"Everybody's Gone to the Rapture" is a 2015 adventure video game created by The Chinese Room and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation 4. The game is set in a small village in England where all the people have disappeared without explanation. It is seen as a follow-up to another game called "Dear Esther," also made by The Chinese Room. The game was released for PlayStation 4 on August 11, 2015, and for Windows computers on April 14, 2016. Critics gave the game positive reviews.

Gameplay

In the game Everybody's Gone to the Rapture, the player explores a small village in England where all the people have disappeared in a mysterious way. Throughout the game world, the player can interact with floating lights. Many of these lights show parts of the story. The player can also interact with objects such as doors, radios, phones, fences, and power switches.

Plot

The game is set in 1984 in a fictional village called Yaughton in Shropshire. The player's goal is to explore the village and find out why everyone has disappeared. Mysterious glowing orbs float in the air and guide the player to scenes with human-shaped lights that reenact past events. By following the orbs, finding telephones and radios that play conversations and broadcasts, the player gathers clues that lead to the game's main event, called the "rapture."

The game has five areas, each focusing on a different character. The main characters are Dr. Katherine "Kate" Collins and her husband, Stephen Appleton, both scientists at an observatory. While working, Kate and Stephen notice a strange pattern of lights in the sky. They believe the lights might be a form of life. They observe the pattern harming animals like birds and cows before spreading to humans. Kate thinks the pattern is trying to communicate, but she does not realize the harm it causes.

After an argument with Stephen about his affair with his ex-fiancée, Lizzie Graves, Kate locks herself in the observatory and tries to communicate with the pattern. Meanwhile, Stephen becomes convinced the pattern is a deadly threat that could destroy humanity.

Many villagers begin to experience unexplained bleeding and brain pressure, similar to a brain tumor, as noted in a recording left behind. Others disappear, leaving behind strange light specks and the smell of unknown ash. Stephen believes the pattern is spreading and convinces the local government to quarantine the village by blocking roads and cutting phone lines. Officials claim the outbreak is due to Spanish flu, but some villagers are skeptical, especially when dead bodies vanish.

As the village population decreases, Stephen realizes the quarantine failed. He believes the pattern has adapted to spread through telephone lines, radio waves, and televisions. He urges the government to gas the valley to stop the pattern.

In the penultimate part of the game, the player finds a bunker where Stephen waited during nerve gas attacks. He planned to kill himself after ensuring no one else in the valley was infected. When he cannot contact anyone outside the valley, he realizes the pattern has spread beyond the village. He confronts the pattern, which he calls "It." He decides to set himself on fire, dousing himself in petrol. Just before igniting the fuel, he sees Kate's image in the pattern of light. He reaches out to her, but the scene ends as his lighter hits the ground, starting the fire.

In the final part, the player enters the observatory's locked gate and climbs to the top. Inside, Kate is seen in the darkness, making her final recordings. She explains that she is the last survivor and that she successfully communicated with the pattern. She says the pattern told her that it was not wrong for taking lives because everyone who wanted to be together was now together. Kate accepts her fate and believes she will join the pattern. She says humanity can now "slip away, unafraid." Kate reaches toward the pattern, which meets her halfway, as her final words are that the pattern was her counterpart.

Development

During the creation of Dear Esther, the team wanted to include interactive features. When this was not practical, they created the idea for Everybody's Gone to the Rapture. The developers were influenced by British science fiction from the 1960s and 1970s, such as John Christopher's The Death of Grass and Charles Eric Maine's The Tide Went Out. The voice actors in the game include Merle Dandridge, Oliver Dimsdale, Aimee-Ffion Edwards, Susan Brown, and Jonathan Bailey.

The team decided to work with Sony's Santa Monica Studio because they believed they could not fund the project through crowdfunding or sales of early versions. A Windows version of the game was released on April 14, 2016. The game's soundtrack, composed by Jessica Curry, was released by Sony Classical as a 28-track album in the United Kingdom.

Reception

The game Everybody's Gone to the Rapture received "generally favorable" reviews from critics, according to the review aggregator website Metacritic.

GamesRadar described the game as "brave, […] challenging, and […] essential," while IGN referred to it as "a beautiful, heart-breaking journey into the end of the world." The game was included on multiple "Best games of the year" lists, such as Kirk Hamilton's list from Kotaku, Alexa Ray Corriea's list from GameSpot, and Kill Screen's "Best Videogames of 2015" list.

Some reviewers pointed out that the game had too little interaction for players. James Stephanie Sterling, while discussing games often criticized as "walking simulators," stated that Everybody's Gone to the Rapture serves as an example of what to avoid in this genre. This includes not changing the tone of the game as it progresses and making the back-story more interesting than the gameplay itself. These reviewers compared it unfavorably to Gone Home and The Stanley Parable.