<i>Mundaun</i>, while rough around the edges, is an ultimately satisfying and unique experience I'd be happy to make again in the future. Like the best of horror media, it creates an atmosphere and world it's easy to dive into and empathize with.
The pencilled artstyle, the feature its marketing is understandably most reliant on, makes the game's balancing act between folksy realism and expressionist surrealism a fluid success. It's a beautiful game in two ways: One, it's set in a Swiss village in the Alps; beautiful vistas, weather-worn farming tools and gorgeous landmarks are a safe bet and populate the world wherever you go. And two, the black-and-white drawings have an uncanniness about them that always feels ever so slightly off; whenever the scene shifts to a nightmarish flashback sequence, this aspect gets heightened and elevated via lighting effects, but it's always connected enough to the "real world" you get to experience earlier in the story to remain creepy and keep you on your toes.
The sound design and music works in much similar way to the general art design, albeit slightly subtler. You're not beaten over the head with sound cues or themes, but the thin, staticy sound of a scratched vinyl record transmitted through an obscure radio channel is something the game gets a lot of mileage out of.
These aspects of <i>Mundaun</i> are generally well-liked by reviewers (from what I've seen). Opinions are a bit more mixed on the gameplay side of things, and I understand but (mostly) disagree. It's not really a big test of your skills, whether mechanical or otherwise; most of the puzzles were easy enough to solve without having to look up a guide or wander around for most of a playing session, but just tricky enough not to make me feel too much pandered to, and the importance of combat is severly downplayed. I don't much mind this (your character's relative weakness is a reasonable character trait, since his fear also slows him down quite a bit: he's not a hero), especially as the enemies are relatively easy to avoid.
While the gameplay is surprisingly varied, the mechanics never go into much depth. The storytelling clearly took center stage here (the idea originated as a comic book before being turned into a game after several years of work had already went into it, according to the making of featurette on YouTube), at the occasional expense of interactivity. The game is fairly linear and more or less tells you where to go next most of the time, and I didn't discover many opportunities to explore off the main path on my playthrough. I have only gotten 50 % of the Steam achievements though, so perhaps another playthrough would prove me wrong.
<i>Mundaun</i> is a fairly short game, and avoids too much repetition pretty much through the entire runtime. It innovates more in terms of storytelling and worldbuilding than with its plot or gameplay, but kept me invested from start to finish and I anticipate to come back someday.
The pencilled artstyle, the feature its marketing is understandably most reliant on, makes the game's balancing act between folksy realism and expressionist surrealism a fluid success. It's a beautiful game in two ways: One, it's set in a Swiss village in the Alps; beautiful vistas, weather-worn farming tools and gorgeous landmarks are a safe bet and populate the world wherever you go. And two, the black-and-white drawings have an uncanniness about them that always feels ever so slightly off; whenever the scene shifts to a nightmarish flashback sequence, this aspect gets heightened and elevated via lighting effects, but it's always connected enough to the "real world" you get to experience earlier in the story to remain creepy and keep you on your toes.
The sound design and music works in much similar way to the general art design, albeit slightly subtler. You're not beaten over the head with sound cues or themes, but the thin, staticy sound of a scratched vinyl record transmitted through an obscure radio channel is something the game gets a lot of mileage out of.
These aspects of <i>Mundaun</i> are generally well-liked by reviewers (from what I've seen). Opinions are a bit more mixed on the gameplay side of things, and I understand but (mostly) disagree. It's not really a big test of your skills, whether mechanical or otherwise; most of the puzzles were easy enough to solve without having to look up a guide or wander around for most of a playing session, but just tricky enough not to make me feel too much pandered to, and the importance of combat is severly downplayed. I don't much mind this (your character's relative weakness is a reasonable character trait, since his fear also slows him down quite a bit: he's not a hero), especially as the enemies are relatively easy to avoid.
While the gameplay is surprisingly varied, the mechanics never go into much depth. The storytelling clearly took center stage here (the idea originated as a comic book before being turned into a game after several years of work had already went into it, according to the making of featurette on YouTube), at the occasional expense of interactivity. The game is fairly linear and more or less tells you where to go next most of the time, and I didn't discover many opportunities to explore off the main path on my playthrough. I have only gotten 50 % of the Steam achievements though, so perhaps another playthrough would prove me wrong.
<i>Mundaun</i> is a fairly short game, and avoids too much repetition pretty much through the entire runtime. It innovates more in terms of storytelling and worldbuilding than with its plot or gameplay, but kept me invested from start to finish and I anticipate to come back someday.
I really feel conflicted on this one. The game itself, from visuals to story, checks all my boxes and really makes me enjoy it as a visual game, however the gameplay, along with some of the "puzzles" feel really obtuse and odd. It took me 40 minutes just to figure out how to progress in some areas as the indicators of what I can and can't interact with were all over the place. I did enjoy my time with it though, just is a bit frustrating.