When you think of the afterlife, do you ever picture mushrooms? In a recent interview I held with Kaitlin Tremblay, the Narrative Director at developer Soft Rains, they explained that the emphasis on fungal life in Ambrosia Sky grew (or should we say, “germinated”) from a particular fascination with ecological death cycles. “It’s something Dalia [the protagonist] reckons with directly in the game…an ecosystem thriving despite the tragedy, and this is an important part of her beginning to understand humanity’s need to co-exist within an ecosystem rather than strive for mastery over it.” Indeed, Ambrosia Sky gives players a dazzling window into a corner of the galaxy where humans are the conduits of life, long after their pulse has stopped.
The story of Ambrosia Sky follows Dalia Volkova, a death cleaner, as she is summoned to her hometown (The Cluster) on the edge of Saturn’s belt to perform the last rites for victims of calamity. Given her familiarity with this setting, her mission is a perplexing mix of her professional and personal life. As players encounter the deceased throughout the game, these folks are not just nameless corpses to Dalia; they are the farmers, researchers, and engineers that Dalia knew intimately before she left town. Players will spend much of the game reading through emotionally charged messages shared between citizens of The Cluster, as well as carefully listening to Dalia as she rehashes the guilt of her past life and her mysterious fallout with her stepmom. The narrative is the bleeding, melancholic heart of Ambrosia Sky, and it is the game’s strongest aspect. There is a special tenderness in the way the game handles its character-driven story, demonstrating the grace, preservation, and adaptation necessary to right the wrongs of a torrid history.
The sights and sounds of Ambrosia Sky are equally memorable. The art style is vibrant, with deep blues and purples of space station architecture contrasted against the pops of color from the fungal outbreak. The music is ambient and lo-fi mostly, which perfectly fits the meditative ambiance of cleaning. Nonetheless, the score will transition into something far more robust during the game’s impressive, comic-panel-inspired cinematic sequences.
Certainly my favorite part of the Ambrosia Sky aesthetic was when I got to break out from the suffocating space station and explore the exterior environment. Here, sound is vacuumed out from around the player, and they are left to stare in wonder at the magnitude of Saturn and its vast asteroid belt. This is where I also must air my first grievance, which is, why are there not more of these sections in the level design? Floating around the cosmos is by far the most evocative part of the art design, and for that reason, I was quite bummed that only about 2 of the 16 missions gave me the chance to do that.
Speaking of the missions, this game is broken up across two acts, and each mission within those acts comes with its own core objective. Per the R&R of her job as a Scarab, Dalia will need to clear fungal contamination, collect peculiar biological samples for research, and secure the DNA of subjects who have consented to the Ambrosia Project, which is code for the scientific attempt at immortality. Some of these missions function as basic retrieval adventures, with time to poke-and-prod for secrets along the way, whereas others will have Dalia navigate more treacherous and urgent circumstances under the threat of a timed escape. Regardless, one thing is common across every mission: lots and lots of mold sprouting up between Dalia and her goals. This is where her job gets interesting.
When it comes to how Dalia does her job as a death cleaner, she will have a number of tools at her disposal to sanitize the fungal outbreak in each environment. The primary method of containment is the fungal spray, which has several different nozzles to control the spread of the liquid as well as different chemicals to eradicate the fungi. Since the sprayer is the tool players will use most often, the core mechanic of the game feels reminiscent of the Powerwash Simulator series, where players are constantly assessing the different components of their target (in this case, fungus) and matching that opportunity to the particular spray and nozzle that would be most effective for the job. For instance, certain fungi are flammable, so using the chemical for a controlled burn can save the player time while they focus their standard spray on more hazardous fungi that require precision to safely remove an explosive component. I truly had a blast (pun intended) getting the 100% clean on each mission because flipping between spray effects to optimize my approach never got old. It was a perfect, zen-like tedium.
Another tool that Dalia will use often is the tether, which she equips to slingshot herself around the map in any direction. This tool is especially helpful in Zero-G environments where Dalia has no foothold and will opt to instead traverse through the open air. The tether is also used to grab the fruit spouting up in different spots across the fungal network, requiring surgical precision due to the delicate nature of this volatile organic material. This collectible in its three varieties forms the currency needed to upgrade Dalia’s gear, unlocking new ways to explore Ambrosia Sky.
Though I think the system is too simplistic on the whole, I was quite satisfied with some of the subtle progression layers in Ambrosia Sky, because they gave me ways to fine-tune my approach to each obstacle in my path. There are 27 different abilities Dalia can unlock across two different skill trees, one for her sprayer and one for her exo suit. Many of these are basic quality upgrades, such as sprayer recharge rate and sprayer power upgrades that repeat themselves across each chemical type, but others offer a more noticeable expansion of Dalia’s toolkit. I was able to expand the chemical reserves for the sprays I used most often, alter my tether to reduce the amount of impact it had on fragile fruit, and purchase new spray types to help me solve various puzzles throughout the space station.
The puzzles encountered boil down to a few ability-gated areas in each mission that can only be opened by an intentional application of either the electric or flammable spray. The electric spray, for instance, can be used to conduct electricity from one power source to another. In immersive-sim fashion, I was able to power certain doors using a long string of electric chemicals starting from the ceiling lights and connecting down to the door control. This form of player expression was really interesting to toy around with, yet on the contrary, I found the use cases for the flammable spray to be far more equivalent to simple lock-and-key mechanics that didn’t require me to think outside the box.
Once players unlock the various hidden passages of The Cluster, they will find a peculiar object called the Scrimshaw Charm. This is the game’s only hidden collectible, and there are more than 50 of them scattered across the game. What made them fascinating to me was their symbolic value; these charms don’t provide any real benefit to Dalia other than the environmental storytelling they provide. In the lore of The Cluster, Scrimshaw charms were traded among citizens to wish each other good fortune. Thus, they became quite precious and personally meaningful to each recipient as disaster struck. Understandably, these charms are locked away in personal cubbies, bookshelves, hidden vents, and other special places that people kept close by but out of sight. Each time I found a charm, I learned about the personal circumstances of its owner.
Though locating these charms was difficult, each has a bizarre sonic quality to it, which tipped me off. As I explored each space station, I would often hear a funny little noise in between the blasts of my sprayer and realize a Scrimshaw charm was near. The problem is that you are only told how many collectibles are in each mission after you complete that mission for the first time, so I never knew if I had found them all until I could make it back to the main menu. I swear I could hear phantom charms calling me from around every corner until I knew I had found them all.
