A Taste of the Past: An Indie Game about Grief (Review)

I’ve been playing a lot of melancholy, “in your feels” narrative games lately. A Taste of the Past, by Sondering Studio, is a quick 30-minute walking sim that’s free on steam! It’s packed with emotion, which is what drew me to it. In this free, story-rich game, we play as a Chinese-American teenager, Mei, who just lost her mother: the typical emotionally distant immigrant parent who works hard to provide her children with the best life.

When Mei falls asleep on the train, she ends up on a train filled with her ancestors, who help her work through her grief through reassurance, reminiscences, and (most importantly) her mother’s food. This game is really the definition of short and sweet. It only took me 20 minutes to complete, and maybe it was just my mood that day, but I cried through every minute of it.

With the recent hit of the Pixar film Turning Red, I think this game will strike a chord with the millennial and older Gen Z Asian-American community especially. We’ve been getting a lot of deep and relatable entertainment lately, and I love it!

This cute indie game is simple but gorgeous, from the soundtrack to the color palette. And while it is truly an Asian American story about connecting to your heritage, the feelings it conveys are universal. Maybe I’m just on a melancholy game kick, but A Taste of the Past is a relatable masterpiece and it would move any audience. (Also, did I mention that it’s free on steam?)

Do you play narrative games? I didn’t like narrative games before I played Silence by Daedalic Entertainment, but now I can’t get enough (But I’ll make another post about that one soon!).