r/Firewatch

I have only played the game twice so I’m not as versed in the universe as some of the other players on this sub.

What bugs me the most about the game is how we never get to meet Delilah.

I’m wondering if you vets or even newer players have any theories or speculations as to why they decided to make that part of the ending? Do you think it’s something nefarious?

I just finished it and i was like oh wow im finna gonna meet this person we been talking to on the phone and when i said to her to wait for me i thought this was it only to find out that she left we built a good connection over the radio and then she rug pulls just like that i even didn't feel to enter that chopper. She is a coward

Warning: long personal rant 

When I first started the game, I was like, "wow, this Dellilah is too good to be true; smart, funny, cool, charming, friendly. How likely are you to run into someone like that out deep in a forest??" 

But as the game got close to the end & I found Ned's notes on her, & read some internet discussions about the ulterior themes & motives of the game, for example about how in some other runs, she just denies her relationship with Javier... only then I realized what a good manipulative liar she is, that this is what she does, she just has a fling with whoever takes the job each year. I was feeling bad for this Javier dude, getting cheated on all the time, but then I wondered if even Javier is real or just another of her lies lol. 

She left us at the end because just as Ned had observed, she was selfish. She either couldn't be bothered to wait just a few inconvenient minutes for us, or she left deliberately to avoid an awkward meeting & conversation because we'd outlived our usefulness to her, which was entertaining her during a boring summer job.

When she left us there, I really felt it, the same sad disappointed feeling I'd feel in real life if a girl dumped me like that. You see, I'm a simple, kind-hearted guy in real life. If a girl was as charming & manipulative as Delilah, she'd easily be able to play me. I really was Henry, there. 

The writing of the character & the voice acting were so good that they actually played me & made me sad when I realized it. So when I needed to replay a portion of the game again because of a bugged achievement, I no longer replied to any of her comments or questions out of spite. On one hand, it felt a bit good, but on the other hand, I still felt bad for being "mean" because it's not really in me to be mean, it takes active effort for me to be mean, & even then it's still mixed with doubt & regret. 

This game actually made me feel that way; I felt & behaved as if this were a real life situation, as if someone really broke my heart. So big kudos to the writers & the voice actors, especially Delilah's.

That they would show your photographs at the credits, my ass made sure to photograph the dead kid, how he fell, the ruined girls campsite. It looked as thought I was a trail killer 😭

I mean, to the extent that you sought out a dedicated Reddit forum and did a deep dive, reading hundreds of posts and comments.

Hey there, I would like to share a small mod that includes bunch of QoL features and fixes that I created. It most importantly fixes that issue with movement when having high fps count.

I tested this on the GOG version but I believe it should work also with a steam one. If that is not the case let me now, I will try to look into it.

This is the list of features at this point but I might add more:

• Fixes player movement at high frame rates with VSync disabled.
• Adds an optional FPS counter. It is disabled by default.
• Adds an option to remove the time limit from dialogue choices. It is disabled by default.
• Adds a subtitle size slider with a range of 75% to 200%. The original size is 100%.
• Adds a Field of View slider with a range of 30 to 110. The original value is 55.
• Exposes the game's hidden Mouse Acceleration setting in the Controls menu. You need to disable that option if you're experiencing an issue with high mouse sensitivity.
• Includes Ignore Pads option which is set by default, this fixes issue with controllers causing automatic rotation of character.
• Adds a New Game (Skip Intro) button that skips the opening text sequence.
• Includes a simple noclip mode for unstucking your character.
• Improves save loading and reduces some asset-streaming stalls.
• Reduces unnecessary player interaction checks above 60 FPS.
• Prevents the Free Roam day/night cycle from getting stuck after leaving the cave.

If an existing Free Roam save already has broken cave lighting, install the patch, enter the cave again and move through gate until you drop on the first stone, after that go you can go back and the day/night cycle should be restored. The exit event will restore the day/night cycle and the next save should load correctly.

On Github I included I Python script that extracts audio files that may be unused. There are a lot of them so I did not look into it, but if somebody is curious they may take a look. A small chunk of them might have been actually used because they may have been constructed dynamically.

Mod nexus page: https://www.nexusmods.com/firewatch/mods/15

Github: https://github.com/Terminats/firewatch-game-enhanced

OMG I just finished Firewatch and it was amazing, the story was so sad in the beginning, poor Julia and Henry. The story is just a tear jerking almost all the time, for how little you spend with the characters you feel their sadness, their regrets, their everything. Ned is a character who you feel bad for once you learn his story, losing his son while climbing it's just sad stories all around and each character deals with it differently, other than the stress of Ned listening in on things. It shows that Delilah likes to get drunk to forget things, Henry took a job that isolates you alot to get away from the heartbreak of what's happening to Julia, Ned is someone who took his grief and regrets so far that he decided to leave civilization fully, building a bunker for himself in Shoshone and eventually moving deeper into it when the fire gets out of control, in the back of my mind I like to think that instead of Ned going deeper into Shoshone he actually stepped into the fire, or went down in the cave to maybe retrieve Brian, i want Ned to have a happy ending atleast as happy as a man who's lost his son and abandoned civilization can have, whether it's being reunited with his son in the afterlife or burying his son once the fire is ended. This game is a masterpiece. The only criticism there could be is how Ned set up that station or atleast how he made it connect to everything. But other than that this is a game ill recommend to anyone who loves story driven games.

I just finished playing Firewatch again (great game but it will leave you rethinking your whole life afterwards) and it struck me that there are a lot of parallels to KF that honestly, I don’t think are a coincidence. I recall a LONG time ago the dev twitter mentioning Firewatch as a source of inspiration, but I could literally just be misremembering that and it could be regarding a different game.

Anyway, I wanted to write down some fun parallels I picked up on this playthrough, some way more specific than others.

- both games take place in the late 1980’s
- the deuteragonist, whose face is completely obscured (at least during the actual gameplay) in both games is a woman, while the protagonists are both men
- the protagonist of Firewatch’s name is Henry, and a major antagonist’s of KF’s name is also Henry
- the protagonist of KF’s name is Forrest, while the protagonist of Firewatch says “there is no fictional character I hate more” than an in-universe character named Forrest
-the deuteragonist of Firewatch, Delilah, is 43 and stated (however truthfully) to have been in a relationship with a 28 year old man. Peggy, the deuteragonist of KF, is 28, and stated to skip work to hang out with her coworker Karen, who is 43.
- the premise of each game is, generally, that the protagonist had to leave their home and take a job in the middle of nowhere alone
- the plot twist in Firewatch is that there is no great conspiracy, while the plot twist in KF is that there WAS a big conspiracy
- the inciting incident that drives both stories is the wrongful death of a boy resulting from a tragic accidental fall, and the attempt to cover it up afterwards
- aforementioned boy’s initials are BG (Firewatch) and GB (KF)
- in Firewatch, the person who caused the accident’s name is Ned. In KF, the person who caused the accident’s name is Teddy
- both games heavily rely on audio and dialogue and are linear, though KF has multiple endings

Whether or not these were intentional, these two games are a part of a shared, “2-people-solving-crimes-in-the-middle-of-nowhere” universe in my head. I just need games to fill out the winter and spring slots and I’ll have a game for each season lol

Anyways I just wanted to share these because I thought the coincidences were neat and that you all might enjoy!

Spoilers obv. :)