent, but that road is bound to be filled with more awkward mishaps. Does it merit suffering just to prove a point?

The steps, on the flip side, offer Nate an additional crucial instance to choose whether to take assistance or not. The gamer cannot choose in about they reject navigation help, but they can opt to provide Nate with respite and choose the staircase. It might seem like an simple decision, but Baby Steps game is devilishly clever about making you feel paranoid whenever you see a simple solution. The environment includes design traps that turn a safe route into a obstacle suddenly. Is the staircase one more trick? Might Nate arrive to the very summit just to be disappointed by some last-second gag? And more troubling, is he ready to be diminished once again by being forced to call an odd character as Lord?

No Right or Wrong

The brilliance of that instant is that there’s no correct or incorrect choice. Either one brings about a real situation of protagonist evolution and therapeutic resolution for Nate. If you opt to attempt The Manbreaker, it’s an existential win. Nate eventually obtains a chance to prove that he’s as able as everyone else, voluntarily accepting a challenging way rather than suffering through one that he has no choice but to follow. It’s challenging, and maybe ill-advised, but it’s the dose of confidence that he needs.

But there’s no disgrace in the stairs either. To select that route is to finally allow Nate to receive assistance. And when he accomplishes that, he realizes that there’s no secret drawback in store for him. The staircase is not a trick. They extend for some distance, but they’re simple to climb and he does not fall all the way down if he trips. It’s a simple climb after extended challenges. Partway through, he even has a chat with the hiker who has, unsurprisingly, opted for The Manbreaker. He tries to play it cool, but you can tell that he’s fatigued, quietly regretting the pointless struggle. By the time Nate gets to the top and has to meet his agreement, calling the character Lord, the agreement barely appears so nasty. Who has concern for humiliation by this freak?

My Experience

During my game, I chose the staircase. Some part of my reasoning just {wanted to call