From indie teams Un Je Ne Sais Quoi and UMANIMATION in France, here we have the rather charming visual narrative game Dordogne.

It launched in June 2023 and has met with a positive critical response. With watercolours abounding, it’s a visual treat and throws a heartfelt story into the mix to give it extra gravitas. Bon, oui!

Past Meets the Present in a Watercolour Dordogne

Available on all consoles and PC, this artistic ode to reminiscing is one of those narrative-driven video games.

It’s a bit like that epic zen one Unpacking (2022), except there’s less unpacking and more exploring the local neighbourhood of a sunny French village.

You take control of Mimi, a 32-year-old lady who returns to a childhood home. After her grandmother’s recent passing there, she’s visiting to try and piece a few of her memories back together.

She has no recollection of some of her childhood, so is trying to recapture what went down, like. Here’s the first 15 minutes of this in action.

The goal of the game, which takes a sedate pace and involves cut-back gameplay action, is to explore.

You go looking around your grandmother’s home, then further into the French countryside, and you can interact with some of the scenery to advance.

The gameplay mechanics aren’t cutting-edge. In fact, getting around is often a bit clunky and cumbersome. Kind of like Planet of Lana (2023), which we covered recently.

However, just like Lana the whole gameplay aspect isn’t important.

Dordogne is all about the art direction and narrative, which is a touching story of Mimi coming-of-age. All to the tune of romping around in some very impressive artwork.

For Dordogne, almost 200 hand-painted watercolour scenes were created.

It’s a fine little game. There be around three hours of gameplay to it, ensuring it doesn’t outstay its welcome as you unravel the tale.

Despite that clunky control system and gameplay mechanics, it makes for a charming narrative-driven experience with lots to look at and listen to. Honi soit qui mal y pense!

Dordogne’s Fantabulous Jazzy Soundtrack (by Supernaive)

The excellent, soothing soundtrack to Dordogne is by band and music producers Supernaive. This was the first game soundtrack they worked on.

Supernaive is a two man team of brothers. They live in Paris where their studio is. There they create chillout numbers such as this.

It’s a really great piece of work, consisting largely of dance and electronic sounds. There are elements of jazz in there, too.

Contributions to the also album came from musicians Joseph Shabason and the band’s sister Eloise Malgoire.

Some compositions remind us of the glorious FAR: Lone Sails (2018). Emotive, but restrained. The ideal balance between melancholia and happy memories.

As with so many indie games, it’s also another shining example of how the indie scene is helping these musicians get their work heard worldwide.

If this sounds like your cup of tea, there’s a very gorgeous double vinyl collector’s edition available on the band’s site. See Supernaive and the Dordogne LP.

The LP gatefold cover consists of some excellent watercolour artwork, too.

Painting Dordogne: A Timelapse Take

Finally, let’s close with Dordogne’s art director Cédric Babouche. He’s the lead creative of Un Je Ne Sais Quoi and here you can see him painting one of the game’s backgrounds.

As you can see (and probably already knew), watercolours are all about layering. It’s a time-consuming and meticulous process.

Absolutely worth it, though, as Dordogne shows. The thing is awash with some seriously impressive looks.

Babouche explained in a March 2023 interview how his studio and UMANIMATION started working together. The story behind a watercolour video game:

“I came to Bordeaux four or five years ago with a ready-made video game [Mr Tic Toc and the Endless City]. I met a lot of people in the field and they advised me to make a smaller, more modest and less expensive project that would be just as beautiful and narratively interesting.

So before I joined forces with [Aymeric Castaing, CEO of UMANIMATION] , I started working on the development of a new story, drawing on personal references about a little girl and her grandmother. I spent the first fifteen summers of my life at my great-grandmother’s house in Dordogne and it was the first place I visited when I came back to the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region.

The connection I made between my own history and this department therefore came about quite naturally. Aymeric and I were already co-producing on other projects, and we were often in touch. The partnership between us worked well, so we decided to merge our companies. Hence Umanimation and Un Je Ne Sais Quoi were brought under the same banner, and we began in earnest on the development of Dordogne.”

That’s how some games come to be! We doff our caps to them, as this was a great little gaming experience. More please.