DUE SOUTH

This stunning point-and-click parable isn't the next Kentucky Route Zero-it's the first NORCO

- Alexis Ong

Norco is a many-headed creature-a narrative hydra of place, personhood, nostalgia, and spirituality. But to start with the basics, it's a real Louisiana town named for the New Orleans Refining Company, a monumental piece of psychogeographical storytelling, and in February 2022, I'm ready to call it my game of the year. Note: There will be some spoilers for the game from this point onward.

The tiny dev collective Geography of Robots has called Norco's style ‘petroleum blues', a nod to the area's relationship with the oil corporation that has defined both the town and the environmental decline that colors its existence. The game pointedly avoids the disaster porn and fetishization that tend to dominate media portrayals of the Deep South, and while a big part of Norco revolves around grief and trauma, it's also full of rousing punk momentum channeled from the DIY music scene. The result is nothing short of incredible.

Norco is a bristling pastiche of Louisianan references, pop culture, and satirical moments distilled into a point-and-click pixel art adventure. The townscape and Greater New Orleans area take the form of distant highways, refinery stacks, and familiar snapshots of suburbia; impossibly careful, subtle dithering imbues each scene with warmth and life. Norco isn't just for Louisianans, though residents will get a kick out of seeing real locations like Kenner's Esplanade Mall-closed due to Hurricane Ida and now being repurposed for political events, rebirthed as the Promenade Mall. Despite its hyperlocality, Norco has a universal reach that touches on widespread issues like the gig economy and automation. For starters, the non-descript bar Saint Somewhere is an instantly recognisable fixture of gentrifying neighborhoods across the US.