How Pacific Drive uses mood to motivate its players

The motivation for playing through Pacific Drive isn’t conventional - it comes from trusting the player and its world through the immersive design to want to explore its environment. Pacific Drive is a game I loved playing; very rarely does something like this come along. Every part of its game design comes down to serving the mood, and so the sense of presence in Pacific Drive is nearly unmatched. On top of all this, the relationship it manages to build between the player and the car is impressive for many reasons, and I’ve tried to do it justice in my analysis. Hope you enjoy! :) Game Maker’s Notebook video source: Pacific Drive’s playlist: Footage used from (in order of appearance): Pacific Drive, The Last Guardian, Red Dead Redemption 2, Horizon Forbidden West, Subnautica, Death Stranding, Dark Souls, Firewatch, Return of the Obra Dinn, Elden Ring, Bloodborne, Outer Wilds 0:00 Introduction 5:32 The Car is the Main Character 15:25 Frictional Game Design 22:52 Dedication to Mood 31:56 Narrative and Themes 42:04 Inconsistent World-Building 47:29 The Hands-Off Approach 52:14 Closing Thoughts A deep dive analysis and critique of Pacific Drive. I guess you could call it a video game video essay.