Just finished my first playthrough of this game and will be going back for another.
At one point I found myself thinking that this game is just too depressing and too tragic. Then I finished it and realized that the beauty of a well-written tragedy is that it feels inevitable. And for my first playthrough at least, that's what it felt like. I played with the change indicators (idk what to call the message that tells you the effect your choices will have on the stats) off. This is maybe not the choice if you want to try to win or get a particular outcome, but I wanted my first time playing to be blind, so that I could be led less by the stats and more by the story.
It was an interesting approach and I'm glad I did it and committed to it because I got many very sad outcomes and found myself, at times, very frustrated with the options available to me. If that would ruin the game for you, I definitely recommend playing with the change indicators on, though you probably still won't get everything you want. Sacrifices must be made.
I think these feelings, and experiencing them for the characters and about the story isthe point of the game. A very good YouTuber recently said in a video: the point of art is not understanding it or knowing the most about it. The art is in the feeling it illicits in you as you experience it. (Heavily paraphrased from SuperEyepatchWolf's video The Bizarre World of Fake Video Games).
Sometimes your circumstances don't allow you to pick the optimal choice. Your actions have consequences and at many points while playing and seeing the selection I wanted greyed out, I felt those consequences.
It can be a tough play at times, like I said it is very tragic, and I did take a week and a half break at one point, but when I did go back to it I still enjoyed experiencing the game very much.
The major drawbacks are the spelling mistakes. There is a lot of text in this game and it unfolds like a book, so seeing many spelling mistakes throughout my playthrough wound up feeling jarring, and pulled me out of the story. This isn't something I normally mind, and if it were one or two I probably wouldn't mention it. However, in a game that is basically a novel, the text needs to be free of errors in my opinion, especially in a game that has been out for 3 years.
That being said, the writing really is beautiful and the art is gorgeous. The world created is harsh and difficult, but important and worth fighting for. This game made me feel a lot and I'm excited to go explore another branch of the story.
At one point I found myself thinking that this game is just too depressing and too tragic. Then I finished it and realized that the beauty of a well-written tragedy is that it feels inevitable. And for my first playthrough at least, that's what it felt like. I played with the change indicators (idk what to call the message that tells you the effect your choices will have on the stats) off. This is maybe not the choice if you want to try to win or get a particular outcome, but I wanted my first time playing to be blind, so that I could be led less by the stats and more by the story.
It was an interesting approach and I'm glad I did it and committed to it because I got many very sad outcomes and found myself, at times, very frustrated with the options available to me. If that would ruin the game for you, I definitely recommend playing with the change indicators on, though you probably still won't get everything you want. Sacrifices must be made.
I think these feelings, and experiencing them for the characters and about the story isthe point of the game. A very good YouTuber recently said in a video: the point of art is not understanding it or knowing the most about it. The art is in the feeling it illicits in you as you experience it. (Heavily paraphrased from SuperEyepatchWolf's video The Bizarre World of Fake Video Games).
Sometimes your circumstances don't allow you to pick the optimal choice. Your actions have consequences and at many points while playing and seeing the selection I wanted greyed out, I felt those consequences.
It can be a tough play at times, like I said it is very tragic, and I did take a week and a half break at one point, but when I did go back to it I still enjoyed experiencing the game very much.
The major drawbacks are the spelling mistakes. There is a lot of text in this game and it unfolds like a book, so seeing many spelling mistakes throughout my playthrough wound up feeling jarring, and pulled me out of the story. This isn't something I normally mind, and if it were one or two I probably wouldn't mention it. However, in a game that is basically a novel, the text needs to be free of errors in my opinion, especially in a game that has been out for 3 years.
That being said, the writing really is beautiful and the art is gorgeous. The world created is harsh and difficult, but important and worth fighting for. This game made me feel a lot and I'm excited to go explore another branch of the story.