It's a terrifying thing for Bennett Foddy to hand you a controller. Joined by co-developers Gabe Cuzzillo and Maxi Boch of the excellent Ape Out, Foddy tells me at GDC that their new game, Baby Steps, is "a step away" from the rage games that have built his reputation. Games like QWOP, which nobody is actually good at, and especially Getting Over It, the cauldron-lobbing sensation that some people, in a terrifying demonstration of the human spirit, have gotten good at. Channeling the energy of legendary chef Marco Pierre White insisting that he didn't make Gordon Ramsay cry, but rather, Ramsay chose to make himself cry, Foddy says "you can inflict that on yourself playing Baby Steps if you want to. Some people will want to, if they're fans of my work in particular."
So begins the most harrowing appointment I've had in 12 years of games journalism: playing Baby Steps in front of its developers while trying to sustain an interview. This is a "literal walking simulator" – Death Stranding, The Stanley Parable, Firewatch, all the rest, eat your heart out – that puts you in control of a chunky, anxious, onesie-equipped manchild named Nate as he, torn from his mom's basement, navigates an absurdist dreamscape one foot at a time. The more you fall, the dirtier Nate's onesie gets – the better to embellish his considerable ass.
