Fundamentally a proof of concept in how it introduces the two halves of a thematic underpinning behind every Supergiant game aka the very classical marriage of melodrama and ideology, with the conflict between the two providing the driving force behind the game logic itself. Bastion is literally shaped by its framing narrative in the terrain and player choices (it’s significant that Zia isn't heard until the final moments, and Zulf never) and this sets up that tension between directed/immanent action, in that you are playing a game with set goals and levels while also unavoidably in history, with your actions mythologized in real-time and presented as inevitable even as the game is so nakedly arbitrary in its construction. "Coming Home" is the bad end because it is unsatisfying on both of those levels, and the ability one has to choose it is more a statement about the difficulty in revolt, and in saying to a game no this is what I want from this experience, Rucks is wrong, sometimes projects need to be abandoned. And of course the fact that an alternative is already accommodated in the system (as opposed to just like, turning the game off, for example) is telling as to Supergiant's thoughts on the work, and their artistic need to move on to better and brighter things. Of course they would revisit all these threads later in their career, massively abstracting the "constructed world" concept in Transistor and focusing on either melodrama or ideology in Hades and Pyre respectively, but in creating a crude thought experiment that accomodates both bending to a system and breaking it’s obvious that their creative capabilities at this time were vulnerable--can't imagine they didn't make a similar choice themselves as struggling no-name game devs. Anyway, I'm glad this past decade went as well for them as it did, the game is pretty good, but it doesn't compare to how staggering of an artistic statement Transistor and Pyre are, or even to Hades's slick finish. Its strengths lie more in how literal of a debut it is, and how much it yearns for those accomplishments yet to come.