Unquiet Grey

The ending and final resolution of this story is so incredibly cathartic and as it builds up to the final act there is some really delicious dramatic irony that had me completely locked in through the end. Took me about 2 hours as someone who reads kinda slow. If you want to watch someone destroy herself in grief over and over again, strong recommend.

The game has beautiful visuals and satisfying sound design. The story itself is undoubtedly beautiful and moving, but unfortunately, it is surprisingly simple and rather shallow. While the creators certainly manage to evoke emotions, move the player, and create a sense of loss - and they do this very well, but the story itself is very repetitive, and not only in the narrative sense, as was clearly intended, but also in the rather tedious sense of repeating the same lines over and over again. From a game of this type, I would have expected the writing to be a little more poetic, perhaps somewhat more artistic. As I said, unfortunately, the dialogue often comes across as written in a very simple style. However, this is not the biggest problem for me. The entire game, and here comes the spoiler alert, is built around a time loop in which the protagonist experiences the same situations over and over again, unable to change them. This is something I understand, and the internal logic of the loop itself makes sense. The problem is that there are two scenes, in my opinion, that deviate from that internal logic. The first is the opening scene of the game, when the protagonist wakes up on the road with no memory and finds her friend's phone. On the phone, there are pictures of her as an adult woman, despite the fact that at that point in the game she is still a teenager. We even see her reflection in the phone as a teenager, only for her to open and unlock it and find pictures of her adult self. This does not make sense within the game's own logic, specifically the logic of the time loops that are presented to us. In each loop, there is only one version of the protagonist: she lives through her entire life and only returns to a new loop after her death. Therefore, there is no way for her to encounter an older version of herself while she is still young, or for him to exist as an adult in a reality where she exists as a teenager. In each reality, there is only one version of her and one version of him, and they live that life together. Because of this, while the opening scene is certainly intriguing and attention-grabbing, if you think about it more deeply, it does not make logical sense within the rules established by the game. The second scene is near the end of the game, when he sends her a message, or rather, when she finds a message from him on his phone, that he has no logical way of having written. The message also does not really fit the established narrative. It strongly suggests that he knows about the time loops, that he knows how the loops affect her, and so on, whereas throughout the entire game it is clearly implied that he does not know about the loops, is not aware of them, and she never tells him about them. So both the beginning and the ending feel like departures from the game's own concept. Perhaps they have their own artistic purpose and certainly influence the way the game is experienced, but from a narrative and logical perspective, they do not fit with what the game itself has established, and they somewhat break the immersion.

Well, the joke is on the developer. I had already planned on bawling like a baby today anyway. This is not your typical visual novel. It is short, but it is really well written. It delves into grief, loss, and letting go. I realised rather soon that there would be no true "happy" ending to be had, in the visual novel sense of the word. The ending was bittersweet but also quite beautiful. I don't believe I have ever been so moved by a visual novel, and I play a lot of these. i cannot recommend this one enough. It is free. So, you have zero to lose playing it.

Easy game to 100%. This game was romantic. I cried. The moral of the game is that life goes on after love.

Despite this being a short story it had me sobbing by the end. I found the storytelling to be emotionally impactful, the music and art are gorgeous as well and everything fit together perfectly for a gut-punch. The ending broke my heart - what a tough choice to make. But it felt so grounded in reality, and despite some elements of the writing not being as strong in my opinion, they didn't detract from my appreciation and emotional investment. I got the supporter pack & soundtrack, and I'm looking forward to playing the other games from Endysis.

[i]"’T is I, my love, sits on your grave, And will not let you sleep; For I crave one kiss of your clay-cold lips, And that is all I seek.” “You crave one kiss of my clay-cold lips, But my breath smells earthy strong; If you have one kiss of my clay-cold lips, Your time will not be long."[/i] An innovative take on an old poem. However, the achievements give away the core setting (time loop), and the story is somewhat plain and predictable.