So thinking back over the experience of playing Gone Home, I marshaled some of my favorite moments from the game -the touching, the heartbreaking, the weird, the fucked up. Some examples:

- Sam's story where the First Mate turns into a woman.

- realizing Sam and Terrence are into the same porn

- Terrence's new manuscript, The Accidental Human

- putting the Terrence/Oscar story together in the "molestation room"

- the fucking hair dye in the fucking bath tub

- finding Sam's "explicit" story and Karie's response

- Sam/Lonnie's note from class, with Lonnie's big "NO" on the back

- NOT finding Sam hanging from a fucking noose in the attic, or something equally miserable

What are some of your favorite Gone Home moments?

- "Gosh, dad"

- The lightbulb burning out just after I picked up the cross.

- Finding the condom packet (rather mirrored my own reaction when I did the same thing when I was about 15).

- "Not reading any more of that..." and subsequent responses. I think it's the first game I've played where the UI refused to cooperate on the grounds of ickyness.

- The realisation that the parents haven't gone looking for Sam, because they don't know yet.

- The realisation that the second message on the answering machine wasn't from mother (my original assumption).

- The penny finally dropping about the cables under the TV. It wasn't the VCR that was removed. (Come to think of it, where WAS the VCR?)

Popular theory is that Sam stole some of the smaller electronics to sell once she found Lonnie.

Gotta say, for as kind of cheap as it is, the moment where you pick up the crucifix and the light trips out is pretty great.

• All the notes where Sam exchanges a conversation with somebody else.
• The note outside Sam's room that says to stop leaving the lights on just like Katie does.
• Playing the casette tapes while reading notes, I would often replay them once they ended.
• The lightbulb moment.
• Everytime I went into a room I panicked until I could find the light switch.
• Putting the duck back where it belongs.

"ASK ME ABOUT CLOWN COMBOS"

I almost forgot - the magic eye pictures having the actions "stare" and "scrutinize".

Wait, what? Details?

@beachthunder: Near the safe in the basement there is height markings for Terrence from when he was a kid visiting his uncle Oscar. It stops in 1963 when he was 12. There is a wood storage room down the dark hall from the safe with a toy in it, and in the safe there is a note from Oscar to Terrence's mother asking for forgiveness for a "transgressions." Then there is the whole obsession with the JFK assassination, and his stories being about a man traveling back in time and stopping horrible things from happening, and there are even notes with thoughts about what if JFK wasn't JFK, and then the final book he writes is about the main character from his books having to go back and save himself. In fact, all of the troubles in the parent's story arch stems from Terrence's abuse in the past.

As for my favorite parts. I loved piecing the story above together, and seeing how everything is tied together. I really enjoyed the journal entry "Adjusting the the Dark". It was really heart felt, and it was where I really fell in to the game full steam. I had been thinking about stopping and coming back the next night, but that log made me want to keep going because I wanted to see that relationship bloom. The last part that really sticks out for me is the note in the basement that you only get a glimpse at. It was a great character moment for Katie, but reading it outside of the game, I feel is is the best written note in the game. It actually reads like a teenager putting her thoughts about her burgeoning sexuality into words. To me it shows that the creators had so much confidence in everything else, that the player is only given a quick glimpse at this note, and it is probably one of the better hidden notes as well.

The crucifix moment was the point where I was like "OK, Gone Home. You're pretty great."

-All of the music tapes strewn about the house (I'm a huge fan of punk rock and this game really made me appreciate the riot grrrl subgenre)

-Sam's "menstrual cycle story" assignment.

-The stomach-turning feeling about finally seeing what was in the attic.

-"Oh thank God, she's not dead. She's just a lesbian."

I loved the first song I came across - Role Model. I wish I could find a video of the song somewhere online.

People keep mentioning the crucifix, and I found no such thing. I feel like I missed out on something..

@beachthunder: That particular song was actually done by a band called “The Youngins." The band that took credit for it in the game is fictional.

Thanks!

I really wish I still actively listened to punk music.

Did anybody else bring the duck with them everywhere? Seemed like if I had Christmas Duck with me, I could take on the world.

Did anybody abandon Christmas Duck for Steggy? (You monster!)

YES. Seriously. GOCD was my Companion Cube :P

Not sure if this is the moment, but...

The climax. I was watching a performance of Les Mis while I played, and triumphant music started swelling as Sam talked about Lonnie's change of plans... it made a sweet moment heartwrenching.

Going into the attic and thankfully not finding what I had been dreading finding up there.

And Levine's Thousand Island Dressing. :P

I think the greatest thing about how that was done is that in retrospect there were plenty of clues earlier that she had left rather than killing herself. But like you I was so caught up in her story toward the end that every little hint about that filled me with foreboding. The line about how she told Lonnie she didn't want to live without her, and the one about going up to the attic to sleep particularly got me. Extremely well done.

• Condom moment
• Porn moment (never found Terrence's)
• Crucifix moment
• Discovering that Sam was a lesbian
• Sam's sex ed assignment
• The VCRs
• Salad dressing
• The ending not being incredibly tragic/manipulative

The best part was when you pick up Sam's erotic story, and then quickly throw away.

@donutfever: Salad Dressing? Did I miss something special about it?

@iphone_tyler: It's a reference to Bioshock (the developers of Gone Home worked on the Minerva's Den dlc for Bioshock 2)

Another one I forgot to mention - the glow-in-the-dark stars and planets on the ceiling in Sam's bedroom. But they don't glow unless you turn the bedside lamp on first.

"There's nothing I don't hate right now"

And on serious notes, just every Sam diary. Dealing with roots is probably the best one. And the ending too. So many mixed emotions. The climb to the attic and the revelations there, so good.

Can someone explain what's so special about this game? I'm not trying to bash the game, but its been getting alot of praise.

Love the creepy feeling i had through the entire game.

And good to know the it wasn't just in my mind Terry was molested.

Still thinks Sam shouldn't just run away from her family, say a proper goodbye. Spesially when I just got home from Europa..... Kind of a dickmove stealing my thunder like that...

Finding the father's risque magazines was pretty neat.

The crucifix and the light bulb. At some point I realized it wasn't a horror game, and when that moment finally came it scared the shit out of me.

I missed out on the porn (or was it that magazine at the bottom of Sam's locker). But I did find the note and laughed when I couldn't pick it back up.