Firstly, ignore the steam reported played time. Since this game uses an auto save function with no easy way to see when it last saved, I paused and minimized the game a few times while playing so that I didn’t lose progress. I think total time played was close to 4 hours.
Like many games, I wish I could rate this on multiple components rather than a yay or nay scale, but it is what it is.
Firstly, I should state I enjoy a wide variety of game types and this includes walking sims. Which is what I would classify this as. I also especially like trippy or psychedelic themes. So this game seemed like it would be a good fit for me. The closest games i can think of that remind me of this one is the Layers of Fear. Like if Panos Cosmatos made a layers of fear game.
The pros:
Visuals including sets, effects, and lighting. I thought the visual style, although near realism, was still a little bit unique and not generic.
The settings were pretty good. A fair bit of variety. Especially for a short game.
Another pro. Its Not too long. I think walking sims are best when they don’t drag too long. No inventory to manage. No crafting. No leveling up. No weapons. A very simple linear experience. Sometimes these are rather nice to play. (cozy games).
Some will stay its not worth $30 (full price and what I paid for it).
I myself generally dont mind paying more for small indie games. $30 for 4 hours of entertainment isn't too bad imo. but if you still want to try it, maybe wait for a sale.
Generally the world building and story was interesting and engaging, however this was also its weakest part which is why I give it a negative review.
This film gave me "beyond the black rainbow" vibes at some points. It definitely used some of the common surreal elements that director/writer Panos Cosmatos is known for. And even some of the music choices resonated with his style. (com truse was the artist in beyond the black rainbow).
I dont know if that was what they were going for but occasionally it had those vibes.
So lets get into the cons.
As a walking sim, lore and story are dominant and should follow conventional story telling approaches. Such as building a back story (check), creating a mystery (check), creating a conclusion that explains all or at least most of the clues (not delivered).
The story has many bizarre clues as to what is going on and the cause of the circumstance, yet at the end there is no answer. There is conflicting evidence that does not culminate in an interpretation that explains much of anything.
Now I have watched my fair share of “artsy” films that have attempted to do this. They build this elaborate mystery with all of these strange and interesting occurrences and you, the viewer, try to puzzle it out, only for the end of the film to declare “no one knows”.
I find this to be lazy writing and shallow plot points. If you cant come up with reasons why those elements exist in your story, if there is no final interpretation or conclusion, then what was the point? It just seems like the devs threw in things that “looked cool” or “sounded interesting” with no direction to create any cohesion. I don’t care for this. And again, I find it lazy and it feels like I, the player, have been cheated. I was promised and lead to believe there was this mystery. I was given clues. And yet the end is just left ambiguous to the point of saying nothing. Because the 3 primary interpretations are full of plot holes and contradictions from clues in the game.
This is why I give it a negative review. Again , if you make a walking sim, the story better be spectacular. Don’t just throw in a bunch of cool ideas that sound interesting and then at the end say something like...
SPOILERS AHEAD
....something like “its all in her head” “its not real, it’s a simulation” “its real, and its some tech deity or alien or maybe AI but we aren’t going to elaborate”. But all of these have contradictions that make them wrong.
Even the woman Het, changes abruptly in the 3rd part of the game for no reason. Suddenly the protagonist sees her as an enemy and to be distrusted for no apparent reason other than to move the plot forward. Monsters appear with no explanation. Ever.
My other last gripe, gameplay.
Not very many collectables. Few stealth situations that had terrible AI enemies that either constantly blocked your way or didn’t see you at all even though you were next to them. Also a few times you have to run during the stealth parts but its really not clear where to go. The game is dark, no map. And I died repeatedly on many of these. Like a dozen times on one of them because I could not figure out where to go and when I would circle back I would get killed. It just seemed like a pointless insert of gameplay. Stealth mechanics are difficult and probably should not be used by small indie devs. Even AAA struggle with them.
At the start you make a potion and that is the only time you do that.
The puzzles were ok but only like 3 in the whole game. Very easy and simple like looking around for symbols and then setting a machine to those symbols. Like that kind of easy.
I feel like this game had some potential, but the lack of a coherent story really ruined it. I could forgive the other stuff if the story had a conclusion but it just seems like they threw in random stuff they thought sounded cool with no plan on how it was supposed to make sense. Because it doesn’t. Havent been this disappointed since the end of LOST. Although at least with LOST it made sense after you thought it over a bit even if it was a bad ending, it made sense. It was earned, as Sam Lake says.
One other minor gripe. So I liked the use of live action clips. However, the narrator has the voice of a young teenager girl, yet the person in the live action was an adult woman. I thought at first it was two different people and that was confusing. Also, literally every scene of the live action of the woman, is of the woman screaming. so that got old fast. These clips are a big part of one of the interpretations but again, there is too many other conflicting clues to make it true.
As a last point. I am someone prone to motion sickness from first person games. I did have pretty bad motion sickness from this one. I turned off motion blur, turned on vsync and took some motion sick pills to be able to play it but had to take a lot of breaks. I think it was in part caused by the small FOV. or Focal length not quite right. Not sure. Some of the visual effects definitely gave me a little motion sickness but most of these were short so I dont think that was the root of the problem.
In conclusion. I wouldn't recommend because the story is incomplete, incoherent, and not planed through. and it cheats the player. Since its a walking sim this is the most important thing and they fumbled it. But I think the dev team and writers have great potential. and I would like to see what else they have cooking.
