The Climb

The Climb is a rock climbing simulator made for virtual reality helmets, and this is its main feature. Instead of the usual control of the hero, the player controls his hands: he grabs the ledges, pulls himself up, shifts his weight and stretches further. It’s unusual at first, but it’s these movements that give you a sense of height that is impossible to get on the screen. The locations are chosen to be frightening: rocks above the water, sheer walls in the gorge, climbs where every stone and crack is visible. It’s easy to stumble, and when your hand doesn’t reach the desired ledge, you have to look for a way around, and this turns climbing into a solution to a problem rather than an attraction. The movements themselves require physical effort: you have to wave your arms, squat and stretch, so the session rarely lasts for hours - the muscles and eyes get tired. But in return comes the feeling that the peak has been taken for real, on your own. New routes and equipment open up, and with them the difficulty of the climbs increases. Different locations have different sensations: the Bay near the water is easier to look at, the canyon is impressive in height, and the Alps require patience and precision. Each route is marked into sections, and after the first passage you want to go back and go through it cleaner, without unnecessary movements. This structure turns the game into a calm exercise in technique, rather than a race for high scores. The Climb is not so much a competition as it is a training in endurance: the game teaches you to calmly look down and take your time. For owners of virtual reality headsets, this is one of the most representative projects of the early VR era.