I appear to have an unpopular opinion based on the average score and how it’s loved generally. I’m going to focus on the negatives since they’re not talked about enough. I’m going to briefly mention the positives but there are enough reviews/impressions if you need more details.
Positives:
-The game has a gorgeous style, cutscenes are hella cool
-The old school Resident Evil gameplay shines through and some of the puzzles are fantastic
-The last boss fight was awesome
-The puzzles with the frequencies are very original, fun and they add freshness to the formula
-The game is mysterious and intrigues you to play more
-The map is great, especially letting you know where the puzzles are
Negatives:
-Story
The story starts decently. The way it started was abrupt and I was dying to learn more. Things quickly deteriorated. The cutscenes seem to be more about style than substance. You don’t really get a lot of story out of them except for some cool shots and characters trying to hurt each other. There are lots of characters that look like each other and I got a strong Kingdom Hearts vibes. That’s not a good thing even if there is a reason why it’s there. The further you get in the game the more dark and weird the atmosphere becomes. It’s not for me. The story is also about the main character searching for her lover and being lesbian. This fact makes me relate less to her struggles as a straight person. Even so, the game doesn’t try to make me care about their relationship except for maybe one cutscene near the end.
-Notes
After playing Signalis, I realised how making good notes and deciding on the quantity is a talent in itself. I didn’t realise it can be done this badly and I assumed all old school survival horror games get this right by default. The game has way too many notes and a lot of them are just uninteresting. I’m mainly talking about the notes describing the work routines and company policies. There are also notes meant to help you figure out the puzzles which are fine. Then there are notes focused on fleshing out the characters and the world. Most of the notes related to the characters are telling you their personalities as androids and some diaries. It’s hard to care when most characters look like each other and there are so many names thrown around. The notes about lore and the world are pretty interesting but they feel so distant from what you’re doing or experiencing that I just end up not caring. I don’t understand, why didn’t we have cutscenes that introduced and fleshed out the characters more? Why didn’t we have cutscenes that spoke about the planets and the political situation? It doesn’t feel right to put all of this in the notes and have nothing worth of interest in the cutscenes.
-Inventory management
Oh boy. It’s probably the worst I’ve experienced with RE type of games in terms of how many you get and how strict it is. You only get 6 slots. The 6 slots include weapons, ammo, special items, puzzle items etc. With RE games, you get more slots and special items have separate slots. With special items, you can think of lockpicks etc. In Signalis items like a lighter and camera take precious slots away. There are areas you can’t really navigate without this lighter. The camera only allows you to take 6 pictures and they’re meant to help you with the puzzles. The fact that you only get 6 is bad enough in itself but it’s not worth a slot when you can easily take pictures with your phone and can use the slot for something more important. Those special items should have at least had separate slots.
-Item distribution
This leads me to the next problem. The game has sooooo many items scattered and it often feels unnecessary. You often get 2-4 ammo drops. It would have been better to have less scattered but each one you pick up is at least 10 or something. You need to go to the save room so often that that turned into a game in itself. And not a fun one. You can destroy items but can’t drop them.
-Bad puzzles
While there have been some fantastic puzzles and it feels great when clearing them. There have also been around 3-4 puzzles which I thought were silly and tedious.
I still enjoyed my time with Signalis and I was heavily thinking of giving the game 3.5 stars instead of 3. But story, characters and items management are very important with this genre and it just wasn’t good enough. It feels like a lot of gamers were charmed by the anime style and weren’t strict enough about the gameplay and the story. It’s still worth playing but do keep your expectations in check.
Positives:
-The game has a gorgeous style, cutscenes are hella cool
-The old school Resident Evil gameplay shines through and some of the puzzles are fantastic
-The last boss fight was awesome
-The puzzles with the frequencies are very original, fun and they add freshness to the formula
-The game is mysterious and intrigues you to play more
-The map is great, especially letting you know where the puzzles are
Negatives:
-Story
The story starts decently. The way it started was abrupt and I was dying to learn more. Things quickly deteriorated. The cutscenes seem to be more about style than substance. You don’t really get a lot of story out of them except for some cool shots and characters trying to hurt each other. There are lots of characters that look like each other and I got a strong Kingdom Hearts vibes. That’s not a good thing even if there is a reason why it’s there. The further you get in the game the more dark and weird the atmosphere becomes. It’s not for me. The story is also about the main character searching for her lover and being lesbian. This fact makes me relate less to her struggles as a straight person. Even so, the game doesn’t try to make me care about their relationship except for maybe one cutscene near the end.
