Art is hard. People universally say they like art, or think art is a good thing. But getting something artistic in front of a big audience is exceedingly rare these days. You can point to budgets or social media or venture capitalists as the cause for much of this milquetoast media, but the silver lining is that cool art still happens. And, in the case of the latest Day One indie sensation on Game Pass, it can still find a following.
To call Double Fine’s latest release Keeper an indie is a semantic stretch. Obviously anything backed by the conglomerate cash pile that is Microsoft isn’t exactly in hardscrabble bootstraps territory; however, it’s clearly indie in spirit. You play as a lighthouse that walks around and shines a light on stuff to solve puzzles. Not much of an elevator pitch, but the execution is what makes that oddball premise so successful. Keeper is an exercise in vibe and aesthetics so captivating it reminds us that Game Pass can occasionally be a vehicle for something truly grand.
