There can often be a romanticized mystique to games in which you're a solo watchman or explorer--games like Firewatch and Subnautica have always been compelling to me for that reason. The Last Caretaker seems to scratch a similar itch, having you take on the role of the last hope of humanity: a sentient machine. It's an intriguing premise for a sci-fi survival action-adventure, and one that's dripping with atmosphere and mystery. After seeing a 40-minute preview of The Last Caretaker, I'm hooked. I want to play more, if for no other reason than to figure out what's going on.
The debut title for Finnish game studio Channel37, The Last Caretaker sees you play as the titular machine, who has awoken after centuries to find themselves in the room of a facility long devoid of power. As you explore, you find more machines like you, now powerless and frozen in place--some so old that they're falling apart like decomposing corpses. A voice tells you that you're the last of these caretakers and it's your responsibility to continue the mission of revitalizing humanity, who fled from a flooded Earth centuries ago to live in space stations. You can't make babies in space, so the caretakers must grow new humans and send them up to the stations to keep humankind going. You're given a ship and tasked with sailing the endless sea in search of the research stations and labs that will allow you to locate and grow the last embryos, as well as a means of fixing, fueling, and launching a rocket that will take the grown humans into space.
You'll spend a lot of time out on the water, traveling from one station to another.
How did the world end? No idea. Is humanity still alive in the massive space stations orbiting the Earth? Unknown. Are we truly the only caretaker bot still functioning, and why were we kept in sleep mode for so long while the other machines were evidently activated long ago? Who could say. These mysteries and more can be investigated while you're completing your tasks, and keeping a careful eye out for collectibles can uncover logs of humankind's last few years on Earth, and provide answers about your own origins.
There seems to be an almost rhythmic attraction to tasks, which largely boil down to scavenging for the materials necessary to craft what you need. That could be hunting down trash to recycle into metal, which can then be fabricated into a battery to power a water pump that can create pure water for the humans you're growing; or using petrol to fuel the generator connected to the machine that gets you oil. Your character runs on a resource of energy as well, encouraging you to manage batteries to keep your shields charged and body functioning.
It's a familiar-looking loop for anyone who enjoys survival games. The Last Caretaker seems like the perfect game to lose yourself in for a few hours at a time while listening to a podcast. The environments prioritize stillness and calm, creating a relaxing experience. I can see how this set-up might delve into something more unnerving or thrilling depending on the direction of the story, but that wasn't the vibe I got from the preview demo.
To power up machines, you'll need to find batteries to hook them up to.
And that doesn't take combat into consideration. The Last Caretaker is also a first-person shooter, but I didn't get to see any aspect of that part of the game, any indication of how many enemy types there are, or how often combat might pop up.
"[Combat] is generally fast but it also depends on what type of ammo that you use," Channel37 co-founder Antti Ilvessuo told me. The way he described combat made it sound more like a puzzle than an action experience, with the player encouraged to learn which types of weapons are the most effective against each enemy, and needing to adapt if you don't have the resources on-hand to fuel the best tool for the job.
"Certain enemies are weak to certain weapons--it's a Rock, Paper, Scissors-type deal," Channel37 community manager Jack Patillo told me. "You can get overwhelmed. The organic enemies--like the ones seen in the water--they swarm, so there can be like 50 of them. So if you're trying to shoot them individually, it's a huge pain, but if you have an electric pistol, it will arc between them, or if you have a flamethrower, it will clear a bunch of them out."
The Last Caretaker has several elemental firearms that fire lightning or fire.
Ilvessuo added that although the guns fire ammo, some can technically fire by hooking them up to the caretaker's own internal battery. That's pretty cool--I hope this mechanic is an indication of themes the game might explore in its violence, such as how killing (even if done out of necessity) is self-harming. It might pose an interesting dilemma that we don't often see in survival games that incorporate some form of combat.
Admittedly, shooting stuff sounds like the least appealing part of The Last Caretaker, so unless there's a future reveal of combat that changes my mind, I'm not that concerned that I didn't get to see it in action. When it comes to survival games, I want to focus on the act of endurance and the thrill of discovery, both of which seem central to The Last Caretaker's core gameplay loop. Still, combat is a question that hopefully will get answered as we get closer to launch.
Exclusive to GameSpot, we can confirm that The Last Caretaker will be delayed from its original Summer 2025 release window. "We're happy to announce [The Last Caretaker is] now arriving this fall," Ilvessuo. "Why happy? Because creating a game is like nurturing humans. It requires time, effort, and patience. Just as children start their lives in a cradle but must eventually step out into the world, games also need time before they're ready to thrive on their own. Plus, Finnish summer is here, and even developers need to recharge. Considering this might be among the last games of our human epoch, we thought, 'Heck, let's make it count.'"
