American Arcadia

Good story

I'm a big fan of the Truman Show so this was a real treat to play through. Very enjoyable experience altogether.

A short, beautiful, compelling (and occasionally frustrating) 2.5D platformer/first-person puzzle game with a strong narrative. I picked it up as a sort of palate cleanser between the 40+ hour games I had been playing, and I was very pleasantly by surprised. The voice acting is great, the characters are strong, and the narrative is basically The Truman Show cranked up to 11. There were a couple parts of particularly annoying bits of platforming, but the puzzles were diverse and tricky while never being outright obtuse. I felt that the game stuck the landing, even if it wasn't in a way that I had expected. The game also runs great on the Steam Deck, with simple and easy-to-grasp controls. I would strongly recommend picking this one up if you're in the mood for something with a strong story that dares to do something a little differently.

Waste of time

[h1] Walt Disney encontra O Show de Truman que encontra Big Brother que encontra Black Mirror.[/h1] [b]|***| Análise completa de quem jogou até o fim |***|[/b] Jogado com [b]Flydigi Vader 3 Pro[/b] + Enredo genial abarrotado de referências finas + Direção de arte que dá um banho de identidade visual + Gameplay diversificada e muito competente nas suas propostas - Dificuldade baixa - Cenas em primeira pessoa são menos empolgantes - O gosto de "quero mais" no final chega a dar um aperto no peito ===|||||||=== [b]ANÁLISE[/b] Se tem uma coisa que me ganha de primeira em videogame (e outras mídias) é uma premissa original que sabe exatamente de onde veio e para onde quer ir. Pegue O Show de Truman, Big Brother, Walt Disney, Black Mirror, bata tudo no liquidificador com uma boa dose de distopia e voilà: American Arcadia! Não tem como não se emocionar com a criatividade do estúdio espanhol em conseguir fundir o conceito do EPCOT (Experimental Prototype Community of Tomorrow) de Walt Disney com a pegada de 1984 de George Orwell. Para quem gosta de caçar referências, o prato é cheio: dá para encontrar acenos (as vezes explícitos) à Matrix, Os Miseráveis (jura que chamaram o chefe da polícia opressora de Javert?), O Fugitivo, Intriga Internacional etc. Se o roteiro não te prender busque ajuda médica. Além do plot, o grande trunfo de American Arcadia está na sua jogabilidade, que sabe diversificar o ritmo com maestria dependendo de quem você está controlando no momento. Quando estamos na pele do carismático e bigodudo Trevor, o jogo é um plataforma 2.5D competente – deu até pra lembrar de INSIDE em algumas fases mais soturnas. Já quando a perspectiva muda para a Angela, a bagaça se transforma em um FPS sem S, também conhecido como aventura em primeira pessoa. Só que o grande barato de AA, a mecânica que realmente brilha, é o sistema cooperativo assimétrico implícito: você controla o Trevor na plataforma enquanto usa os sistemas de câmera de TV e hacks com a Angela para abrir o caminho para ele. Essa mecânica funciona incrivelmente bem e dá uma dinâmica única para a fuga. Em alguns poucos momentos o jogo vai exigir uma coordenação motora mais apurada, mas nada que alguém que tenha terminado a pré-escola não consiga executar. Mas segura a onda, gafanhoto. Se você está esperando algo que vá testar os seus reflexos ou te fazer travar em puzzles por horas, esquece. A dificuldade aqui é consideravelmente baixa. Em nenhum momento o jogo tenta te punir ou exigir uma precisão cirúrgica. Junte a isso o fato de que as seções em primeira pessoa com a Angela, embora fundamentais para o enredo e para a quebra de ritmo, são nitidamente menos empolgantes do que a correria desenfreada e os saltos e escaladas do Sr. Mustache. Na parte técnica, American Arcadia não é o jogo que vai sangrar sua GPU ou derreter sua RAM, mas é inegavelmente lindo. Sua direção de arte soberba, retrata uma cidade distópica dos anos 70 com uma paleta de cores e uma identidade visual de cair o queixo. É colírio para os olhos de quem aprecia bom gosto estético. Ainda nos elogios, a trilha sonora é muito boa e dita o tom da fuga perfeitamente. Já o trabalho de dublagem dos personagens é de primeira linha, entregando a carga dramática, ironia e canastrice que o roteiro pede sem soar piegas. No fim das contas, a jornada de fuga desse reality show corporativo vale cada centavo e cada minuto investido. Não revoluciona a indústria de games, mas entrega uma das narrativas mais redondas, estilosas e divertidas dos últimos tempos – sem contar os plot twists no fim. A conclusão não poderia ser outra: American Arcadia é o melhor jogo de fuga de reality show retrofuturista de todos os tempos da última semana. >_[b][url=https://steamcommunity.com/id/mremerson/screenshots/?appid=1249040]Screenshots capturadas durante a jogatina[/url][/b] > _ [b][url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/32675902]Para ver minhas análises, siga o curador Megatrônico![/url][/b] > _ [b][url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/37848041]Também contribuo para o grupo de curadores do Gamerista![/url][/b]

