The Cursed Town of 'Pathologic' Is Now Receiving Visitors

A few months ago, I wrote about Ice Pick Lodge's remarkable Pathologic demo: a standalone, two hour story called The Marble Nest, featuring a confused doctor, an army of masked orderlies, and a terrible rainstorm.

At the time, it was available only to backers of their kickstarter, but today the studio have decided to make it playable, for free, for everybody on Steam. This something that you should absolutely do.

A few days ago, I was surprised to see a 2 gigabyte update for the game on Steam, and, suspecting sinister changes by the developers, opened it up to find things much as I'd left them. This was almost more disconcerting.

The cursed town where the game takes place had changed, sure, but in ways subtle and unnoticeable. This figure no longer appears here. That bridge across the water is slightly better guarded. Certain characters don't show up quite where you expect them.

In hindsight, it is clear that the team at Ice Pick Lodge were fixing little things. Making the cursed town a little more presentable, since more visitors would be arriving soon.

If you are going to play The Marble Nest, which you should—and especially if you've never played a game by Ice Pick Lodge before—here are some things to bear in mind.

• People are going to lie to you. There is little you can do to prepare for this. You will not be told when it is going to happen.

• Many of the characters you meet do not have your best interests at heart.

• Sometimes things will seem confusing, and sometimes things will seem very clear. In this way, the game is an accurate reflection of many things you have experienced.

• You can safely play The Marble Nest without fear of spoiling the main game. It is standalone and self-contained.

• The only thing worse than hopelessness is misplaced confidence.

You can download and play The Marble Nest for free on steam , by clicking the "Download Demo" button on the right of the page. It will take you about two hours. There is no save functionality.