@ztiworoh said:
The ways they use the physical device you're playing on to convey puzzle solutions is incredible and without spoiling anything, I'll just say that the companion app is more than just a reference guide.
Really? Going in not knowing all about the huldra seemed far more effective, since I totally thought she was a kindly calming presence and thus she totally freaked my shit out too.
Reading all about huldra afterwards made it all the more intriguing than I think it would have been had I gone in knowing all about them.
I'd guess a large part of the game's target demographic are the Scandinavian or northern European countries, where the huldra or very similar stories are things people have grown up with and know of.
I don't know much of American folklore, so I can't name any direct parallels, but I guess big foot or stuff like the Loch Ness monster aren't all that far off, though I guess they aren't so much associated with a specific behavior or intent like the huldra is. But I'm sure that if you set a game in a vast American forest and hinted about some ape like creature, you'd be culturally primed to draw associations to the big foot legends.
I think the companion app is largely something they created to give non-Scandinavians the cultural context that would in large part be ingrained in the minds of Scandinavian players. Of course, not all of the legends in the game are well known to all Swedes either, seems like the idea of the "year walk" has been largely forgotten in most parts of Sweden except for the southernmost provinces, but the tales of the huldra seem to appear all across the Germanic countries.
