Through the Darkest of Times (Paintbucket Games, 2020) is about civilian resistance in Berlin during the rise and fall of Nazi Germany.
Ordinary citizens were factory workers, lawyers, artists, Catholics, and Communists.
In 1933 the Weimar Republic collapses as Hitler becomes Chancellor (Cabaret).
In 1936 the regime hides its cruelty behind The Berlin Olympic Games
In 1941 happened the height of World War II during the invasion of the Soviet Union and the beginning of mass deportations.
In 1945 happened the collapse, with The Battle of Berlin and the final days of the war.
Das Erdbeben (El Terremoto - 1933): El nombramiento de Hitler como canciller y el incendio del Reichstag.
Die Wende (El Giro - 1936): Los Juegos Olímpicos de Berlín y la consolidación del régimen.
Der Krieg (La Guerra - 1940): El estallido de la Segunda Guerra Mundial y las victorias iniciales.
El Colapso (1945): La Batalla de Berlín y la caída del Tercer Reich.
Gestapo
Gestapo (abreviation of german Geheime Staatspolizei: “Secret State Police”) was the official secret police force of Nazi Germany and German-occupied Europe.
It was created in 1933 by Hermann Göring by combining various Prussian political police agencies. By 1934, control was handed over to Heinrich Himmler, the head of the SS, who integrated the Gestapo into the Sicherheitspolizei (Security Police).
For most of World War II, it was directly managed by Heinrich Müller, a ruthless bureaucrat who focused entirely on crushing any form of political dissent.
The most terrifying aspect of the Gestapo was not its size, but its reliance on ordinary citizens. Gestapo was surprisingly small. They relied on denunciations: regular citizens willingly informed on their neighbors, coworkers, and even family members out of personal grudges, fear, or Nazi loyalty.
The Gestapo operated outside the judicial system. In 1936, a Nazi decree officially placed the organization above the law. Instead, they utilized a system called Schutzhaft (“Protective Custody”): a legal euphemism that allowed them to arrest anyone without a warrant, hold them indefinitely without a trial, and send them directly to concentration camps. No court could overturn their decisions.
(Sophie Scholl; Die letzten Tageaka (M. Rothemund, 2005))
German expressionism
El juego utiliza un apartado visual fuertemente inspirado en el expresionismo alemán de los años 20 y 30. Las ilustraciones tienen tonos oscuros, figuras angulosas y rostros sombríos que transmiten a la perfección el ambiente de paranoia y opresión que se vivía en las calles de Berlín.