The Forgotten City is a phenomenal video game. People have been telling me that for months, and I've always brushed them off. Running about in Ancient Rome in an old Skyrim mod? Aye, I'm sure it's class mate, you do you. Dear reader, I was a fool. The Forgotten City is truly, madly, deeply excellent, and everyone should go and play it - it's even on Game Pass, if that sweetens the deal. It's not just to get you to play it that I'm writing this though - it's to talk about Behind Closed Doors, the greatest side quest in a video game this year.
All of The Forgotten City's quests merge into one - that's the nature of a time loop game. You never really know what's a side quest and what will end up being crucial to the main story path in a few loops' time. However, Behind Closed Doors is most definitely a side quest. As you embark upon it, the game will tell you it features some horror and is more action-based than the rest of the game, and let's you know it's fine to skip it and continue playing the main campaign. Here's the thing though - it's not fine to skip it at all. This is the best side quest of the year, have you not been listening? Please don't miss out on this one.
As that 'warning' explains, for want of a better phrase, it's more action-packed than The Forgotten City's usual gameplay loop, which is conversations about time and Roman stuff. I get that it sounds boring, but let me serve as a cautionary tale. These conversations head in so many directions, and the layers of the city, metaphorically and literally, make for a powerfully engaging tale. Behind Closed Doors isn't great because it finally lets you shoot some arrows. It's great because it knows exactly when to let you have a slice of action, it's perfectly balanced, and it feeds into the wider game superbly.
The Golden Rule in the city is that no one can do anything wrong. Lying, for example, is wrong. If you lie, everyone dies. If you just mislead someone though, you're fine and dandy. Thanks to being misled, you find yourself trapped in a shrine to the gods with a golden bow in your hand and nothing but darkness and hornets around you. You've been tricked, and the only way to escape is by venturing deeper into the palace. You do this by shooting said hornet's nest, turning it gold. It falls and crashes to the floor, and that sets up the key power you wield in Behind Closed Doors - you can now turn things into gold.
Sometimes, this is used in peaceful ways, such as turning vines golden to make them strong enough for you to climb. Most of the time though, you're using them to shoot the raving skeletons that come surging towards you to rip the flesh from your bones. See, I told you it was good. With the rest of the game playing out so methodically, asking you to do this, then that, then this other thing, it's refreshing when it gives you a bow and says "go shoot things." It's even more refreshing when the quest finishes and you're told to go back to long, philosophical conversations about the nature of a sin.
This quest stays around for exactly as long as it needs to, and it ends with a revelation I won't spoil - but I will tell you to go and play The Forgotten City. Go and play it now. What are you waiting for? You're at work? Pfft, you can always get another job - tell your boss you're quitting to go and play The Forgotten City instead.