NORCO is a tricky one. It simultaneously has some of the best ambiance in point and click games to date - its southern gothic industrial-core setting managed to make me nostalgic for something I never lived through (I tentatively put it alongside Kentucky Route Zero in this regard) - and a mind bending story about faith, religion, capitalism and coming to terms with oneself that's part beautiful, part cathartic and part harrowing.

It also has some of the most questionable gameplay decisions I've seen in games of this genre, mainly the combat sections which are completely unnecessary and inconsequential, and some basic point and click "going back and forth" to pad out for more content. Sure, some of it helps you get even more immersed into the game, but the morsels of lore you gather along the way sometimes don't pay off the filler (I'm looking at you, city hall elevator puzzle).

The game is wonderful, but would've been better if it was just a straightforward point & click interactive novel.

Great humor, great ambiance, gorgeous pixel are visuals and a great story that will fry your brain during its last act, whose themes will surely stay in my thoughts for quite some time.

Very much my thing, this felt like the southern gothic lovechild of Kentucky Route Zero and Disco Elysium. I love when games try dare to try weird and out there things without fear of alienating the audience.

A mix of visual novel and point and click gameplay elements, its real hook is its writing and visuals. It boasts some of the most moving and evocative writing I’ve read in a videogame probably since playing Disco Elysium last year. It’s hard to wrap my head around how a team gets to write and actually design such an experience. It’s also comprised of beautifully crafted pixel art. There’s a particular frame that instantly became my new desktop wallpaper. And the music, what a surprise. Just a terrific moody score that goes so hard.

There’s just so much depth and thematic nuance here, enough to think about for a long time after playing. It oozes creativity and artistry, and a certain kind of weird earnestness and sincerity.

Complicated and winding, Norco is a game that defies and embodies the genres it's assembled from. Part existential RPG, part 90s style point & click, Norco is a painful and intelligent game to its core. You don't play Norco to be happy, or to enrich yourself per say, but because it reflects humanity at a very universal level.

Your enemies may occasionally be security guards or impressionable cultists, but the ones driving them, you, and everyone else in Norco are more present and dangerous. Religious paranoia fuels radical violence, poverty informs where you go and what solutions you can partake in, and the constant threat of a world ravaged by humanity, where flood waters rise constantly at your front door, forces into you a dread that you can't just turn-based battle away.

To reduce it down, Norco is WEIRD. And I mean the good kind of weird. The kind you'll be thinking about for weeks after, and that makes you want to find a way to express the feelings in you that you can't ever seem to say right. For all its technical jank and dubious narrative conclusions, Norco is a game that will make you want and make you fear how badly you do so, and I mean that as the highest praise.

Pretty engaging story that didn't quite stick the landing in my opinion. The world and characters are interesting, the music is very good, the writing is funny but it knows when to take itself seriously. Unfortunately the gameplay is quite weak, even for a point and click. I would've liked to see more in depth combat (or no combat at all), and the puzzles could've done with some finetuning.

Overall it's still absolutely worth a shot if you can get behind point and click adventure games.

78

The most recent game I have completed as of writing this review.

You play as Kay, a nomad who ran away from home. This is a dystopian near future southern-gothic pixel art point-and-click adventure game and it's fucking great. Endlessly pessimistic and creepy, I couldn't put it down until I completed the game. There are multiple endings so if you do end up playing it be sure to do all of the side objectives and pay attention if you want the "good" ending. I may revisit to get all of the trophies. It's worth your time even if you don't typically play games like this.

wow. stunningly beautiful. such an engaging and interesting story, such perfect pacing, and amazing character development. gameplay wasn't really the focus but the gameplay that was present was fun puzzle-y point and click standards, and i think it was utilized well. this kind of game truly transcends the genre and is pure interactive art and storytelling. would absolutely recommend.

(knocked off half a star for the "combat" gameplay which felt ehh kinda unnecessary but not bad. thats honestly my only complaint tho)

Enjoyed but the sound presentation consistently underwhelmed me and kept me at arm's length. Where I the player am stumbling clumsily through a nebulous, imaginative, beautifully evocative first person point'n'click pixel world, the sound and music are prosaic, empty, and downright normal at times. I just felt overall cold as a result, even despite the game showing me so much warm flesh to bite into. The combat bits also felt obligatory, and the top-down rotational map bits didn't rise past being bare-bones maps. Plot elements like the Garretts are interesting and certainly have their jokes but didn't feel like they ultimately came together into something arresting. In short, I got the feeling of depersonalization that certainly was at least somewhat intended, but it didn't feel like it dovetailed with the work.

