Sometimes a man stands up

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Life and Death on Rails:
The Symbolisms of Syberia

An exploratory essay by Beiddie Rafól

Please keep in mind that this is not a review of the game. It is instead an exploration of the ideas and recurring themes that Benoit Sokal presented through the game's story, characters, and situations. This essay contains major spoilers for the story but not for any of the puzzles. It is strongly recommended that you play the full game of Syberia before reading this essay as to best understand and appreciate it. This essay is nine webpages long and is illustrated with screenshots from the game.

Rainer Maria Rilke (translated By Robert Bly)

ate Walker - Hessian hero, sort of.

Kate Walker is a textbook 'yuppie', an ambitious and sophisticated young lawyer whose intelligence and resourcefulness are employed primarily to serve her social and professional status. Though nowhere near presented to us in a way as developed, complex, and nuanced as, say, the main character who narrates Hermann Hesse's Demian, Kate represents the fundamental 'Hessian' hero, an individual lacking soul and intrinsic direction, whose seemingly procedural business trip to the Swiss Alps turns out to have life altering consequences for her (at this point we should allow understanding for the primitive ways computer games present characters and stories at this stage in their evolution, Benoit Sokal is one of the very few game designers who actually care to give narrative motivation to the player to continue). Kate moves in a world of materiality, deadlines, social obligations, and ultimately, repression and spiritual stagnation, a kind of precarious teetering between living and non-living.

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© 2003 Beiddie Rafól

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"Sometimes a man stands up during supper
and walks outdoors, and keeps on walking,
because of a church that stands somewhere in the East.
And his children say blessings on him as if he were dead.

And another man, who remains inside his own house,
dies there, inside the dishes and in the glasses,
so that his children have to go far out into the world
toward that same church, which he forgot."

If you have haven't played Syberia but still want to read this
essay, I strongly suggest at least downloading and playing the game demo to give you an impression of the atmosphere and nuances. Download the demo

here.