Trust in providence
What feels (and might as well be) a passion project from Josh Sawyer and the folks at Obsidian, Pentiment feels unique and niche in its approach of a period piece. It's admittedly hard to gauge how much love went into the time period due to my personal knowledge of religion, the holy roman empire and God but what's here is a well written role playing mystery game that really makes you think about every small decision you make while tackling our protagonist's own woes.
Beyond the alps lies a small Bavarian settlement called Tassing and alongside it being Kiersau Abbey where most of His followers congregate and spread the word of His grace, a young artist tries to make something of himself in hopes of creating his masterwork and returning home. Sadly events unfold and you quickly find yourself in the center of something sinister, Pentiment's gives you a question, a couple of hints and limited time. There are some things that will never come to light but the world forever moves forward as you try to find the answer everyone is seeking. The characters of Tassing are the bread and butter of the whole experience and extremely easy to invest yourself in. Listening to their struggles, reminders of how awful being at the lowest part of the social pyramid really meant for these people at the time and the extremely limited futures women had as well. One constant throughout is the love of His word and kindness, it feels like something that people hold onto despite the grotesque conditions everyone faces. Text scribbled and printed differently by person showing how educated and different everyone else is to coarse writing for the peasants to fine print for church members and to printed word for those that are familiar with printing. Pentiment ultimately offers you a mystery and a few side activities but somehow makes it accessible for anyone to understand due to the game highlighting terms, places and people some people not know to help them paint a better picture of the period.
Being put in the shoes of someone entangled in something deep, your only way through is finding the answer. Pentiment feels more like an adventure game with specific role playing elements that promotes replaying the game again for different answers. You decide where you've been, what you studied and what type of person you are and that can help get you far or even more further behind than ever before. You're only given a few leads and you can't pursue them all (for the most part), time is of the essence. I really appreciated this aspect of Pentiment as these decisions really stay consistent through the rest of the game for the most part. It'll get brought back up in dialogue or even keep a person on this earth to find a different answer than you would've gotten otherwise. Traveling around can be pretty tedious at times and admittedly the game can feel like a real slow burn at times compared to more narrative adventures. Some dialogue can be extremely long winded unless you're a huge fan of catholic reform during the 16th century. It almost feels like this game was made with the encyclopedia skill from Disco Elysium going into maximum overdrive over this time period. The general gist of history and the time period and enjoyable but after a while it feels like a history lesson that veers away from the main narrative for too long.
The overall presentation and art style is immaculate as it does an excellent job recreating the art from the tomes back then. Page flips served as loading screens, a journal essentially serving as your general hub of information, the way people are drawn in general. It serves to bring further immersion that you almost feel like you're in an actual part of history in a way. The soundtrack is good especially when the church hymns are sang in His grace but the sound design is also great from birds chirping to hear the livestock and buzzing at a farming plot. It's all familiar sound at the time, no bombastic music but the mundane life of being a peasant at times.
Despite being in the past, Pentiment provides a lesson for the main three facets of time and existence: the past, the present and the future. The clock will never go backwards and what's done is truly done and it will be remembered forever not by the masses but by those special around you. As long as your existence is recorded on this earth via a picture or in writing, you will have existed but not all of us are so fortunate. As of now, we'll live on through people and we can only hope we make the right choices in that we'll be remembered in a bright light instead of a shadow of someone else's life. Back then, all people had was God for a sliver of hope. It was in the greetings and their goodbyes and they always thought He had a plan for them despite the harsh reality they had. It's never a bad thing to believe in something because when logic and reason fails you, all you have is hope and that might be enough for you to see the next sunrise.
What feels (and might as well be) a passion project from Josh Sawyer and the folks at Obsidian, Pentiment feels unique and niche in its approach of a period piece. It's admittedly hard to gauge how much love went into the time period due to my personal knowledge of religion, the holy roman empire and God but what's here is a well written role playing mystery game that really makes you think about every small decision you make while tackling our protagonist's own woes.
Beyond the alps lies a small Bavarian settlement called Tassing and alongside it being Kiersau Abbey where most of His followers congregate and spread the word of His grace, a young artist tries to make something of himself in hopes of creating his masterwork and returning home. Sadly events unfold and you quickly find yourself in the center of something sinister, Pentiment's gives you a question, a couple of hints and limited time. There are some things that will never come to light but the world forever moves forward as you try to find the answer everyone is seeking. The characters of Tassing are the bread and butter of the whole experience and extremely easy to invest yourself in. Listening to their struggles, reminders of how awful being at the lowest part of the social pyramid really meant for these people at the time and the extremely limited futures women had as well. One constant throughout is the love of His word and kindness, it feels like something that people hold onto despite the grotesque conditions everyone faces. Text scribbled and printed differently by person showing how educated and different everyone else is to coarse writing for the peasants to fine print for church members and to printed word for those that are familiar with printing. Pentiment ultimately offers you a mystery and a few side activities but somehow makes it accessible for anyone to understand due to the game highlighting terms, places and people some people not know to help them paint a better picture of the period.
Being put in the shoes of someone entangled in something deep, your only way through is finding the answer. Pentiment feels more like an adventure game with specific role playing elements that promotes replaying the game again for different answers. You decide where you've been, what you studied and what type of person you are and that can help get you far or even more further behind than ever before. You're only given a few leads and you can't pursue them all (for the most part), time is of the essence. I really appreciated this aspect of Pentiment as these decisions really stay consistent through the rest of the game for the most part. It'll get brought back up in dialogue or even keep a person on this earth to find a different answer than you would've gotten otherwise. Traveling around can be pretty tedious at times and admittedly the game can feel like a real slow burn at times compared to more narrative adventures. Some dialogue can be extremely long winded unless you're a huge fan of catholic reform during the 16th century. It almost feels like this game was made with the encyclopedia skill from Disco Elysium going into maximum overdrive over this time period. The general gist of history and the time period and enjoyable but after a while it feels like a history lesson that veers away from the main narrative for too long.
The overall presentation and art style is immaculate as it does an excellent job recreating the art from the tomes back then. Page flips served as loading screens, a journal essentially serving as your general hub of information, the way people are drawn in general. It serves to bring further immersion that you almost feel like you're in an actual part of history in a way. The soundtrack is good especially when the church hymns are sang in His grace but the sound design is also great from birds chirping to hear the livestock and buzzing at a farming plot. It's all familiar sound at the time, no bombastic music but the mundane life of being a peasant at times.
Despite being in the past, Pentiment provides a lesson for the main three facets of time and existence: the past, the present and the future. The clock will never go backwards and what's done is truly done and it will be remembered forever not by the masses but by those special around you. As long as your existence is recorded on this earth via a picture or in writing, you will have existed but not all of us are so fortunate. As of now, we'll live on through people and we can only hope we make the right choices in that we'll be remembered in a bright light instead of a shadow of someone else's life. Back then, all people had was God for a sliver of hope. It was in the greetings and their goodbyes and they always thought He had a plan for them despite the harsh reality they had. It's never a bad thing to believe in something because when logic and reason fails you, all you have is hope and that might be enough for you to see the next sunrise.