Sagebrush (2018) - Review
Redact Games
Sagebrush opens with headlights crossing a desert. There’s a brief monologue wherein a woman recounts meeting someone named Amy, who promised inner peace through the teachings of a man named James. Not the disciple, but an actual flesh-and-blood figure who had a church out in the wilderness. Shortly thereafter, the car pulls up outside of the Black Sage Ranch, an abandoned compound somewhere in the American Southwest where the gates are chained and the windows are dark.
Past the chain link fence there is a rec hall, fields of corn, a barn, and a church on a hill overlooking it all. From there, the charcter goes to the trunk of the car and take out a pair of pliers to cut a hole in the damaged fence–this is the first hint that they came here with an intention—and perhaps knows this place. The year is 1993, and the site before her is that is the old compound of Perfect Heaven, a new revelation Christian cult that grew and flourished throughout the 1980s until the cult members committed mass suicide.
Redact Games
Tumbleweeds
Sagebrush is a brilliant example of what small or solo developers can accomplish when their vision is appropriately scoped to their resources, uncompromised by deadlines or creative dilution, and–I mean this in the most complementary fashion–free from the need to make a title commercially viable. It’s tiny indie games like Sagebrush where purity of intent can yet be found, where a creator can bring a vision into existence that is unmarred by anything apart from their own limitations.
I came away from Sagebrush feeling that it executed what it set out to do almost perfectly. It showcases video games as a storytelling medium that is uniquely affecting and immersive, as deserving of its own bespoke critical lens as film, novels, or television. While it didn’t some of the turns I hoped it would, I nonetheless found a deep appreciation for what I had experienced.
Redact Games
Looking at the Truth
And here, right on the other side of the chainlink fence, is when players will have to do the bulk of their expectation-setting. The compound beyond draws a great deal of inspiration from real-world cults of the 70s and 80s, and the material can come off as overly familiar for those of us who’ve spent thousands of hours digesting documentaries, books, and other media about such things.
Through the story, I recognized elements of the cult at Black Sage in the Branch Davidians, Heaven’s Gate, People’s Temple, Children of God, and others, and this element cuts both ways, as it firmly roots Sagebrush in real world tragedies and in the same breath can make them feel a touch imaginative. You could put on a true crime podcast now and, presuming it was simply something you hadn’t heard about before, hear the story of Perfect Heaven more or less as it is told in the game. That being said, if you’re not as saturated with American cult history as I am, Sagebrush might prove just the thing to spark your imagination and scare you a bit at the same time.
While there are definitely moments when I wanted Sagebrush to go outside the lines a little more, to make the story a bit more of its own yarn, but I can’t actually fault what was done because the game is well-paced, immersively told, and has a sordid narrative with at its heart that both holds the attention and keeps the player on their toes.
Redact Games
Eyes of a Survivor
At its heart, Sagebrush is a hunt-and-learn adventure game, where the player goes from location to location, picking up a hint or a clue about where to go next while slowly revealing the story of the Perfect Heaven and Black Sage Ranch. There’s a woman who becomes the lover of the messiah figure, cult members with flagging faith, a double agent working with the government, secret dalliances that are exploited by other church members. It’s all pretty straightforward, and the text notes and audio recordings hit just the right vibe, neither being too sparse nor too long-winded. Additionally, there’s a notable absence of extraneous or non-essential documents so that everything you find gives you a piece of the story and pushes the narrative forward, and this creates excitement when you break a door lock and a discarded notebook in the chamber beyond. Walking simulators often struggle with capturing attention throughout, but Sagebrush does this expertly.
The story that unfolds follows the course of many cults of the period: a messianic leader who claims he alone has a line to God who subsequently breaks down the sexual barriers between himself and the women of the group, going so far as to use them as agents against those who might work against him. Similarly, the men he turns into brutes and enforcers, pitting them against one another and using them as weapons against those who have, knowingly or otherwise, displeased him. I have to appreciate how closely Sagebrush tracks these developments to human behavior, as as I’ve said before, the story feels as really as history.
Redact Games
Final Thoughts
What is here is of particular quality, but were the characters and events not so recently introduced to my brain, I think they could be largely interchangeable with historic events. The names, events, and plot developments all closely fit the rise and fall of historical American cults. It’s a worthwhile and memorable story to experience, and the final chapter is particularly well executed and ties up all the loose ends adequately. While I yearned for a bit more originality in the story, I can’t fault the developer for doing something different, as they did it remarkably well.
Verdict: 7/10
Strengths
Wonderfully immersive
Makes great use of its pixel graphics
Cultivates a nice sense of dread, particularly that you may not be alone at Black Sage
Weaknesses
Story tracks perhaps too closely to the histories of real cults
Once you’re done, not much reason to revisit
You can purchase Sagebrush on Steam, Nintendo, Playstation, and Xbox.
You may also like: Dear Esther, Firewatch, Gone Home
