Sunlight takes you on a peaceful hike in a hand-painted wood, one where the trees themselves will talk and sing if you’ll bend your ear to listen.
The game is a kind of exploration of both space and audio, letting you free to wander its landscape and get closer to the various trees and their singing voices. The developers have taken singers with all manner of dialects and tones and brought them together to create a musical realm to meander through, steadily taking in the story of the music. You’ll take a part in this through your exploring, guiding your walk and your reception of the song as you do so.
It’s a striking thing to guide your reception of the sounds at the same time you do so with what you see. I’m used to thinking about visual space as a place of exploration in games, but that same kind of aimless walk doesn’t often touch upon the music (as far as I’ve seen). Being able to move to the tree and take in their song – appreciate the individuality in the voices that make up the harmony – made it feel like I was moving through the music as well as the place. That my curiosity could guide the experience a bit more, and that I had a hand in shaping how the music would come to me based on what I chose to listen to.
Sunlight, therefore, is a lovely experience, both as a rich visual/audio experience, and as one where your footsteps and paths will shape what you receive.
Sunlight is available now on itch.io and Steam.
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