Very few games have sat on my wish list as long as Kentucky Route Zero. An episodic point-and-click adventure that launched its first episode in 2013, the complete five-episode season will finally conclude on January 28. It only took seven years. But like I hinted at, you've got to be promising something pretty special to hang out on my Steam Wishlist for seven years and not get bounced. I mean, in that same amount of time, Telltale Games peaked and imploded, starting with The Walking Dead...and then never quite getting to a Stranger Things adventure series.
Not only is Kentucky Route Zero finding its ending, it's finding its way from PC to Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. The whole shebang will be in what's called the TV Edition.
KENTUCKY ROUTE ZERO: TV EDITION is a magical realist adventure game about a secret highway running through the caves beneath Kentucky, and the mysterious folks who travel it. Wander the highways of Kentucky, meet dozens of compelling characters, learn the secret language of bats, and make some friends before morning.
The trailer shows off intriguing details in the world of Kentucky Route Zero. A washed-out color palette in a washed-out rainstorm. "Waffle's for any Weather" signposted with that erroneous apostrophe-s. (Unless, of course, the place belongs to a person named Waffle, and then it's 100 percent correct.) A somehow cold orange light barely reaching the windows on a mobile home. A sinkhole sporting a spiral staircase. A pair of horses inexplicably out in the lightning storm. A logo of a house attracting a dark mass of people as the sun reemerges. And a curious cat meeting a cautious person on a park bench outside of some ruins.
Why did I wait seven years before hovering my mouse over the buy button? I'm just not an episodic gamer. I just know that about myself. I envy you if you've been there from the get-go and have anxiously awaited each episode as its come out. But I know my attention span would've left me high and dry back in 2013, secretly welling up with disdain for the years-apart episodic nature of this one. Regardless, congrats to developer Cardboard Computer for sticking with it.
Again, Kentucky Route Zero: TV Edition comes to Switch, PS4, and Xbox One on January 28.
