ΤΗΕ ΜΑΚΙΝG OF...NORCO

How South Louisiana's Cancer Alley inspired a dreamlike cyberpunk adventure.

- JON BAILES

Format PC

Developer Geography Of Robots

Publisher Raw Fury

Origin US

Release 2022

Norco's protagonist Kay stands in the front yard of her family home and recalls how the house flooded three times when she was growing up. Should you click through her thoughts, she will describe each occasion, clearly still haunted by drenched carpets, lost possessions and forced stints in hotels. The details of these accounts feel deeply personal, and for good reason. "My home that I grew up in was flooded quite a few times," explains Norco's lead developer, who goes by the name Yuts. "I've lost pictures and memorabilia and clothes and all kinds of things to floods over the years."

A strong current of lived experience flows throughout Geography Of Robots' surreal debut, which explores a region of South Louisiana, but also the social psychology of its embattled inhabitants. Yuts maintains an affinity to the real Norco, a small town upriver from New Orleans, yet there's no avoiding its sad condition. Situated in a strip of the state darkly referred to as 'Cancer Alley', it struggles for breath between Shell's giant Motiva oil refinery, which fills much of the area's safe elevated ground, and an expansive flood plain, where excess Mississippi waters are drained away. Its unique circumstance powers the game's broiling dreamscape, where tales of improvised survival surround giant monuments to industrial pollution.