They say there are no survivors in war. The people that experience war, soldiers or otherwise, never fully heal and certainly will never be who they once were. I kind of feel that this game is trying to prove just that to us.

This War of Mine aims to show that war is not kind, but the men who choose wars are not the only victims. This is not the glorified experience of a super soldier wielding more guns than the average man can carry. It’s the plight and suffering of the common man who is a victim of circumstances entirely outside of your control. You are not meant to enjoy this game or in any way feel that you have the tools to succeed. But it will certainly push you to try nevertheless—obsessively so—likely because it is so terribly difficult and depressing when you inevitably die…slowly, one day at a time. And remember, this was created by the company whose reasoning goes, “Not sad enough? Let’s add children. Let’s add children with PTSD.”

My first experience, years ago, ended with Bruno crying on the ground. Katia was too wounded to get out of bed, Pavle had been killed trying to get us food, and now all Bruno had to do was boil some water so we could finally eat. But he was too broken to get up anymore. He sat there, weeping, until he froze to death on the ground.

That’s kind of how I felt.

At least we do have second chances in this game. There’s no reloads or retries while the game is still going—unless you’re quick on the ol’ alt+F4. But you can start over. So people saying that this game is exactly like war are not entirely honest. You still get to sit in your comfy chair when winter comes. But you’ll get pretty close to understanding just how soul-wounding it is to be an unwilling tenant of ‘conflict areas.’


You can pretty much assume you’re going to fail your first scenario. Not just because the game is hard—but because it’s hard due to the fact that you have no idea what you’re doing. The game doesn’t really have an assist for this (despite the clear and elegant interface). Protection against predators is important—but how? You figure these things out through failure. And then through the Wiki. Eventually you will learn the things you should know: who runs like a pregnant yak, what’s a teddy for, where do I find an axe, when do I take the medicine, why would I give food to starving children when I am starving myself, how many people do I leave to guard, and just how essential is a chair? Don’t axe the chair.

This becomes a lesson of priorities. Namely, don’t die. Don’t charge people with your fists. Remember you basic needs: shelter, water, food—and about in that order—closely followed by anti-depressants, which in this case means cigarettes and booze. Also, take notes. You’ll be sad when you can’t remember where you left that stack of components because your bags were too full of wood and they didn’t seem needful at the time.

But even after mastering the mysteries, there’s still plenty of challenges to keep veterans occupied, for instance: Marko Solo runs, and ending on a ‘content’ note rather than just alive-but-not-quite-standing.


One criticism is that this is not a fast game. You move at the pace of a sickly, wounded, sufferer of depression. And yet, I’ll still get sweaty palms when creeping around a neighbor’s house—slowly—wondering if I’ll get a shotgun to the face. This is the only game where I’m afraid of rats because you just don’t know if they’re rats. It’s also the only game where I’m afraid of parishioners and homeless people. Tension and dismay abound with only brief respite when you have too few materials to do anything but sit and play a melancholy guitar as you starve. But watching your characters sleep for five hours somehow seems to build anxiety when you know you have yet to barricade the windows before the raiders return, and they are coming tonight. But there’s no fast-forward either; just slow, stifling, patience as you’re bleeding out.

A second criticism is how easy it is to die a death of panicked clicking. For example, 'I had a gun, so why did I run up and try to punch this guy’s face to death? Err…to my death.' Yes, learning to kill appropriately (and quietly) is definitely a basic need. And yes, going on a murderous rampage through the neighborhood is the easiest path to victory (so long as you’re equipped with a couple sociopaths), and yet it is not the optimal route, as Zleta will tell you. But I do recommend YouTubing the proper use of crowbars nevertheless.

Crafting also seems a little off to me, being difficult to make a profit off hard work—but then, that’s probably intentional.


There isn’t much in the way of story other than: you’re in a war-zone. But there is plenty of mood and ambience to convince you of this despair from the gloomy, ashy colors to the skyline on fire. It’s a modern setting but often feels like a black and white docudrama directed by Spielberg; it’s hard to believe that people do actually live like this.

The characters however are believable: ugly, troubled, but realistic with mundane backstories. I never feel particularly happy with them, or that I relate well to them. I have no special hero. They’re just people. There’s a slight disconnect, though I’m not sure if that was intentional—perhaps because of the multi-character managing view, or because there’s a kind of emotional self-preservational sense of detachment, the way you’d feel about someone else’s diseased and discarded puppy that you’re pretty sure is going to die.

But, beyond the war-zone, there is a deep realism that’s more than “if I don’t have enough kindling, I can’t make clean water.” It’s “if I don’t stash the booze, Roman might get drunk and start beating up his housemates.” I think it is that attention to the details and ultra-realism that makes hacking a person to death with a hatchet absolutely hair-raising. Especially since they were probably your neighbor. Especially since you’re probably killing them over a can of corned beef. It’s brutal.

After four years of surviving this war, I was equipped with Roman, the one man army, who had pretty much single handedly brought the war to a close and cleaned the streets. His entire household was warm and content, thanks to him, thriving in cigarette-rolled capitalism. It was going to be my first perfect run. One night Roman went snooping in what I thought was an innocent household. He wasn’t going to steal anything—didn’t need it. He tried to sneak past a sleeping woman, but she woke up and came at him with a knife. The door to escape was barred. He had a weapon; he could have easily killed her. But she was just a civilian. He tried to punch her to frighten her off, but she stabbed him in the ribs. Roman never saw the end of the war that came two days later.

It’s a good game if you’re depressed—or if you want to be depressed—or just be grateful for things like…tomatoes. If you want a game with a challenge, I recommend it. But more philosophically, if you don’t want to forget what kind of world you really live in, this one will make you grateful, but also horrified that charities like War Child are still needed today.