Spoiler Alert: This article includes explicit references to the ending. This game has a fantastic conclusion and if you intend to play it I recommend you don't read on.
Last summer, Danish indie developers PlayDead Studios came out of nowhere to develop Limbo, their first game. It was a downloadable title that was hugely well-received and sold incredibly well, and quickly became one of the Xbox 360's proudest exclusives. However, I look back on my time with Limbo, and I don't see it simply as a 'good game the 360 had', like I would with Gears of War or Halo 3. Limbo was a step further, establishing a place in the 'art game' subgenre, and presented the same sort of minimalist experience people found in Shadow of the Colossus, or I found in Mirror's Edge. Wandering through the dark forest as this boy was no simple task and no ordinary journey, and the more I look back on it, the more I realise how hard it hits.
Looking at the opening titles of Limbo, I think of Lars' Von Trier's horror film 'Antichrist'. In black and white, the screen simply shows the word 'LIMBO', similar to the placards in the film that signal the beginning of the next chapter in the story. The game and the film also share a fondness for silence, and if not that, a lack of music. Where they differ however is in meaning, for while Antichrist tries (and in my opinion, fails) to offer a deeper meaning of morality and man's bloodlust and dominance over women, Limbo does not yearn to put across a message, but rather share an experience of a lost soul.
Let me put this bluntly: if you have not picked up on it already, the boy looking for his sister in the woods is a metaphor, and the word 'Limbo' is not used in vain. Many wonder what was the significance of the ending, and could not find the conclusion. In fairness, it is left fairly open to interpretation, but I will explain the way I saw it. The boy, after waking suddenly in a dark forest, has had to find his way through traps and escape creatures to find something or someone. Traps may best him, and indeed upon failure can lead to his gruesome end, but he keeps coming back until he overcomes such challenges (yes, I believe even the quick respawn after death is significant), and after one particularly large puzzle he smashes through an unseen pane as time slows down. What this pane is made of is not important, because it is not real. He once again opens his eyes, and finds his sister, standing next to an old ruined treehouse in the rain. She perks her head up without turning around, and the game ends. Because not a word is spoken in the entire game, nothing is openly explained, and as such many people do not realise: he is dead, and so is his sister. They both died falling from their treehouse some time ago, maybe minutes, maybe years. This journey has been through the titular limbo, on his way to the afterlife, and it has tested him. The things he has faced are things children see as hostile in a world that is much bigger than them - scary things like spiders and rats, violent kids (bullies), things we are taught to stay away from (dangerous machinery and electrical equipment), things we must learn to conquer as we grow (deep water) and, most importantly of all, loneliness. Not a single friendly life form has the boy encountered, but at the end he has ultimately overcome what he has faced, and he is reunited with his sister. The afterlife he has entered is irrelevant, heaven or hell, as nothing good nor bad is seen, but he finds his sister at the very spot they were separated, and to this end it is concluded.
Look around the internet and there are plenty of other interpretations, and this is fine. If there was a simple explanation, it would have been obvious, and PlayDead clearly wanted people to see the story's ending in their own ways. Some may say the girl has chosen to stay in limbo with him, some say he has entered a shadow world, where he can see his sister but not vice versa (which would explain why she does not turn around); but all involve him facing fear and solitude. What's amazing is that such debate is caused because of people having their own individual experiences with it, some considerably varied, but it is done without dialogue, without any music beyond ambient noise and without colour.
Limbo is an amazing title, one that has certainly broken the mould for Indie titles, and for storytelling. If you have read this and have not played the game, come to it with an empty mind, and take the game for what you will, because it is in giving you the chance to pick up the pieces that PlayDead have massively succeeded in offering a beautifully dark but touching tale.
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