Gaming Photography Weekly Contest: My Mountain Stories from The Long Dark

I'm a simple man: show me a mountain and I'll immediately feel the urge to climb it. While I don't do this so often in my daily life, I love exploring mountain regions in video games of all kinds. One of the many reasons I'm a fan of the indie survival simulator The Long Dark is its setting, the Bear Island located in the frozen wastelands of North Canada. Unsurprisingly, the game offers many mountains the player can climb up and down. Below, dear readers will find some selected photos taken during my many playthroughs.

Here's the link to the Gaming Photography contest announcement.

All screenshots were made by me.

The first thing the player sees in the story mode after arriving at Bear Island. A strange storm filled the sky with weird colours and the plane our protagonist was flying suddenly malfunctioned. Without any means to control it, the pilot crashed into a mountain slope. After waking up, he realises that things could hardly be any worse: he's stranded in the middle of nowhere with nothing but some light clothes, a metal shard piercing his bleeding hand. And this is just the beginning of a long and wild adventure.

The only chance to survive is to leave the crash site and climb down the mountain to reach relative safety. There is a town in the valley which lets you sleep in an abandoned home, safe from predators and the deadly cold. There's a lot of loot to find there, too, and the lights in the window are a clear sign that somebody is still alive on this God-forgotten island.

Time for a break. Fortunately for wayward travellers, caves can often be found in the rocky regions of Bear Island. They give the opportunity to rest in safety from predators and bad weather, and feel really cosy, too!

Creaking and swaying in the wind, rope bridges like this one are not for the faint-hearted, especially when a thick fog makes it impossible to see anything. At least it's impossible to get lost and reaching the other end of the bridge is easy.

These mountains may be dangerous to the weak and unwary but they offer sights of serene beauty, too, like this enchanting waterfall near an old railroad bridge.

The Long Dark has simple graphics and gamers shouldn't expect highly detailed textures or objects made of thousands of polygons but the lighting can do wonders for what you see on the screen. The sunsets in this game are a sight to remember.

Every journey to the top has to start somewhere. After leaving the safety of the camp office located near a lake, our survivor sees his destination, a watchtower proudly standing on a peak. The eerie aurora has brought electricity back for a while and fighting the way at night couldn't be easier.

We're on the track. The sign shows the path leading to the top of the peak with the watchtower.

The final shot. Climbing up to this point wasn't easy but the survivor has reached the destination. The tower may hide many treasures: medicine, a useful tool like a hunting knife, a rifle or revolver and, most importantly, delicious food such as canned pork'n'beans.