Beaten: Mar 28 2022
Time: 5.3 Hours
Platform: Mac
Well, this is the second game I can remember that got me to tear up. The other one was Mother 3, which managed to catch me off guard at the very end of the game with a warm embrace, a shoulder to cry on who’s existence was what got me to open up those ol tearducts that don’t see as much use as they probably should. Norco hits different, but also the same. At least as far as the crying came about. There was a small moment partway through that gave me those same emotions, an optional small warm cozy patch to stick for a while, get your bearings, and brace for your return to the dour world on display, and that got me primed I think. But it was a scene closer to the end that really got me, and while I didn’t cry as hard as Mother 3, it was enough.
But uh anyways, it’s also a game! Not just a crying simulator! As a game, and a piece of southern-gothic-cyberpunk media, it’s very fucking cool!!! So it’s a pixely point and click adventure game set in Norco (wow, who woulda thought), which is a real place in Louisiana, known for being the home of a Shell petroleum refinery according to Wikipedia. Now, I knew Norco was real, but I just learned about the Shell refinery thing as I was looking it up to write that sentence, and wow that makes the politics of the game hit way harder.
See, it’s not just set in our real world Norco, it’s a cyberpunk reflection of it. It eschews the standard neon billboards and “wow, this city looks just like tokyo but it’s in LA? and it’s raining all the time?” (I love blade runner don’t @ me) cyberpunkisms, for a much more unique setting, a combination of cyberpunk tech-stylings with eroded swamps, run-down small town vibes, and refinery smokestacks spewing towers of flame into the night sky as their owner (Shield, haha) expands it’s operations and pushes people out of their homes. It’s cyberpunk, but just barely. It feels like very much it’s own thing, fresh in ways not much from that style of media has been in years.
The politics of the large corporation vs the small town aren’t the textual focus of the story though. Instead, you play a character who’s returning to the town after years away, exploring the changes that’ve gone down since you’ve left, and trying to find your brother. The narrative spins out much MUCH more from there, but that’s the basis, and might be my favorite part of the game.
Norco’s small, subtle moments are my favorites. Descriptions flare vividly like anything out of your favorite book, while the evening sky in the background adds a sense of romanticism to the downer vibes. A point of comparison would be Kentucky Route Zero, as far as weird narrative-first point-and-clicks go, but there’s a different intent here. KRZ was interested primarily in letting you stew in its winding passages and dark caves, providing ample detours (some mandatory) to ensure you understood that moving forward was not the point. While Norco’s writing has a similar quality to KRZ, the pacing is more in line with traditional point-and-clicks, speedy from scene to scene and only slowing down when you want it to. While I don’t personally think either style is better, Norco’s approach feels much more accessible.
Similarly accessible is the puzzles. In classics of the genre, things like Beneath a Steel Sky and I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, I’m often in love with every aspect of the game besides progression. There’s an esotericism to those old puzzles, a real arcane complexity that’s generally pretty cool on paper, but becomes tedium upon tedium for me when I try to solve them. Norco keeps the feeling of complexity and arcane solutions juuuust enough, while also not forcing you to make any enormous leaps of logic like the classics used to. In place, there’s a good amount of more elaborate and more obviously “puzzly” minigame-based puzzles, where you’ll be controlling a boat, or performing Paper Mario-esque RPG attacks. These moments are just in there enough to bring the pacing and energy up or down when needed, and not for a second more.
My only thing is I wish the game was longer. I wish it let me stretch out a little bit more, that it took a bit more time reaching climaxes. But I feel like that’s a good problem to have, leaving me wanting more. It didn’t feel insubstantial or anything, I just want to exist here for a bit longer, to let things build a bit more.
Regardless, fantastic game here. Big ol Please Giv it a Shot
Time: 5.3 Hours
Platform: Mac
Well, this is the second game I can remember that got me to tear up. The other one was Mother 3, which managed to catch me off guard at the very end of the game with a warm embrace, a shoulder to cry on who’s existence was what got me to open up those ol tearducts that don’t see as much use as they probably should. Norco hits different, but also the same. At least as far as the crying came about. There was a small moment partway through that gave me those same emotions, an optional small warm cozy patch to stick for a while, get your bearings, and brace for your return to the dour world on display, and that got me primed I think. But it was a scene closer to the end that really got me, and while I didn’t cry as hard as Mother 3, it was enough.
But uh anyways, it’s also a game! Not just a crying simulator! As a game, and a piece of southern-gothic-cyberpunk media, it’s very fucking cool!!! So it’s a pixely point and click adventure game set in Norco (wow, who woulda thought), which is a real place in Louisiana, known for being the home of a Shell petroleum refinery according to Wikipedia. Now, I knew Norco was real, but I just learned about the Shell refinery thing as I was looking it up to write that sentence, and wow that makes the politics of the game hit way harder.
See, it’s not just set in our real world Norco, it’s a cyberpunk reflection of it. It eschews the standard neon billboards and “wow, this city looks just like tokyo but it’s in LA? and it’s raining all the time?” (I love blade runner don’t @ me) cyberpunkisms, for a much more unique setting, a combination of cyberpunk tech-stylings with eroded swamps, run-down small town vibes, and refinery smokestacks spewing towers of flame into the night sky as their owner (Shield, haha) expands it’s operations and pushes people out of their homes. It’s cyberpunk, but just barely. It feels like very much it’s own thing, fresh in ways not much from that style of media has been in years.
The politics of the large corporation vs the small town aren’t the textual focus of the story though. Instead, you play a character who’s returning to the town after years away, exploring the changes that’ve gone down since you’ve left, and trying to find your brother. The narrative spins out much MUCH more from there, but that’s the basis, and might be my favorite part of the game.
Norco’s small, subtle moments are my favorites. Descriptions flare vividly like anything out of your favorite book, while the evening sky in the background adds a sense of romanticism to the downer vibes. A point of comparison would be Kentucky Route Zero, as far as weird narrative-first point-and-clicks go, but there’s a different intent here. KRZ was interested primarily in letting you stew in its winding passages and dark caves, providing ample detours (some mandatory) to ensure you understood that moving forward was not the point. While Norco’s writing has a similar quality to KRZ, the pacing is more in line with traditional point-and-clicks, speedy from scene to scene and only slowing down when you want it to. While I don’t personally think either style is better, Norco’s approach feels much more accessible.
Similarly accessible is the puzzles. In classics of the genre, things like Beneath a Steel Sky and I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream, I’m often in love with every aspect of the game besides progression. There’s an esotericism to those old puzzles, a real arcane complexity that’s generally pretty cool on paper, but becomes tedium upon tedium for me when I try to solve them. Norco keeps the feeling of complexity and arcane solutions juuuust enough, while also not forcing you to make any enormous leaps of logic like the classics used to. In place, there’s a good amount of more elaborate and more obviously “puzzly” minigame-based puzzles, where you’ll be controlling a boat, or performing Paper Mario-esque RPG attacks. These moments are just in there enough to bring the pacing and energy up or down when needed, and not for a second more.
My only thing is I wish the game was longer. I wish it let me stretch out a little bit more, that it took a bit more time reaching climaxes. But I feel like that’s a good problem to have, leaving me wanting more. It didn’t feel insubstantial or anything, I just want to exist here for a bit longer, to let things build a bit more.
Regardless, fantastic game here. Big ol Please Giv it a Shot