A Dramatic Retelling of My Interloper Experience

I foolishly started an Interloper run. Having yet to get the “Face the Impossible” achievement earned after surviving a full 24 hours on Interloper, I was ballsy. I clicked Interloper difficulty and let myself become an intruder on Great Bear Island.

I find myself at the base of a steep cliff with a rope to my back. This, of course, tells me nothing as I have hardly any of the maps memorized. I check the map to see I have been placed in Ash Canyon, a region I’ve ran through a single time. When a quick glance around tells me nothing more, I shrug and climb the rope heading up the cliff face leading to God doesn’t even know where.

I see a sign pointing down a narrow path. Great. As if I had anywhere else to go. So helpful. I find myself greeted with a second rope and take it on, my half-filled sleep bar permitting and with no other real choice. I find myself surrounded by trees, picking up sticks as all the great Interloper players do. After some going about in circles, I find out this area is called High Meadow. Like that tells me anything. A few steps later I find myself staring down a shaky bridge hung above a thin canyon hugging a frozen river. With sweaty palms I press on, holding down the W key and swaying my mouse slightly in time with the bridge. Even 8 minutes into this run, I was invested, and feared dying via long fall onto ice the most.

Thankfully it was longer than the 5 hours that it felt like, and I was greeted by a semi-flat expanse. I wander to an abandoned campfire, a sign someone’s been here since the miners fled. I pass on taking the charcoal and roll my eyes at the maple and birch saplings that I pass up because I can’t harvest them. I wander down a thin cavern, with a cave to the right. I hesitantly wander inside, holding my breath as I see a suspiciously bear-looking rock. I grab a piece of wood and leave, continuing down the thin passageway, forgoing mushrooms and rosehips due to my declining health and empty energy bar. The game must have known the exact things I’d hate to see the most in this moment: a bear, wolf, god forbid a moose blocking my path, or another long ass creaky bridge built by a person who wanted people to die. Luckily, I hit the jackpot and was greeted with the only unliving thing on that list: a bridge. Yay. Again, I wipe my palms on my obnoxiously long and but very warm (and very pink) comfy that’s preventing my IRL form from truly being immersed in this game: freezing to death IRL. I do the same old ‘press w and move with the motions of the bridge’ thing, not daring pause the game in fear of losing my stride.

I let out a breath as I reach stable, unmoving land, where it seems the game also knew exactly what I’d love to see most in this moment: shelter, matches, food, warmth, anything but the two cans clanking in my pack. I recognize that I have found Miner’s Folly, meaning Foreman’s Retreat isn’t far. Jackpot! I grab stuff on the floor and take a quick nap in the house to stop the drain from my empty cold and energy bars. I head out and down to Foreman’s hoping for more than the soda can and dog food that I found. On my way, I again am faced by the whiplash of RNGesus: a cuddly, fuzzy, hungry bear makes its presence known with a growl. Fuuuck fuck fuuucckkk fuckk fuck offf dude now isn’t the time! I was blessed until now to have no encounters with dangerous wildlife, but that luck has run dry and a bear wants to welcome me to the miner’s town. Nope nope nopee. I skedaddle on over to Foreman’s Retreat, my energy bar empty again thanks to hypothermia. The adrenaline in Astrid has run dry, as I am moving at a snail’s pace to the front door. I make it, and find a note on the wall, which I see is pointing me to Angler’s Den to make use of the stuff the cabin owner has left behind and won’t be returning for any time soon, apparently forgetting to grab the key I didn’t even see for future me to find out later. Yay! I go inside, and again find myself to be another case study of RNGesus whiplash as I find matches! I start a fire and do the boiling water trick to stop my water bar from draining in the 30 minutes it’d take for the entire pot to boil. After I get a little warm and sleeped up, I go back outside and inspect the cliff. It was very, very, steep, meaning it was likely I’d just fall to my death if I tried to scale it. RNGesus here again: the bear is right on my ass. By some miracle, it runs away from me after doing it’s wind-up charge roar, making wimpy little sounds as it runs its ass back to its cave and mine runs back into the cabin. I go to sleep a few hours, running low on both food and water, threatening death if I slept too long as my condition teetered at a steady 15%. I feel like a slacking student who has walked in a room to take the Bar Exam, surrounded by people who’ve dedicated their lives to the subject: their college major, internships, job experiences, mentors, hours of studying, mock trials, guest speakers, you name it, while I came to class on my own schedule and only made it this far by putting C down for every multiple choice question and miraculously getting it correct. In other words, I felt extremely out of place, out of my league, the only thing pushing me on is arrogance repeating in my head “hey, I got this far.”

I sleep for a few hours and wake up to an illuminated room, green leaking in from the windows. I audibly ask if this is an Aurora, to which I am greeted by stunning green and purple skies. If the bear is around, it is truly over, as I’m in no condition to take on any roided-out green bears. So, I find a promising spot to the side of the cabin and begin goating my way down. Rapidly tapping the A and D keys to slow my descent, I maneuver around the rock like a pro, even when faced with near 90-degree descents. I press on, knowing my salvation could very well be in the cabin below. I hurriedly, but carefully, make it down, and finally my feet touch flat ground again. I make my way south-west to the cabin illuminated by green light, praying no wolf saw me spidering my way down and got hungry.

I enter the cabin, and am greeted with a flare, can of tomato soup, and scarf. I start a fire and boil some water as I eat ketchup chips for all the empty calories I can get. I was finally in a good spot. Literally. I ran out to grab a few cattails and begin to do the interloper starvation tactic thing I hear all the good streamers talk about. I sleep after eating a reed and gulping down water. In the middle of my slumber there is a popup in the corner of my screen. I look at the day-night cycle in the corner. It can’t be, it can be... it is! “Face the Impossible” was mine! I had faced the impossible! I am in the 4.3% of users on steam who have tackled a day in Interloper. I was among the 4.0 GPA-ers, debate-team captains, the criminal justice teacher’s assistants and teacher’s pets. I was the slacker in the big league. To the 4.3% of people who’ve achieved “Face the Impossible” on steam: I am one of you.