Much like the game itself, it's hard to find a point to grasp onto for a "review" of any sort.
It feels like a... deeply personal experience, and one that i understand all too well. And there's not really any thesis you can give for it without the context for it as a whole.
It's easy to chalk it up to just another liminal space walking simulator- one among the hundreds plopped onto Steam to make a few bucks off the old Backrooms content creator trend. But i can promise that thought does this game more of a disservice than i could easily explain.
Nophenia is an intensely personal art piece, speaking to a multitude of experiences common amongst queer people; social isolation, depression and anxiety (and debatably even schizophrenia through some imagery of its own), trauma, suicide, amnesia and dissociation, with spatterings of body horror that i can only assume is safe to attribute to this game(and the creator)'s undeniably trans sense of style and humor. Speaking from what i can only imagine is a similar lived experience as the game itself, the spaces in the game instilled me with a mix of potent emotions that felt like they were ripped straight out of my brain.
The calm peace and safety in solitude, nothing but me and the the falling snow, or the waves at my feet, or the rain against my umbrella.
The overwhelming tension and anxiety standing in the shadows of towering monoliths, representing structures and ideas larger than i could ever hope to control- the feeling of the need to simply run away in the face of something larger than yourself.
The terrors of the sound of beating hearts and breath, desperately clawing for safety and familiarity in a fleshy darkness, or against blackened skies like a memory tainted in nightmares.
The blissful haze of the early morning skies, a feeling i still struggle to explain for any more than its' place in memories that are beyond my reach.
Each of those and more speaking to so many unspoken thoughts and memories inside me, with each and every space and moment embodying a memory, an emotion, a fear, i've experienced all on my own. And there's a beauty, a comfort in seeing it reflected, in seeing that experience and the impact and the things you see and feel are understood in that way. Not just in a literal sense, but a metaphorical one too; there is no story, there is no plot, you're given no background for Nia's life or trauma... instead, that history, those memories, that trauma is implied through overwhelming imagery full of emotion- imagery telling the right kind of viewer, "you aren't alone".
I was the right kind of player, and the game spoke to me in a way that's exceedingly rare. The symbolic representation of memories, of change, of trauma, of passion, of death, of grief, of uncertainty felt like a window into my own empty mind- a vision of memories and feelings i can't reach anymore, almost as a way to tell me that i am still real.
It's an experience that's going to stick with me for a long time, as a representative cornerstone of who i am and have been- my taste, my style, my interests, my fears, my past, my uncertainty, all reflected in one place. And i suspect i'll be returning to this place to remember myself- [i]see[/i] myself- for a long time.
