Launching at the end of October 2023, here’s Jusant. It’s by French indie studio DON’T NOD in Paris whose other work includes Life Is Strange 1 and 2 (2015 and 2019).

Jusant lets you play out that Alex Honnold documentary Free Solo (2019), but without the constant risk of really plummeting to your death at any second. Which is nice.

It’s a fantastic little game that really makes you feel like you’re scaling a vast mountain, so let’s abseil into this one with much enthusiasm.

Shimmy Up That Mountain in Jusant

This one is out on Steam, PS5, and Xbox Series X/S (for the latter with Game Pass, so hop to it if you’re on that).

There aren’t many dedicated climbing video games out there, which feels like a bit of a wasted opportunity. Nintendo has used it a lot in the likes of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom (2023) and many games have a climbing mechanic.

But few dedicate everything to the joys of scaling stuff.

The plot is brief. You take control of a lone wanderer and then you must scale a desolate tower/mountain thing. It has lots of artifacts of a long past civilisation to discover but the real point is you just scale the thing and climb into the unknown, learning more as you go along.

After a brief introduction you’ll learn the climbing mechanics. From there you’re really off in what is an often thrilling depiction of rock climbing.

The tower is split across three biomes, each offering new gameplay mechanics to get to grips with. The higher you get, the more you discover about the mysterious world of the people who once lived there.

It’s no surprise we loved Jusant. That introspective component is there, letting you think clearly as you scale the tower and lose yourself in all the grips, ropes, and manoeuvring to scale your way up.

We lost ourselves in the experience and thought it was brilliant. You get thoroughly absorbed in the game as it’s one of the most demanding on a controller I can remember for a long time.

You’re constantly having to hit buttons whilst planning and plotting your course ahead, so it’s mentally a demanding time of it.

It has the feeling of sweeping grandeur Journey (2012) offers, along with the joys of solitude seen in the likes of FAR: Lone Sails (2018).

The press reviews have stated the same by offering strong feedback.

However, the mainstream gaming press has done the usual thing of complaining about the game being too short. There’s this sect of journalists who do this every time with indie games.

Jusant has just over two hours of gameplay time. Because it’s an indie game. So, yes, that means it’ll be short. Like most indie games are. Which is why it doesn’t cost £60 like most AAA games and is, instead, much cheaper.

As we’ve stated before, it’s one of the reasons we prefer indie games to AAA titles as we don’t constantly have 100+ hours spare to for each and every new blockbuster release.

Instead here we have Jusant.

It’s a beautiful game. Not just to look at, and to listen to with its glorious windy whooshes and soundtrack swells, but also due to how it makes you think.

Playing it you’ll forget about the world, focus solely on your next grip, and even further ahead—how you’ll get up that next big bit.

It helped us understand why rock climbers go rock climbing. And we think that’s a fitting tribute to the peaks of this project.

Jusant’s Suitably Scalable Soundtrack

Composer and musician Guillaume Ferran is responsible for Jusant’s often magnificent soundtrack. He takes a meditative approach to things, skipping from any pulse-pounding anthems or whatnot.

The game is surprisingly introspective, which lends itself well to various piano pieces and a sense of climbing rhythm.

Plus, with the sights you get to see in Jusant when you’re high up Ferran captures that sense of wonder you expect.

Looking out across the heights, or as you dangle above huge drops, the 23 pieces in this OST are very effective indeed.

It’s important to note the game also embraces silence. The music isn’t a constant as you play, it’ll often disappear and leave you to scale the mountain.

That’s a nifty little touch and one the likes of Nintendo has used for its recent Zelda. As with Jusant, you can just listen to the sounds of the wind howling as you scale and take things from there.

Brilliant stuff from Ferran and yet another example of an excellent indie game soundtrack.