Baby Steps Includes One of the Most Significant Choices I Have Ever Faced in a Game

I've faced some challenging choices in video games. Certain choices I made in Life is Strange continue to trouble me. Ghost of Tsushima's final sequence led me to set down my controller for around ten minutes while I weighed my options. I am the cause of so many Krogan fatalities in the Mass Effect series that I would love to reverse. Not a single one of those situations hold a candle to what could be the hardest choice I've faced in gaming — and it concerns a giant staircase.

Baby Steps, the recent title from the developers of Ape Out, is hardly a selection-based adventure. Definitely not in typical gaming terms. You only need to explore a expansive environment as the main character Nate, a grown-up in childish attire who can struggle to remain on his unsteady feet. It appears to be one big ragebait joke, but Baby Steps’s strength comes from its surprisingly deep narrative that will sneak up on you when it's most unexpected. There’s no situation that exemplifies that strength like one major choice that I keep reflecting on.

Note: Spoilers Ahead

A bit of context is necessary here. Baby Steps starts when Nate is magically whisked away from the basement of his home and into a fantasy world. He quickly discovers that moving around in it is a struggle, as a lifetime spent as a couch potato have weakened his muscles. The physical comedy of it all comes from gamers directing Nate gradually, trying to keep his ragdoll body standing.

Nate requires assistance, but he has trouble voicing that to others. Throughout his hero’s journey, he encounters a group of unusual individuals in the world who everyone tries to assist him. A self-assured trekker seeks to provide Nate a guide, but he clumsily declines in the game’s best laugh-out-loud moment. When he plunges into an inescapable pit and is offered a ladder, he attempts to act casual like he can manage alone and truly prefers to be trapped in the pit. During the narrative, you see numerous irritating episodes where Nate complicates his own situation because he’s too self-conscious to accept any assistance.

The Pivotal Moment

That comes to a head in Baby Steps’s key situation of selection. As Nate gets close to finishing his adventure, he discovers that he must climb to the top of a snowy mountain. The default guardian of the world (who Nate has actively avoided up to this point) comes to inform him that there are two ways up. If he’s up for a challenge, he can opt for a particularly extended and hazardous route dubbed The Challenge. It is the most intimidating challenge Baby Steps includes; taking it seems inadvisable to anyone.

But there’s a alternative choice: He can merely climb a gigantic spiral staircase instead and reach the summit in just moments. The single stipulation? He’ll have to call the groundskeeper “Sir” from now on if he opts for the effortless way.

A Painful Choice

I am completely earnest when I say that this is an agonizing choice in context. It’s the totality of Nate's self-consciousness about himself culminating in a single ridiculous instant. An element of Nate's story is revolves around the truth that he’s self-conscious of his physique and male identity. Each instance he sees that impressive outdoorsman, it’s a difficult memory of everything he’s not. Undertaking The Challenge could be a moment where he can prove that he’s as able as his one-sided rival, but that road is bound to be laden with more awkward mishaps. Does it merit struggling just to demonstrate something?

The staircase, on the contrary, give Nate another big moment to decide between receiving aid or refusing it. The player has no choice in whether or not they reject navigation help, but they can opt to provide Nate with respite and choose the staircase. It might seem like an easy choice, but Baby Steps game is exceptionally cunning about making you feel paranoid whenever you find a gift horse. The game world contains design traps that turn a safe route into a obstacle suddenly. Is the staircase an additional deception? Could Nate reach all the way to the top just to be let down by some last-second gag? And even worse, is he willing to be emasculated once again by being made to address an odd character as Lord?

No Perfect Choice

The excellence of that situation is that there’s no correct or incorrect choice. Each path brings about a real situation of protagonist evolution and catharsis for Nate. If you opt to attempt The Manbreaker, it’s an existential win. Nate at last receives a chance to prove that he’s as capable as everyone else, consciously choosing a challenging way rather than struggling through one that he has no choice but to follow. It’s difficult, and maybe ill-advised, but it’s the dose of confidence that he requires.

But there’s no shame in the steps as well. To select that route is to eventually enable Nate to accept help. And when he does so, he finds that there’s no secret drawback waiting for him. The stairs aren’t a prank. They continue for a while, but they’re straightforward to ascend and he won't slip to the bottom if he trips. It’s a straightforward ascent after lengthy difficulty. Partway through, he even has a discussion with the trekker who has, naturally, selected The Manbreaker. He strives to appear composed, but you can discern that he’s exhausted, quietly regretting the needless difficulty. By the time Nate reaches the summit and has to pay his debt, calling the character Lord, the arrangement scarcely looks so nasty. Who has concern for humiliation by this freak?

My Choice

In my playthrough, I chose the staircase. Part of me just {wanted to call