After Light Fades, produced by indie studio Orchid of Redemption, is now available on PC via Steam. The game will have a 10% discount for the first week after its launch, according to a press release.

The game’s core genres are puzzle, Sokoban, and adventure, featuring a compelling narrative about letting go. A mystical atmosphere surrounds the game as Alice, the main character, is left with seven artifacts after the death of her partner. Each artifact must be returned to the abyss; however, as each artifact is returned, the mechanic associated with the artifact is also removed. 

Each of the seven artifacts inspires each of the seven puzzle worlds, which reflect the favorite places Alice and her partner would visit in life. Handcrafted environment, puzzle mechanics, and over a hundred total puzzles span across each world, leading to a sprawling gameplay mechanic. The puzzles are primarily spatial, in which environmental objects like mirrors, magnets, fire, vines, clones, and elemental systems are combined for mind-bending puzzles that go beyond moving boxes.

Players are expected to become more and more creative in their puzzle-solving methods as gameplay mechanics are taken away rather than granted. That unique flip on the traditional progression of gaining more tools forces players to engage with their existing tools through a new lens. Developers intended for this process to reflect the emotional growth of the main character.

The official release date trailer showcases the gameplay, a top-down style game in which your character model traverses across squares on the puzzle map, with a separate map that allows you to move between puzzles. Each puzzle showcases unique environmental interactions with plants growing, fires spreading, objects falling into the abyss, teleportation, and at times, multiple character models on screen that are being moved.

The trailer leads demonstrate the complexity of interactions in the game, which can be interacted with by players through a built-in level editor. The level editor will be integrated directly with the Steam Workshop, making the game, in theory, timeless, as new content can be created by the community.