9.03m

This is a game so short that one particular oddly tricky jump (and the word 'jump' is being a little generous) could conceivably double your playing time if you get it wrong enough times, and it may well take you longer to read this review than play it. So without enough time to really tell a story in any traditional sense or to introduce any mechanics beyond moving and inspecting items, it goes without saying that 9.03m sinks or swims on the basis of its message.

That message is that in the face of natural disasters that kill thousands of people, it's important to remember these people aren't statistics, they're individuals with personalities and hopes and dreams and all that stuff. The specific disaster in question here is the 2011 Tohoku earthquake and subsequent tsunami, and proceeds from the game go towards Aid for Japan. It's a simple, uncontroversial message, but crucially, it's delivered in a sensitive, poetic way. Essentially the game takes place on a beach (I've since read that it's a beach in California, but this isn't explained in-game), and while the game tells you to find and follow butterflies, what you actually follow is silhouettes of people in the distance. When you approach one of these silhouettes, they dissipate and leave behind an item from the person's life. These items are all obvious emotive staples - a wedding ring, a stopwatch, a child's toy, a pram - and must be inspected to find the butterfly emblem on them before dissipating again and leading the way to another silhouette. Once the last item is inspected, the camera pans out and reveals a beach filled with silhouettes, the obvious implication being that all of these have specific memories attached to them.

I'm not sure I'd exactly call it moving, but it's gentle, it's pretty, it's relaxing, and it's obviously admirable both for its message and its fundraising. I can certainly think of worse ways to spend five minutes, at any rate.