While I'm listening to the credits music again while writing this - you've got this fascinating screamed vocal line like "The Black Stone" by Kayo Dot in the background with an interesting drone track and warping synths, but nothing builds to encompass you and the drums are just the flattest possible dinky little sounds - they sound lame. Punch me in the face with these drums, man, make me FEEL something, christ. Just not for me, I guess.

Quando eu penso em narrativas feitas para videogames, eu penso em algo exatamente como isso.

Uma narrativa incrível, escrita com primor e com vários apontamentos políticos certeiros.

Figura entre meus jogos favoritos agora.

It turned out to be quite an unusual and charming thing. An intriguing mixture of point-and-click quest and visual novel (and even with a combat system) in a dark mixture of not-too-distant cyberpunk and southern Louisiana mysticism that is Norco - a very involving, confusing and at times frightening experience. I was thinking about whether it was possible to effectively transform the old genre of text quests and the execution of the formula in this project is exactly what is needed to return this niche form of video games to modern realities. Beautiful pixel art and painstaking descriptions (and also a wonderful interface) create a truly intriguing world, the web of which is extremely interesting to unravel. The game successfully mixes creepy moments with quite funny humor (though it certainly could have been better in places), and thanks to your involvement in the world, you want to know even more about it even as the credits roll. It’s nice that the game surprises in moments and gives special segments in terms of gameplay (for example, an episode with a theater, which also turns out to be a preparation; or an episode in the town hall), and besides this, almost all the solutions to the “puzzles” are both intuitive (and the game helps well) and not too obvious. The story itself, in addition to excellent world-building and competent work with a parallel narrative structure, succeeds most of all, it seems to me, in deceiving the player’s expectations - several times during the game something completely unexpected happened and radically changed the picture of what was happening. But in the story, as for me, lies the main drawback of the game.

And specifically, unfortunately, its ending. Around somewhere from the appearance of the shopping center, it seems to me that the game loses a little focus of the narrative and where it then goes, although it looks partly logical, it still begins to raise questions. And the ending itself seems to me rather crumpled, written too abstractly at the climactic moments, and even with a choice of several endings, none of them seems satisfactory and does not really answer many questions (although the overall picture can be put together). This is partly just a subjective rejection, since I perhaps expected a different balance of power in this story, but abstracting from this, the entire final part of the game can hardly be called not (at least a little) disappointing. Which of course is a little sad, and only increases the desire to learn more about the world of the game.

However, other than that it's pretty good! Norco does an excellent job of showing the vitality of the genre in modern times while creating a unique mix with a compelling world and (with caveats) a quality story. Sometimes poetic, sometimes creepy, sometimes funny, sometimes surprising, sometimes sad. And it’s absolutely a pity that the Monkey wasn’t with me the whole game.

Monkey stares at you. You stare at Monkey

I expected a conventional, by-the-numbers point-and-click game, with a typical, american "small town horror" story, and a visually stunning piece.

Well, it turns out. I wasn't that blown away by its visuals. I liked it most of the time, the pixel art it's pleasant to look at and it conveys all the info you need. The game truly excels at backgrounds though, compared to character design. Still, it's good, that's for sure.

The gameplay is...weird. Mixing typical mechanics of the genre with many other elements, such as turn-based battles with quick time events, and top-down driving? And for me, that's the key to understand for those that seem to be dissapointed with the combat. They want to see it as a combat "system" when the game treats it as nothing more than a minigame.

The puzzles felt very engaging for me, the exploration was intriguing. It was never too much to handle, it was never so loose that I wouldn't care. Except for a single part of a grander puzzle in the final parts of the game, I believe all of it can be beaten without a guide.

The story was something else. You gotta understand, for us worldwiders, in like, anyone from outside America (or USA for many of us), your culture can be strange. Those stories about people in a small town, most of the time in the middle of nowhere, where either a tragedy, a supernatural event or a capitalist takeover happens, seem so cliché. I don't necessarily hate the premise, though, I gave this game a chance after all. I'm so happy I did!

