Speedrunning---the concept of completing a game as fast as possible---serves little purpose to the audience in walking simulators. Speedrunning shows proficiency of game mechanics, typically of someone who is familiar with the game but does not hold the same value when applied to a walking simulator.

I find this interesting because in the Steam achievements of Gone Home, there is an achievement for completing the game in less than a minute. I wonder why the creator of the game even created that achievement… Was it to foster a similar experience to an adventure game? Was it a joke, making fun of the modern speedrunning? Was the achievement created at first release, or was it added after player feedback?

Gone Home, introducing itself to the user as a horror game, leads the player to believe that they must “act quickly” to avoid any supernatural beings. As the game progresses, however, the user realizes that there is no longer any immediate fear, but a longing fear that they are reading a story that they can no longer act upon and have no choice but to observe.

After playing, I was wondering what the actual purpose of the horror aspect was. The argument that the game is meant to transition from external horror to internal horror is a strong interpretation of Gone Home. Playing as Katie brings more emotional meaning to the game rather than playing as Sam. If we would have played as Sam, we would experience more of the first-person shooter action, but playing as Katie really forces us to immerse ourselves into her shoes, as though we have a sibling that has ran away. As we play the game, this concept becomes stronger and stronger as we realize that there is nothing Katie (ourselves) can do at this point.

Odysseus, the protagonist of the story, tells the Cyclops, the antagonist, that his name is "Nobody." This is significant due to the fact that if Odysseus does something evil to the Cyclops, the Cyclops will say that "Nobody" did it, in which Odysseus will have successfully tricked the giant into making him look foolish, keeping his identity.