Plug & Play
Each time I start a new play-through of P&P I feel as if I am going home. There’s this strange comfort I get from it that I rarely have found in other games. I won’t go into it to much now, but the music changes with each scene so perfectly, it fits the mellowness of the colourful art style very well. If I had to sum up Plug and Play in one sentence, that sentence would be “Plug and Play is an emotional, precious tale of romance and strict violence that has the potential to outdo both Life is Strange and Undertale.”
– Real player with 6302.5 hrs in game
Read More: Best Indie Surreal Games.
After completing it many months from the start, there are a few notes that come to mind when reviewing it. The first one is this: it is a beautiful story of both the highs and lows for the main protagonist and tackles the main issues that any person will experience in life. Second, as far as the notion of sorrow and pain goes, this story does effectively make you feel every heartbreaking moment that it has to offer. Lastly, despite being long, it draws real relationships and ties with each character you meet and ultimately have you going till the very end.
– Real player with 12.7 hrs in game
Freshman Year
I’m going to go through the more technical issues I had with this game, rather than the ones involving the story, since the story has a clear message about it, and I don’t want to tread on that.
First off, I rather enjoyed the watercolored art that Freshman Year had, and for some strange reason, very much enjoyed the simple faces on the characters. However, the groping scene, in which is the best I can call it, seemed a bit messy, in which I didn’t understand what was going on until the next scene with her being groped by the bouncer. Also, there seems to be no real build up between leaving the bar and the scene itself. Again, it could be a way of showing that these things happen when you least expect them to, but in each scene themselves, you couldn’t tell what was happening until after it was all said and done.
– Real player with 0.9 hrs in game
Read More: Best Indie Visual Novel Games.
This is not game. It’s a short story or possibly even a short film. Either way it isn’t a game. You’re a girl, Nina, and you go to a bar because your friend told you to. Your friend is late and you get sexually assaulted. Then it ends. The player has no agency or choice in anything. That could possibly be the point though, as in the lack of mechanic is there to mirror the lack of choice the character has as well. The feeling of helplessness is mirrored in the fact as a player you cannot help her. But, the problem is, you don’t really care about the character. For a short story, short film, art game, whatever this is where the entire point is the story you should have to care about the characters. This game has no back story, no character building, no world building. Nothing. The most you really learn about Nina is she drinks long island ice teas. I think the game relies on the fact you will feel bad because it’s a true story. To be fair, I did feel bad through the assault but that has nothing to do with the game. I’m just a human being with empathy and sympathy and I will feel bad for someone who is assaulted. But this game did not truely shape my feelings. Thinking about it, this game relies solely on that ending scene of the assault. Without it the game is nothing. Without those outside feelings, the game has absolutely nothing.
– Real player with 0.3 hrs in game
Dinner Date
I’m 42 hours into this game. My date still hasn’t shown up yet. She’s probably still coming. Gonna wait a few more hours.
Updates:
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Nov. 28 2012 @ 4:09pm
60 hours in. Still no date. Maybe her car broke down and her phone isn’t working.
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Dec. 1 2012 @ 6:36pm
72 hours. Date still hasn’t shown up yet. Maybe she’s just really sick.
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Dec 4 2012 @ 2:23pm
127 hours played. Date hasn’t shown up. Food is cold and stale at this point.
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Dec 8 2012 @ 7:08am
147 hours now. No sign of date. Maybe she’s lost and can’t find my house.
– Real player with 335.0 hrs in game
Read More: Best Indie Experimental Games.
I can’t remember when I got this game, but it was closer to when it came out than to now. Pretty sure it was around the time Heavy Rain came out and I didn’t have a PS3 and I thought “hey this is a novel experiment I should try this out.” It wasn’t really much back then and I don’t think it aged well at all. It’s absurdly short and I’ve heard people back then say $5 is a bit overpriced for a “demo” like this. Nowadays I don’t think people care that much about throwing $5 away to play shitty video games but fuck it.
– Real player with 1.3 hrs in game
Memoir En Code: Reissue
It’s tough.
It’s a narrative game with a lot to say, without saying anything in particular. Not brilliant, or even remarkable, but definitely creative and agrees with new videogame tendencies, as seen in games (or if you prefer, interactive animations) like Plug & Play, Pony Island (maybe Pony Island is stretching it) and in unorthodox game jams, that might be what you’re into.
It’s a really personal work but sometimes relatable.
Weird, but weird isn’t always good. It’s easy to call something good when we don’t understand it, but even when we don’t understand things we can be blown by them. When I finished Memoir En Code, I’ve just verbalized “Ok”, because is far more author purging than it is player focused.
– Real player with 1.9 hrs in game
This is a game I keep referring to when talking about the potential of interactive media, and one that really made me say “This is the kind the direction I want to take when making games”.
I realised I never publicly left a review, after first playing this so many years ago.
Memoir En Code shows us how far can you go about storytelling in interactive media, cleverly making use of its game design in each track to let you experience the story, to help you understand how it was to be there in these slices of the author’s life.