Norco's story may not be perfect, there may be some plot holes and some predictable results, but only some. As this game excels in its writing, balancing a lighter tone with effective drama and tension, with perfectly-defined characters and motivations. The predictability does end, and some curveballs are thrown.

This is an easy recommendation for any fan of the genre. I can't fathom finishing it in 3 or 4 hours like many seem to suggest.

Played for around 12 hours through Xbox Game Pass on Xbox Series S.

NORCO usa do surrealismo futurista e do expansionismo industrial para entregar uma história interativa que realça uma das mais importantes e básicas verdades da existência humana.

As coisas mais bonitas nesse mundo decaído ainda são as coisas efêmeras. E é através desse jogo de 6 horas de duração que estamos diante de uma das melhores metanarrativas já feitas.

NORCO é quase autobibliográfico ao ser baseado e se passar na própria cidade de NORCO, em Louisiana. Cidade dominada por uma companhias petrolíferas em que seu próprio nome é um acrônimo para New Orleands Refining COmpany. Da mesma forma da cidade do jogo, a agressiva expansão industrial respinga não só na vida dos moradores para como também diversas patologias à ambientação local, como inundações, poluição, erosão massiva etc. O fato da região do jogo ser, a um só tempo, real e ficcional, torna ainda mais tênue a linha entre o jogo e a realidade do jogador.

Nossa protagonista Kay foge dessa vida sufocante para adotar uma vida viajando nessa versão deteriorada e mega futurista distópica dos Estados Unidos. Eventualmente, Kay precisa voltar para casa ao descobrir que sua mãe que antes fora abandonada em casa agora está morta devido um câncer terminal. Kay se vê diante não apenas de uma bagunça familiar, mas laços foram cortados diante memórias confusas embaralhadas no tempo. Não demora muito para NORCO nos jogar em um mistério sobre as investigações clandestinas da sua mãe realizadas antes da sua morte na medida que lida da relação de Kay com as pessoas e com essa tóxica comunidade (nos mais diversos sentidos) que deixou para trás.

Norco combina vários gêneros para contar sua história, incluindo cyberpunk, mistério e Southern Gothic. Este último permeia todo o jogo, tanto no sentido visual quanto textual, com sua valorização da paisagem. A área está sendo invadida e envenenada por tecnologias: algumas do nosso mundo, como refinarias de petróleo e smartphones, e outras que não são exatamente do nosso mundo, como a nuvem corrompida e lucrativa na qual os personagens carregam suas memórias. O enquadramento de Norco como um mistério permite que você entenda como essas tecnologias destruíram sua cidade natal.

Uma das maiores forças de NORCO é que ele é totalmente destemido ao entregar o absurdo. Não um absurdo aleatório ou chocante, mas sim com total contexto dentro da narrativa que ele propõe em elaborar. É um jogo que sabe instigar o jogador para o emaranhado, dando as ferramentas não só em termos de mecânica mas como artisticamente para ele desenrolar o que acabou de presenciar. É uma verdadeira incursão para o mais profundo detalhismo que a escrita de um videogame possa ter em nível poético. O jogo fala de estrelas, céus e muitos olhos, desenterrando aquela ansiedade de observação e vigilância. Ele transforma pântanos em cérebros. Mistura redes neurais, religiões, corporações e cultos com impulsos humanos básicos de se correlacionarem. Pode começar com os problemas locais de uma crise ambiental global, mas logo se expande muito além disso, para inteligência artificial e dados, para privacidade, pobreza, desilusão, a maneira como a internet moderna pode pegar qualquer pessoa separada de uma comunidade em sua rede e radicalizá-los em uma nova rede. E o desespero e a futilidade das pessoas que veem as falhas da sociedade e querem fugir dela e escapar para sempre.

É um título que de cara é modesto mas demonstra que uma experiência rica em narrativa, feita por um desenvolvedor indie de primeira viagem, nem sempre precisa ser ofuscada por exibições ostensivas de lançamentos maiores. Norco pode se referir a si mesmo como uma espécie de pixel efêmero, uma aventura que é um vasto conto cósmico que será lembrado com carinho com certeza, pelo menos por mim, décadas depois.