Bonfire – The Review

Have you ever thought about what would happen if the human race had to set out for a new destination, one that hopefully, could help keep the human race alive and going for generations to come? If you were in a similar situation, what kind of choices would you make and what would your thoughts be? Does Developer Baobab Studios show us what it would be like to be stranded on an alien world wondering what would happen next? Let’s find out with Bonfire for the PlayStation VR.

In Bonfire, you play as a Space Scout named Space Scout 817. Your mission is simple, to see if there is a new home out for the human race to survive. So before you begin, you must decide, Dualshock 4 or Move controllers. If you have the Move controllers, you do have that independent freedom compared to the Dualshock 4 locked hands position, but if you don’t have the Move controllers, you will still get to enjoy your experience with Bonfire. With that said, let’s continue…

Being called Bonfire, that is where the majority of this experience is around, a bonfire. Just you, the darkness of an unfamiliar place, and your robotic friend named Debbie who is voiced by the wonderful and talented Ali Wong. Not only does she keep you company and has the most awesome culinary skills any human could want from a robotic friend next to a bonfire, but she also ends up being more than just a friend, but also your conscience in a way. That’s a good thing considering your pilot and flipping switches skills have crash-landed you on this alien planet.

But because this is Virtual Reality and Baobab Studios wants to do what they can to incorporate interactions and not just have you sit within Bonfire, you will need to make sure that your fire is going and oh, those strange noises you hear out in darkness, you may just want to watch out a little bit because you never know who or what may appear. Good thing Debbie has a scanner for you to use and gives you a pretty good explanation of the things that you are scanning and what they could be used for.

Let’s talk about sound and it is pretty good here. Being out at night and what appears you being all alone and hearing the noises out in the woods while still hearing the crackling of the fire in the background is very nicely done and just adds to the atmosphere. Looking at the graphics, you are mostly in the dark with just the bonfire and moon of the night to help light things up. Seeing the dim light in the background does give you a feeling that you are deep in the woods with plenty of areas that could be explored all while having the action coming to you as if you really were to crash-land on a planet.

Baobab Studios did an excellent job here presenting a Virtual Reality story that anyone can enjoy, but also something that parents can feel safe knowing that their children can experience as well. Bonfire provides this comfort as well as the ability to test ourselves given the choices that we can make and knowing that there is still some good left in the human race.

Bonfire is out now on PlayStation VR and is also available on the Oculus Quest and Oculus Rift/S on the Oculus Store and on Viveport. A review code was provided.

To learn more about Baobab Studios, please visit their site, like them on Facebook, follow them on Twitter, follow them on Instagram, and subscribe to their YouTube channel.

In case you missed the trailer, please enjoy. Until next time, I am going to go back to the bonfire and just enjoy life.