Game: Signs of the Sojourner
Genre: Adventure, Other, Role-Playing
System: Nintendo Switch (also on Steam, PS4 & Xbox One)
Developers | Publishers: EchoDog Games | Digerati
Age Rating: US E 10+ | EU 3+
Price: US $19.99 |UK £17.99 | EU € 19,99
Release Date: March 18th, 2021
Review code used, with many thanks to Digerati
Signs of the Sojourner is a game about conversations and relationships, with all of the interactions determined by a deck-building card game.
Am I a cat?!
You are dropped into the game to find you play the part of an unnamed young merchant, who looks a little cat-like, at least from the silhouette of the character as that’s all you can see. Your mother recently died, and the curio shop she ran is now yours. Your mother would regularly set off in a caravan of vehicles that drove from town to town, picking up interesting items as she went, that she would sell in the store. Now that falls to you.
Join the Caravan
Joining caravan leader Nadine, and a collection of other characters, you set off on weeks-long journeys out of town to find treasures to bring back, as well as form relationships with the quirky residents of these nearby small towns.
All of the conversations with everyone you meet on your journey is conducted through the card game, and how you balance your deck of ten cards will determine how well you can communicate with different characters. This isn’t a game of branching dialogue trees where you choose what to say and when to say it.
Cards have Two Symbols
At first appearance, Signs of Sojourner feels pretty simple. You start with a limited deck of cards that evolves as you meet new people. You have cards with one of two symbols on either side and play them alongside one another, matching or failing to match the symbol. Match them in rows of three to six, depending upon the conversation, and you’ll have more positive responses from the person you’re talking to.
Mismatch and things turn more negative and the conversation can go downhill fast.
With a successful chain, the conversation continues positively, though not always happily, and generally new details or items are gained. Such as items to take back to your shop or maybe details of where the next town is on your route.
Logical, Empathetic, and Grief
As you play more of the game, things begin to change, and creating matches becomes more and more difficult. You see, each symbol on the card represents a personality trait like logical, empathetic, and even grief. After each conversation has ended you get to change out one of your cards, from a pool of two new cards.
In theory, this works fine until the introduction of fatigue cards into your deck. The more you travel the more fatigue cards are added to your deck. Fatigue cards don’t have any symbols on them, so using them in a conversation is basically conversation suicide, it stops the conversation dead in its tracks. You can end up with a deck full of fatigue cards, and no one to talk to!
Five Expeditions
Signs of the Sojourner has a set length of five expeditions out on the road before you have to return to your hometown. In one of my playthroughs, I had visited the fourth town on my journey and couldn’t have a conversation with anyone as all I had was fatigue cards in my deck. I understand the mechanics of the game, meaning my character was so tired they couldn’t have a conversation with anyone. But it feels very unfair, harsh punishment to me to end up with a deck full of fatigue cards and without any other options, it’s basically game over!
Of course, you can start again and take another trip, which is what I did. You start the game from the very beginning again and start all the conversations over again! Storywise and through the conversations you do have, Signs of the Sojourner manages very well to convey feelings like familiarity, sadness and tiredness. Making you experience things like growing apart from a friend or talking to someone you have no affinity with simply by playing cards.
Visuals and Music
For me where Signs of the Sojourner shines is in its visuals. Gorgeous artwork in beautiful colour palettes throughout the game. There isn’t much animation as the story is told in storyboard scenes, and you only ever see a silhouette of your character.
The soundtrack, which is very good, varies from town to town. In the first few towns, it’s tranquil and pleasing, some of the most relaxing music I’ve heard, while it shifts to lively and upbeat as you explore more of the locations.
Conclusion
At its core, Signs of the Sojourner is a deck-building card game with elements of a visual novel. At times the card drawing feels very much like it’s luck of the draw. Like real-life conversations with others, it’s a game were failing these card encounters is a part of the experience.
You can’t see everything in one playthrough or win at every conversation every time. And the narrative of the story adapts to that, leading to multiple endings. Similarly in the world of Signs of Sojourner as in real life, words and actions do have consequences!
Final Verdict: I Like It A Lot 