The Game Baby Steps Includes Among the Most Significant Decisions I Have Ever Encountered in a Game

I've encountered some challenging choices in video games. Some of my decisions in Life is Strange still haunt me. Ghost of Tsushima's concluding moments made me set down my controller for several minutes while I considered my choices. I am responsible for numerous Krogan fatalities in Mass Effect that I regret deeply. Not a single one of those situations measure up to what possibly is the hardest choice I've ever made in a video game — and it has to do with a massive stairway.

Baby Steps, the latest game from the developers of Ape Out game, is hardly a decision-focused experience. Definitely not in any traditional sense. You only need to explore a vast game world as the protagonist Nate, a adult in a onesie who can hardly stay upright on his shaky limbs. It appears to be one big ragebait joke, but Baby Steps’s strength comes from its unexpectedly meaningful plot that will surprise you when you least anticipate it. There’s not a single instance that demonstrates that power like a pivotal decision that I can’t stop thinking about.

Note: Spoilers Ahead

Some scene setting is required here. Baby Steps starts when Nate is magically whisked away from his parents’ basement and into a magical realm. He quickly discovers that navigating this world is a challenge, as a lifetime spent as a couch potato have atrophied his limbs. The humorous physicality of it all arises from gamers directing Nate one step at a time, trying to keep his ragdoll body standing.

Nate requires assistance, but he has difficulty expressing that to other characters. During his adventure, he encounters a group of unusual individuals in the world who all offer to give him a hand. A cool, confident hiker tries to give Nate a navigation aid, but he uncomfortably rejects in the game’s funniest instant. When he falls into an trapping cavity and is offered a ladder, he strives to appear nonchalant like he can manage alone and truly prefers to be confined in the cavity. During the narrative, you see numerous annoying scenarios where Nate creates additional difficulties because he’s too insecure to take support.

The Ultimate Choice

Everything builds up in Baby Steps’s key situation of choice. As Nate gets close to finishing his adventure, he discovers that he must climb to the top of a snow-capped peak. The de facto groundskeeper of the world (who Nate has actively avoided up to this point) appears to tell him that there are two routes to the top. If he’s prepared for difficulty, he can choose a very lengthy and dangerous hiking trail called The Challenge. It is the most formidable barrier Baby Steps provides; taking it seems inadvisable to anyone.

But there’s a second option: He can merely climb a enormous coiled steps in its place and arrive at the peak in a short time. The sole condition? He’ll have to address the guardian “Lord” from now on if he opts for the effortless way.

An Agonizing Decision

I am completely earnest when I say that this is an painful decision in the game's narrative. It’s every one of Nate's doubts about himself reaching a climax in a single ridiculous instant. An element of Nate's story is revolves around the fact that he’s unconfident of his body and his masculinity. Every time he sees that impressive outdoorsman, it’s a difficult memory of everything he’s not. Undertaking The Obstacle could be a time where he can demonstrate that he’s as capable as his imagined opponent, but that route is sure to be filled with more awkward mishaps. Is it justified suffering just to prove a point?

The stairs, on the flip side, offer Nate an additional crucial instance to either accept or reject help. The user doesn't get to decide in if they reject navigation help, but they can decide to give Nate a break and take the stairs. It ought to be an simple decision, but Baby Steps is devilishly clever about creating doubt anytime you find a gift horse. The game world contains intentional pitfalls that change a secure way into a difficulty instantly. Are the stairs an additional deception? Might Nate arrive at the peak just to be fooled by an ending prank? And more concerning, is he prepared to be humiliated once again by being made to address some weirdo Lord?

No Right or Wrong

The excellence of that situation is that there’s no right or wrong answer. Each path leads to a genuine moment of personal growth and therapeutic resolution for Nate. If you choose to tackle The Obstacle, it’s an existential win. Nate finally gets a chance to prove that he’s as able as everyone else, consciously choosing a difficult route rather than struggling through one that he has no option except to pursue. It’s difficult, and maybe ill-advised, but it’s the dose of confidence that he craves.

But there’s no embarrassment in the stairs as well. To select that route is to at last permit Nate to take support. And when he accomplishes that, he discovers that there’s no real catch waiting for him. The stairs aren’t a prank. They extend for some distance, but they’re straightforward to ascend and he doesn’t slide to the bottom if he stumbles. It’s a straightforward ascent after hours of struggle. Halfway up, he even has a conversation with the hiker who has, of course, opted for The Manbreaker. He strives to appear composed, but you can discern that he’s fatigued, silently lamenting the pointless struggle. By the time Nate reaches the summit and has to meet his agreement, addressing his new Master, the deal hardly seems so unpleasant. Who has time to be embarrassed by this odd character?

My Choice

When I played, I selected the steps. A portion of my thinking just {wanted to call