The Girl of Glass: A Summer Bird's Tale

- Nice enough to play, rating 82/100

[u] Before you do anything:[/u] [i] If you decided to purchase this game please before entering the turn-based battle section of the game, set it on easy mode, trust me it will make life a lot easier, pun intended. [/i] Having played a lot of points and click adventure games as well as a fair bit of turn-base combat games purchasing this game was a no-brainer for me even after reading some of the negative and agreeing with a lot of them I have a soft spot for it. Maybe it’s the ending I got or the beautiful blend of 3D and 2D art style or even the accent, I don’t know, despite the flaws, I really enjoy this game. [h1] Positive (First-half-ish of the game):[/h1] So let's go to the beginning, the point-and-click section where we play as Kristal who is.... well a fragile crystal, adopted by the traveling circus and working with them as a janitor because she is too.....breakable to do anything else. This portion of this game was properly the sweetest part of the game thanks to your standard, easy enough, point-and-click puzzles, peaceful soundtracks along with beautifully painted backgrounds that suited well with a 3D render of Kristal. Oh, and before I forget, the characters were much more compelling and complex than I had envisioned, depending on if you choose to ignore or spend time with them to learn about their backstory, which was nice to give players the agency to explore what they want. Lastly, I adore the narration, and colourful illustrations and the title screen are used to convey this game is a children's storybook, sharing many similarities to stories like Cinderella thinking at the top of my head, [spoiler] like how Kristal is doing manual labour and being mistreated by her boss and coworker.[/spoiler]. I could even see this being adapted into a 2D with some 3D movie if Disney would stop doing remakes. So, not a bad start, even if the point-and-click section throughout the game had gotten easy and shorter, I still highly enjoy it I like anything circus theme as I was obsessive about that type of theme back then. If this game was divided into just being a point-and-click adventure in the circus, for a smaller price, I think more people would appreciate it a lot than this version. [h1] Negative (Second-half-ish of the game):[/h1] Now to the nitty gritty, the turn-based battle system has a few issues, firstly being, not being newer player-friendly, even though it does a decent job talking you through its mechanic, as soon as elemental strength and weaknesses are introduced and field ability gets more complex. Why? because the game doesn't explain what they all do or keep track of the effect they're having and there's a lot to keep track of, even for me that I have to write a whole list, like, ‘clown weak against fire’ or ‘water field- deal less damage’ etc, etc, not that I mind this type of game design, but in this case, it is targeted towards 2 different audiences it should had designed much more simply rather than being too much of one game. So that's wouldn’t recommend this game to those new to RPGs or just fans of point-and-click adventure games, if they need to go through this part of the game The other problems were the antagonist, mainly their monologues being cliches and may I say ‘cringy’, and we have to endure bossfight after bossfight which hurt the progression, especially when they are at a certain HP they pause battle to explain why they are evil. God help you if you need to restart it and listen to them speak over again. All these problems occur after the tone just shifts from a sweet, circus fantasy land into an edgy apocalypse alternative world, not that I have a problem with it, I applaud the idea, but it was poor execution of pacing and the dialogue as well as the RPG mechanic balance that hold this game back. [h1] Conclusion:[/h1] It was a ballsy move for the developer to mix 2 different types of games together, I could see a world where this will work, in this case, it just needed more time to be marinated for a lot longer. But, for what I got to play I love what this The Girl of Glass was trying to accomplish and the metaphorical message towards the end in this wonderful journey.

The RPG element is pretty basic but what really makes this game is my imagination: I imagine that the voice of Kristal is Bjork and it makes everything infinitely more charming.

one of many indie gem's. to those who want a good story

This game does not really have a target audience -- it's more like a piece of artwork someone put out into the world. Compared to all the other games out there, this makes it stand out but I'm not sure if that makes it a good game. Either way, I would recommend it for the experience and due to what feels like an otherwise high quality production. [b]PRICE:[/b] A I bought this on sale, however, there is more than enough content to justify the full price tag. [b]ARTWORK & MUSIC:[/b] A Way, way better than I would have expected. It looks and sounds beautiful. [b]STORY:[/b] C+ The story is essentially a giant metaphor about life, society, and introspection. The game even admits it towards the end. This could be either good or bad depending on your view point. There are also slight variations to the story and path, which was more than I expected. [b]TACTICAL BATTLES:[/b] B- or D- I played on the hardest difficulty and personally enjoyed the challenge. It's fun and logical and keeps you on your toes. However, if you hate this aspect of the game it will feel very tedious even on the easiest difficulty and may even completely ruin the rest of the game. Some of the early "combat-tutorials" likewise feel tedious. [b]POINT & CLICK PUZZLES:[/b] C- While there are a few point and click [i]segments[/i] the actual puzzles are limited. It is mostly just hidden object hunting or straight forward 'use key with lock' "puzzles''. [b]OVERALL:[/b] B- The game tries to do a lot of different things, but the only thing it truly succeeds in is expressing its artistic vision, and it does that very well. [b]GAME SINS[/b] [list] [*] At the start of the game you are shown pictures of people and asked to describe them. This completely changes that characters story and how you interact with them... but you aren't told this until after immediately you've chosen them all. [*] Possible localization issue- Sometimes characters' randomly say an expletive that does not match the tone of the game or the scene. [*] In the first point and click segment, some objects are extremely hard to spot and seem to only spawn "randomly", when you need them. [*] Asking for a hint in-game either tells you everything you need to do, or absolutely nothing. [*] Two aspects of the point and click puzzles did not make logical sense even tangentially: [spoiler]Turning on a lawn mower to get a knife[/spoiler] and [spoiler]Giving a crazy lady a gift to tear down a poster[/spoiler] [*] After you pick something up, you have to watch for a good 5-10 seconds as it slowly moves into your inventory. [*] While you can save during combat, reloading a combat save will restart the battle from the beginning. [*] On hardest difficulty, a single mistake can ultimately force you to lose the combat, yet there is no "restart combat" option anywhere. Trying to reload also sometimes replayed all the dialogue. [*] On easier difficulties, and during some tutorial battles, combat can feel long and tedious. [*] On someone's turn, you have to click their face and then drag to select what action you want them to perform. This felt very tedious all on its own. [/list]

I can't finish the game, it's neither visual novel, crpg, hopa. I got stuck twice. The first time, I've managed to somehow push the story. The second time, I just could not. Sure, there are gameplay and tutorials, but is it really how I should play this game? This game should have some hints. REAL hints. Not the boy to whom I tried to talk a few times and my character was like: sure I know what to do. While I on the other side of the screen was WTFing... What should I do?... What, is there some missing dialogue? xD But there are some positives. Art is gorgeous. Lector is pro. The story seemed interesting. But could not push further. Characters also were nicely designed. Even the fight was decent (well, could be easier, and there should be an option to skip if the struggle is too big. And believe me, it is.) Sorry, negative from me, so devs can hear me out :/ I'll most likely buy the next game if the art stay the same

I bought the game without knowing much about it, and I expected it to be a short but sweet game, and thought I was close to finishing after chapter one. I was pleasantly surprised by the advancements in the story and characters from that point on and I discovered that there was much more to the gameplay aswell. The chapters alternate between a point and click puzzle game and a turn-based strategy game. The dialogues can be a bit long at times, but are worth the read. They include a lot of funny remarks, but also touch on many controversial but topical subjects, which I found great. It took me between 8 and 10 hours to complete on my first play-through. I recommend this game if you enjoy laid-back games with a good story.