Sunday ⭑ July 26, 2026

SPOILER WARNING: Dear Van Gogh

I will be talking about Sky: Children of the Light's latest collab and current season, Dear Van Gogh. Screenshots are personally taken by me and contain major spoilers of the quest. Please proceed with caution.




Whoa, double posting in a single day about 2 different games? Totally not like me!

This is the first time I ever posted content about the other game that I frequently play, Sky: Children of the Light (or Sky COTL or just plain Sky, since it's too long to type the whole name). While there's nothing much going on over there — it is a cozy, social game after all; wherein if you've basically finished the "main objective", you'll just end up with repetitive tasks like doing the 4 daily quests and collecting candles (one of the main game currency) for any upcoming cosmetics — I had to talk a bit about the recent collab they did.

Honest take about this game: it's been steadily going downhill. The way the devs focus more on producing half-assed yet overpriced in-game cosmetics (which doubles the price because of different currencies; they don't bother converting and adjusting it properly), yet the game almost breaks everytime there's a new update.

There are tons of new bugs and server errors happening, especially when big events like new seasons or new events are released. It takes days or worse, even a month or so (back when server error pop ups keep happening every second, every grandma time, for at least 2 months straight), for them to fix it properly. And I wouldn't even want to start talking about the community.

Anyway, on to the Dear Van Gogh collab and my review about it.

I often don't like collab seasons, unless it fits with Sky's narrative and lore quite well, so it was quite a surprise and big question mark for me when they announced they collabed with Dear Van Gogh. I was skeptical on finishing the quests in one sitting (it's the first time for me to experience all season quests already available on the first day; normally they release 1 or 2 quests and then we had to wait for a week or two to release the next ones), but I managed to have some time last week to do it.

It starts with Vincent's sister-in-law and Theo's wife, Johanna. She's like, the main quest giver of the story, where she introduces a few of Vincent's paintings that are also linked to a certain memory and a piece of Vincent's past life before he passed away. I like the way some of his famous paintings were integrated with the game, and how it was quite interactive.



Admittedly, I find some scenes a bit "dragging", as in, I just sit and stare at my phone screen for a few minutes just to watch the characters slowly walk up the hill, look around the scenery, or the screen focuses on something, like a house or a flower for a bit too long. They did say that the first day and the first few weeks of a new season, everything can be buggy or slightly laggy, with the amount of players playing at the same time.

But I can't deny that I enjoyed doing the quests halfway through, especially when it was "helping" Vincent complete his paintings by "coloring" it with flying up to the place or doing a big call. It was fun and enjoyable, watching the colors glitter and spread through slowly until the painting is complete.

It's also a nice reminder that the collab season contains heavy topic about suicide. Although they did not explicitly say it due to the game being rated PG, but if anyone knows about Vincent Van Gogh's sotry, they'd get the whole idea. Anyway, the more we progress the quests, it's quite clear that there are signs and metaphors of Vincent suffering from depression. The crows.



To be honest, I'm not very knowledgable about Vincent's life; just that I knew he's a famous painter with a distinct art style. During the quests, I learned what he actually has been through. The fact that he discovered his passion for art late, the way he traveled to beautiful places to paint, to only then realize that people were dismissing his art — it was actually very informative.

The way his younger brother, an art dealer, was Vincent's number one supporter. He always believed in his older brother, always supported him and gave him enough funds when needed; it was such a beautiful bond between brothers. And the way Theo's wife, Johanna, was very supportive as well. And this was one of the reasons why Vincent felt guilty pursuing art. The more he strive and ask, the more he could see that his brother and sister-in-law were struggling with financial problems as well.

Nonetheless, Theo always showed support and I'd like to headcannon that the the sunflower he's been sending to his brother meant that way. Because after finishing each quest, there was always a sunflower placed beside Vincent's art supplies. A gentle reminder that someone he loves also loves him and supports him regardless.

So when the crows started to multiply in numbers the further I progress the story, the atmosphere turned darker and heavier. It serves as a dark reminder of the mental war that Vincent has been suffering with, as well as the guilt of burdening Theo and Johanna (and now their child, since Theo wrote in his letters that his wife has given birth).

In one of the quests, I had to struggle to go through the field of wheat while there were crows cawing and circling above, the wind was trying to push my Sky kid back (and it doesn't help that I have the second shortest height in the game too LOL).

And honestly, I was already teary-eyed when my Sky kid reached the scene and saw the dried up sunflowers. This meant that Vincent had taken his life and Theo's health has been deteriorating.



The next scenes were heavy. It showed Vincent laying on his bed, with a miserable Theo by his bedside. It was also briefly mentioned that Theo had followed his brother in the afterlife, 6 months after his death, due to his deteriorating health.

This left Johanna widowed with their six-month-old child. By then, it was decided that Johanna's life mission was to show the world Vincent's paintings. The paintings that Johanna had saved and showed to me all fell down.

I helped her fix them all up, and finally the last painting, which was the famous The Starry Night was revealed. The collab room was then colored the same way as the painting, with hues of blue and yellow, and each of the paintings were light up properly. I thought the collab room was another half-assed attempt at just creating a space for the season, but I'm glad the whole area changed after finishing the last quest.

It was also shown/mentioned in the narrative that Johanna continued to prove the public, always putting Vincent's paintings in art galleries and museums, in hopes for showing the world how great of a painter he was.

And then, it finally happened. It started gaining attraction, until multiple people were noticing his paintings. It wasn't too late at all; people still appreciated his art from then until now. By that point, I was already feeling overwhelmed by the relief and sadness I experienced. The final blow wherein I cried were the words that were shown on the screen as the ending credits.





Like what the fuck. I was having a bad week — no, actually, on a deeper note that I won't talk in great detail, I was already considering of unpleasant things; I lost hope to anything at all, and life was bleak for me. It was as if I was just drifting through life and hoping tomorrow will be the last. It was like this message was personally shown to me to not lose hope and to hold on for a little longer. I don't know what came into me, but I was bawling when I read it.

Vincent died thinking he was a failure, yet people adored and appreciated his art now. There are people who loved him dearly and supported him wholeheartedly, to the point of devoting their entire life on proving to the world that he was a great painter. How much heartbreakingly beautiful could that get? To be loved is to be seen.

I'd say this is the only collab season that I genuinely appreciated and enjoyed. Sure, there were other nice and fun seasons that I experienced, but this type of season is something that I will always remember and keep close to my heart. I'm genuinely and deeply moved by it and the messages it conveyed; I'll definitely treasure this collab season.



Also, here are some few screenshots I took that didn't fit with my lame commentary about the collab season, but I didn't want them all to go to waste.

Click here to show the screenshots:

I also enjoyed staying in the art gallery a lot, just sitting on the bench and watching the paintings quietly. It felt like I was in an interactive art gallery. I like it.