-Notes
After playing Signalis, I realised how making good notes and deciding on the quantity is a talent in itself. I didn’t realise it can be done this badly and I assumed all old school survival horror games get this right by default. The game has way too many notes and a lot of them are just uninteresting. I’m mainly talking about the notes describing the work routines and company policies. There are also notes meant to help you figure out the puzzles which are fine. Then there are notes focused on fleshing out the characters and the world. Most of the notes related to the characters are telling you their personalities as androids and some diaries. It’s hard to care when most characters look like each other and there are so many names thrown around. The notes about lore and the world are pretty interesting but they feel so distant from what you’re doing or experiencing that I just end up not caring. I don’t understand, why didn’t we have cutscenes that introduced and fleshed out the characters more? Why didn’t we have cutscenes that spoke about the planets and the political situation? It doesn’t feel right to put all of this in the notes and have nothing worth of interest in the cutscenes.
-Inventory management
Oh boy. It’s probably the worst I’ve experienced with RE type of games in terms of how many you get and how strict it is. You only get 6 slots. The 6 slots include weapons, ammo, special items, puzzle items etc. With RE games, you get more slots and special items have separate slots. With special items, you can think of lockpicks etc. In Signalis items like a lighter and camera take precious slots away. There are areas you can’t really navigate without this lighter. The camera only allows you to take 6 pictures and they’re meant to help you with the puzzles. The fact that you only get 6 is bad enough in itself but it’s not worth a slot when you can easily take pictures with your phone and can use the slot for something more important. Those special items should have at least had separate slots.
-Item distribution
This leads me to the next problem. The game has sooooo many items scattered and it often feels unnecessary. You often get 2-4 ammo drops. It would have been better to have less scattered but each one you pick up is at least 10 or something. You need to go to the save room so often that that turned into a game in itself. And not a fun one. You can destroy items but can’t drop them.
-Bad puzzles
While there have been some fantastic puzzles and it feels great when clearing them. There have also been around 3-4 puzzles which I thought were silly and tedious.
I still enjoyed my time with Signalis and I was heavily thinking of giving the game 3.5 stars instead of 3. But story, characters and items management are very important with this genre and it just wasn’t good enough. It feels like a lot of gamers were charmed by the anime style and weren’t strict enough about the gameplay and the story. It’s still worth playing but do keep your expectations in check.
2 Comments
@straylight
I’ve just read the sentence again and I’ve worded part of it wrong looking back on it. It gives a bad impression. I should have removed the ‘her struggles’ part. I didn’t mean it that way. Of course I feel pain and feel empathy when others are struggling regardless of sexual orientation, believes etc.
I purely meant relating less. The story becomes less personal. It’s the same as saying I relate to women more for being a woman. The story generally needs to try harder to make me care when I don’t relate with the characters or situations as much.
Aside from that, their romance is genuinely badly told. You know almost nothing about them, how much they care about each other and what they experienced together. You read one note about them being drawn to each other for being the odd ones out or feeling lonely (I hope it was about them now that I think about it, the story is a bit complicated lol). Then there is one cutscene near the end where they kiss and dance to the music. The ending (I got Promise) can be seen as pretty emotional and you finally understand what the promise was. It just doesn’t feel as impactful when you feel there is a lot of story missing. Seriously, that was all you got out of their relationship. They had so many cutscenes but they didn’t use them to tell the story. A very missed opportunity.
I’ve just read the sentence again and I’ve worded part of it wrong looking back on it. It gives a bad impression. I should have removed the ‘her struggles’ part. I didn’t mean it that way. Of course I feel pain and feel empathy when others are struggling regardless of sexual orientation, believes etc.
I purely meant relating less. The story becomes less personal. It’s the same as saying I relate to women more for being a woman. The story generally needs to try harder to make me care when I don’t relate with the characters or situations as much.
Aside from that, their romance is genuinely badly told. You know almost nothing about them, how much they care about each other and what they experienced together. You read one note about them being drawn to each other for being the odd ones out or feeling lonely (I hope it was about them now that I think about it, the story is a bit complicated lol). Then there is one cutscene near the end where they kiss and dance to the music. The ending (I got Promise) can be seen as pretty emotional and you finally understand what the promise was. It just doesn’t feel as impactful when you feel there is a lot of story missing. Seriously, that was all you got out of their relationship. They had so many cutscenes but they didn’t use them to tell the story. A very missed opportunity.
straylight
7 months ago