The Last Caretaker is set to launch in early access on PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store; a follow-up release for consoles has been confirmed, but no news as to which or when.
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The debut title for Finnish game studio Channel37, The Last Caretaker sees you play as the titular machine, who has awoken after centuries to find themselves in the room of a facility long devoid of power. As you explore, you find more machines like you, now powerless and frozen in place--some so old that they're falling apart like decomposing corpses. A voice tells you that you're the last of these caretakers and it's your responsibility to continue the mission of revitalizing humanity, who fled from a flooded Earth centuries ago to live in space stations. You can't make babies in space, so the caretakers must grow new humans and send them up to the stations to keep humankind going. You're given a ship and tasked with sailing the endless sea in search of the research stations and labs that will allow you to locate and grow the last embryos, as well as a means of fixing, fueling, and launching a rocket that will take the grown humans into space.
You'll spend a lot of time out on the water, traveling from one station to another.
How did the world end? No idea. Is humanity still alive in the massive space stations orbiting the Earth? Unknown. Are we truly the only caretaker bot still functioning, and why were we kept in sleep mode for so long while the other machines were evidently activated long ago? Who could say. These mysteries and more can be investigated while you're completing your tasks, and keeping a careful eye out for collectibles can uncover logs of humankind's last few years on Earth, and provide answers about your own origins.
There seems to be an almost rhythmic attraction to tasks, which largely boil down to scavenging for the materials necessary to craft what you need. That could be hunting down trash to recycle into metal, which can then be fabricated into a battery to power a water pump that can create pure water for the humans you're growing; or using petrol to fuel the generator connected to the machine that gets you oil. Your character runs on a resource of energy as well, encouraging you to manage batteries to keep your shields charged and body functioning.
It's a familiar-looking loop for anyone who enjoys survival games. The Last Caretaker seems like the perfect game to lose yourself in for a few hours at a time while listening to a podcast. The environments prioritize stillness and calm, creating a relaxing experience. I can see how this set-up might delve into something more unnerving or thrilling depending on the direction of the story, but that wasn't the vibe I got from the preview demo.
To power up machines, you'll need to find batteries to hook them up to.
And that doesn't take combat into consideration. The Last Caretaker is also a first-person shooter, but I didn't get to see any aspect of that part of the game, any indication of how many enemy types there are, or how often combat might pop up.
"[Combat] is generally fast but it also depends on what type of ammo that you use," Channel37 co-founder Antti Ilvessuo told me. The way he described combat made it sound more like a puzzle than an action experience, with the player encouraged to learn which types of weapons are the most effective against each enemy, and needing to adapt if you don't have the resources on-hand to fuel the best tool for the job.
"Certain enemies are weak to certain weapons--it's a Rock, Paper, Scissors-type deal," Channel37 community manager Jack Patillo told me. "You can get overwhelmed. The organic enemies--like the ones seen in the water--they swarm, so there can be like 50 of them. So if you're trying to shoot them individually, it's a huge pain, but if you have an electric pistol, it will arc between them, or if you have a flamethrower, it will clear a bunch of them out."
The Last Caretaker has several elemental firearms that fire lightning or fire.
Ilvessuo added that although the guns fire ammo, some can technically fire by hooking them up to the caretaker's own internal battery. That's pretty cool--I hope this mechanic is an indication of themes the game might explore in its violence, such as how killing (even if done out of necessity) is self-harming. It might pose an interesting dilemma that we don't often see in survival games that incorporate some form of combat.
Admittedly, shooting stuff sounds like the least appealing part of The Last Caretaker, so unless there's a future reveal of combat that changes my mind, I'm not that concerned that I didn't get to see it in action. When it comes to survival games, I want to focus on the act of endurance and the thrill of discovery, both of which seem central to The Last Caretaker's core gameplay loop. Still, combat is a question that hopefully will get answered as we get closer to launch.
Exclusive to GameSpot, we can confirm that The Last Caretaker will be delayed from its original Summer 2025 release window. "We're happy to announce [The Last Caretaker is] now arriving this fall," Ilvessuo. "Why happy? Because creating a game is like nurturing humans. It requires time, effort, and patience. Just as children start their lives in a cradle but must eventually step out into the world, games also need time before they're ready to thrive on their own. Plus, Finnish summer is here, and even developers need to recharge. Considering this might be among the last games of our human epoch, we thought, 'Heck, let's make it count.'"
The Last Caretaker is set to launch in early access on PC via Steam and the Epic Games Store; a follow-up release for consoles has been confirmed, but no news as to which or when.
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