Gnosia is the best game about a guy with a cat living inside of his neck ever made.
A Visual Novel lives and dies on its story and characters, its art and music, and its VIBES. And in all these ways, Gnosia sings the sweetest song you'll ever hear. A social deduction game where everyone is certifiable and your strategies are ever changing, because so are the rules.
What makes Gnosia realltly stand out among its contemporaries is how it handles progression. Not only do you level up your stats as you play, allowing you to build out your character like an RPG, but the world of Gnosia and the lunatics trapped therein are rife with mysteries and riddled with secrets. As you learn more and more about the gameplay systems and how to manipulate the other characters onboard the ship, you become more able to use that knowledge to advance your understanding of the backstories of the characters and world of Gnosia, and that knowledge will further enable you to manipulate the characters in search of the results you're looking for with every round you play. Gnosia's "final boss" is a spectacular culmination of these mechanics, forcing you to execute every skill you've learned over your 20 or so hours with the game with peak precision against a terrifying threat. It's one of the most memorable boss fights I've played in a game this decade, and Gnosia is a visual novel. It's awesome.
Gnosia excels in its presentation as well. The art is excellent and unique and oh man, the music is blissful. Tense, exciting, nerve-wracking, and always enhancing the mood of every scene. The only fault to be found within Gnosia is that locating the game's final secrets may become a bore, but even that feels thematically and mechanically appeopriate. It's a very unique game well worth seeing through to its poignant and memorable conclusion. Cannot recommend it enough.
A Visual Novel lives and dies on its story and characters, its art and music, and its VIBES. And in all these ways, Gnosia sings the sweetest song you'll ever hear. A social deduction game where everyone is certifiable and your strategies are ever changing, because so are the rules.
What makes Gnosia realltly stand out among its contemporaries is how it handles progression. Not only do you level up your stats as you play, allowing you to build out your character like an RPG, but the world of Gnosia and the lunatics trapped therein are rife with mysteries and riddled with secrets. As you learn more and more about the gameplay systems and how to manipulate the other characters onboard the ship, you become more able to use that knowledge to advance your understanding of the backstories of the characters and world of Gnosia, and that knowledge will further enable you to manipulate the characters in search of the results you're looking for with every round you play. Gnosia's "final boss" is a spectacular culmination of these mechanics, forcing you to execute every skill you've learned over your 20 or so hours with the game with peak precision against a terrifying threat. It's one of the most memorable boss fights I've played in a game this decade, and Gnosia is a visual novel. It's awesome.
Gnosia excels in its presentation as well. The art is excellent and unique and oh man, the music is blissful. Tense, exciting, nerve-wracking, and always enhancing the mood of every scene. The only fault to be found within Gnosia is that locating the game's final secrets may become a bore, but even that feels thematically and mechanically appeopriate. It's a very unique game well worth seeing through to its poignant and memorable conclusion. Cannot recommend it enough.