The helicopter sequence destroyed the game for me. I got to the part of the game where you're fleeing the bad guys—no spoilers there, since you learn that in the first few minutes. The problem is that it takes several hours to actually get there. Once you do, the game starts throwing challenge after challenge at you. By the helicopter sequence (again, nothing that isn't already shown at the start of the game), I kept running into one problem after another. Usually it started with me not understanding what the game wanted me to do. Then I'd die, only to get stuck in some kind of endless death loop caused by a bug. After restarting from a checkpoint, I'd end up past that bug and run straight into another one. I'll never know how this game ends because after 50-plus deaths—and with me absolutely refusing to look up walkthroughs or use a hint system, assuming one even exists—I'm done. Goodbye, game. Speaking of hints, there was one section where I missed something obvious and the game handed me the answer. I grant it did wait a while before giving me the hint, but regardless there should be an option to turn that off. I nearly quit and uninstalled the game right then. I want the chance to figure things out myself, not have the game solve puzzles for me. That said, it's not all bad. The story is engaging, the visuals are beautiful, and the controls are generally straightforward. I do wish it leaned a little less into the walking-simulator style of gameplay, but I was having a pretty good time right up until the final stretch. Unfortunately, the combination of bugs, frustrating trial-and-error gameplay, and intrusive hints completely killed the experience for me. It's now firmly on my "do not play again" list.

American Arcadia is another lovely little game from Out of the Blue games, and while not perfect, has cemented them as a developer I really want to watch in the future, as they’re 3 for 3 in their releases being damn entertaining for me. Being very plot heavy and having many twists, it’s a little difficult to talk about the story without spoilers. I’ll leave plot discussion to the end because of that. American Arcadia is an interesting hybrid of first person puzzler, like Out of the Blues other games, and a side scroller with platforming, some stealth and puzzles of it’s own. The two playable characters are Trevor, a nobody stuck in a dead end job, trying to escape a 70s style sci fi city in the side scrolling sections, and Angela, an undercover activist type on the outside, trying to help him escape in the first person sections. Flaws first, as there aren’t too many and I want to get them out of the way, but there are enough they bear talking about. Firstly, and the most petty, but I disliked the art style for the characters not giving them noses. Overall the art and presentation is great, but it annoyed me a fair bit early on. Secondly, and more seriously, there are some puzzle and trial error elements in the side scrolling sections that can be quite frustrating. They often aren’t obvious at first and rely on you failing and then realising what the mistake was. The problem is I found myself repeating a couple of sections repeatedly. To be clear they aren’t that hard and I never found myself hitting a wall but there were a couple of bits that were annoying. I also found the character of Angela a bit “modern quirky” and annoying, though it’s not too bad. There’s also a reveal late in the game regarding Angela and the situation which made a lot of sense why a somewhat annoying activist ended up in the situation they did, and really puts the personality in context, which I liked. In practical terms however, there are a couple of puzzles in her sections where her comments were very annoying as I wanted to think them through myself without her yapping. It’s relativity minor and she’s not too awful or grating of a character, with some sympathetic qualities as well. That’s it for flaws. Other than that I loved the game. The graphic style is really nice, taking full advantage of the 70s inspired scifi setting and being vibrant and stylish for much of the game. It ran beautifully for me as well, bar amusingly a crash at the very end of the game (literally at the very end after the ending and the credits), which honestly bearing in mind some of the 4th wall breaking style of the game, part of me at first wondered if it was deliberate. The gameplay is pretty solid. I really enjoyed the puzzles, bar the occasional yapping comment as mentioned. Trevor’s more exciting chases are pretty thrilling for the most part, and also often have elements of comedy in them. The voice acting is impeccable, with great performances all round, with Yuri Lowenthal as Trevor being a real highlight, really making you start to sympathise with a character who starts as a boring sap. The music in this game is fantastic as too, with a couple of songs used for several moments that really stand out, with one being a real ear worm. The real meat of the game is the story, and so from here on out it’s spoilers. The story is excellent, blending themes such as the Truman Show, Westward and other 70s scifi, with send ups of Disney and reality tv, as well as streaming, particularly IRL streaming. The reveal that the city is a golden cage is very early, and I wondered if the game had more twists up it’s sleeve, which it really delivered on late in the game. I’m glad I went into this without any real spoilers. I found aside from the themes and plot, the characters were well written, especially Trevor, who as mentioned really grows in the game. The game also makes the point that just because someone appears to be boring doesn’t mean that they should be dismissed. The game is also paced really well, always having momentum, which suits a game you can complete in 7 to 8 hours. It has a face paced movie quality to it, swiftly jumping between scenes and with quick cutaways at points that add context or comedy. The game I think, aside from taking some massive swipes at how awful reality tv really is, also does the banality of evil well. In the end, there’s no dramatic murder plot unveiled, the evil corp in charge aren’t doing that, they don’t need to. They have mind control and even that isn’t really needed, they have built a system that is just self sustaining. Still the ending has some horrifying implications for the wider world of American Arcadia, with the government having access to apparently very effective mind control and brainwashing. As in real life, no one really seems to really do anything however. In part that’s because most of the world don’t care, all they care about is watching the American Arcadia shows. The game makes the pretty effective point for all the moralising about the horrible toxic nature of much of reality tv being created by awful corporations, it is the guidance for these that is the true villain, feeding the creation of these. I liked the fact that the game avoids lecturing the player ala Spec Ops: The Line though. For us it’s a fictional game, so it doesn’t undercut it’s point with over the top moralising in this direction. Overall I really enjoyed my time with the game, and while it doesn’t look like my normal sort of game, I am interested in trying Out of the Blue’s next game since they keep hitting it out the park.