“It’s somewhere between a beaver and a rat.”
Of all the things I thought I’d learn from solo game maker Tomas Sala, the existence of muskrats wasn’t one of them. They’re real! They’re like oversized rats but with big webbed back feet for swimming through your nightmares with. And where Sala lives, near Amsterdam, they’re a big problem. They gnaw into and burrow in dams, weakening the structure, until one day, crrrrreeeaaaaack, the whole thing comes crashing down. Let them have their way and what would be left – Amster?
They’re what’s known as an invasive species, and it’s why, in the wood I can see in the window behind Tomas Sala – which I only really comment on to make polite conversation – I discover they have a headquarters for a task force which canoes out and catches, and cages, the muskrats before the rodents wreck everything. And so in five minutes of talking to Sala I realise two things. One, he has something interesting to say about almost everything. And two, everything he says unerringly manages to be about his game The Falconeer, which unerringly always manages to be about him.
The Falconeer is a game about war, you see. There’s the obvious warring between rival factions of the archipelago, but there’s also the sense of a bigger war between people and the world. Ursee, as it is called, is not a hospitable place. And no matter what you do, in the name of whichever faction you are flying your giant falcon for, the world always seems to be trying to repel you, through storms in the sky, giant creatures from the deep, or a hungry mass of water waiting to pull you in.
The only real question is, are you muskrat or human, invasive species or protector? Or have I got that the wrong way around?
Sala laughs. He laughs a lot. For all he looks fearsome in that one portrait that circulates of him online, the one with the scowl and the wild, curly hair, he’s actually jovial and gentle face to face. Of course coming up with The Falconeer wasn’t as simple as seeing a muskrat and making a game. Maybe the rodents didn’t influence him at all. But, as I come to learn about Sala, it’s impossible to ever rule anything out, because The Falconeer is anything and everything in his life.