– Real player with 1.9 hrs in game
199X
This game is kind of loosely based on a true story… as stated from the outset of the game, in the early 18th-19th century women around the world was once being treated for a condition known as ‘Hysteria’ of which the only cure known at the time was to have their private anatomy rubbed by doctors. Now a days we laugh at this psuedo science which originated out of all things from a stupid Egyptian belief that a woman’s private area can move and cause her many problems from nervousness, to fainting, to being irritable and so on.
– Real player with 13.6 hrs in game
I’ve been meaning to review this game for a while, as I’ve completed it some time ago. And yet, what can one say about this game? Well, I’ll do my best to elucidate the matter. I’ll try to avoid spoilers as well, which is kinda tricky with this title.
199X is a story-driven RPG Maker game; there’s no real combat, it’s all about the tale being told. The tagline, “In 199X, you control Clara. That’s the problem.” is awesome, and isn’t just a witty non-sequitur. Your control of Clara really IS the problem, as Clara is mortified to find that an unseen stranger is suddenly in control of her limbs and is “speaking” to her inside her head. It’s a clever idea and quite well-executed, with the player gradually building a rapport with Clara. In my playthrough, we became quite close and worked hard together to try to set things right in her little slice of the odd, dystopian future this game presents. If I may gush for a moment: Clara is a very endearing character and her personality is established quite quickly. This leads onward to many other developments and by the time I was halfway through, I got to feeling like I’d known her for years. Call me sily if you like, but in my experience, Clara becomes as a friend.
– Real player with 6.1 hrs in game
Alien Cat
Stars received: 2.5/10 _ Note: v.5 [0.0 to 1] = personal impressions
[0.4] Controls & Training & Help
[0.1] Menu & Settings
[0.2] Sound & Music
[0.3] Graphics
[0.4] Game Design
[0.2] Game Story
[0.3] Game Content
[0.4] Completion time (level/game)?
[0.2] is it Enjoyable & Fun?
[0] Could it hold a spot in Favorites? (& if the Game can be repeatedly played again)
[0] BONUS point: Multi-Player related
[0] BONUS point: Review for VR
[N] - if Registration is required with providing PII
Game description key-points: 2D Platformer
– Real player with 7.0 hrs in game
As others have stated, you can beat the game in 10-20 minutes.
The controls are simple, but the “twitch” sensitivity when you move is annoying and the only reason you will probably ever die. However, it is also what the entire game is based around, which makes this n odd one for me…because the first thing I tried to do when I started the game was immediately try to fix the sensitivity. I thought it had gotten screwed up somehow.
Once I realized it was supposed to be that way…I adjusted, and got through the game to get my achievements.
– Real player with 1.9 hrs in game
BAPTISM
Summary
Nicely written story, but to me it feels like the ending is cut off. Without me trying to give away spoilers, I think the ending has a lot more potential.
Pros/Cons
**+ Well written
- Nice sound
+/- ‘Okay’ visuals (suitable to ambiance), and I did like the animated design of the personas a lot (including the ‘eyes’ and ‘sun/light’ signs – I think I fully understand their meaning), and the mansion. However I did not like the images of the church and road, that look too much like regular photos made black-white, and also didn’t really blend in with the story.**
– Real player with 3.4 hrs in game
A kinetic visual novel, curiously referred to by its developer as a “game”. As a strong and frequent advocate of walking simulators and such, even I’d opine that a product in which you click through a linear story and never once make anything resembling a choice is not really a “game”.
It is, however, a fairly interesting and by-and-largely well-written short story (though the end was a tad abrupt for my liking). So is the unorthodox audio-visual presentation of a visual novel justified? I would say so, yes. It arguably makes for a more immersive experience, though some literary purists would no doubt argue that the text should be doing that job for itself. Each to their own I’d say, and I certainly can’t fault someone for trying something new in this artistically-saturated day and age.
– Real player with 1.1 hrs in game
Cube Chase
Cube Chase is a steam videogame featuring mercifully quiet levels with shifted backgrounds!!!
It’s stirred with a swinging sling of whimpered stand alone stages…elevated with shale support that throbs puzzle design i give this game a 10/10 its a slipperly slope of fun love the burrito master
– Real player with 1.7 hrs in game
Really good idea and a dun game only thing i want i some music and maybe little smoother movement otherwise such a fun and enjoyable game :)
– Real player with 0.3 hrs in game
Defective Holiday
Big fan of Kim Laughton’s stuff and Mechatok, I can not stop thinking about this world. Its nice to walk inside Kim’s work and experience the details and style up close. You’ll quickly fall in love with Mechatok’s music as it connects you to this world. Look forward to more from all involved.
– Real player with 4.8 hrs in game
Absolutely stunning. Perfect soundtrack. Outstanding vibes. Ridiculous graphics. A sweet dream that you should have.
– Real player with 1.9 hrs in game
Dissonance: An Interactive Novelette
Not a game in the expected sense, but a really neat story in the end.
– Real player with 4.0 hrs in game
A short enjoyable experience. The user experience could use some support in terms of control support, installation, and navigation. But a nice quick experience overall.
– Real player with 1.2 hrs in game