Sights & Sounds
- Lovingly crafted pixel art all around. The characters lack a bit of detail, but the backgrounds look pretty great
- The music is quite good in that laid back somewhat lo-fi way. Lots of muted synth with pronounced piano and percussion
- The only real knock on the music is the final song, a vocal track. The vocals are meh and the lyrics are pretty terrible
- There isn't much voice acting, but the little bit that exists is fairly well-performed
Story & Vibes
- At this point, the cyberpunk noir mystery adventure game market is pretty saturated (weird to say for such a specific niche), so a game in that category needs a good hook to stand out. Lacuna does this by giving player decisions more story and gameplay impact
- It's hard to offer a plot synopsis without spoiling the mystery. Briefly, you're a special agent with hangups about your ex who is charged with protecting a political dissident leader who is visiting your planet. Things predictably turn south, and it's up to you to solve the mystery and try to ease the tensions that could boil over into interplanetary war
- As you might expect, there's multiple possible endings. Your adeptness as mystery solving and dialogue choices can be very important in determining which one you get
- Overall, it's a pretty good mystery. Lots of intrigue and twists to the narrative to keep you guessing. The romantic/family subplot (should you choose to pursue it) feels a little throwaway, though
Playability & Replayability
- If you've played any investigation and narrative focused adventure game in the past decade, this will feel immediately familiar to you. If you haven't, you walk around, talk to people, and look at things to gather info to help you further the game's central mystery and solve puzzles
- Narrative and gameplay are closely intertwined in a game like Lacuna. It's pretty cool how your choices and mistakes affect things like puzzle solutions. The game will actually punish you for making the wrong choices by making future puzzles more difficult or removing some of your options
- Given the multiple endings, there's probably some replay value in here for completionists. My only gripe is that there's an achievement for seeing them all, which is a tough sell in a mystery game where you already know what's going to happen
Overall Impressions & Performance
- Lacuna does a lot of things well. The story is a pretty motivating mystery that kept me interested and invested. The fact that there were actual consequences (positive or negative) to your choices and actions was also great
- It also does some things pretty poorly. The great mystery (even if you get what is presumably the good ending) ends in a somewhat unsatisfying manner. All the loose ends are tied up, but not in any interesting way. Even the good ending for the subplot involving your ex-wife and kid is kinda understated in such a way that it doesn't emotionally register at all. After you get let down by the game's mediocre conclusion, you're then serenaded by the worst ending credits song I've heard in a long time
- It ran well on Steam Deck, at least
Final Verdict
- 7/10. Playing this game is like eating a delicious, satisfying meal, putting the last bite in your mouth, and finding a bug in it. It was a wonderful experience that unfortunately doesn't stick the landing
- Lovingly crafted pixel art all around. The characters lack a bit of detail, but the backgrounds look pretty great
- The music is quite good in that laid back somewhat lo-fi way. Lots of muted synth with pronounced piano and percussion
- The only real knock on the music is the final song, a vocal track. The vocals are meh and the lyrics are pretty terrible
- There isn't much voice acting, but the little bit that exists is fairly well-performed
Story & Vibes
- At this point, the cyberpunk noir mystery adventure game market is pretty saturated (weird to say for such a specific niche), so a game in that category needs a good hook to stand out. Lacuna does this by giving player decisions more story and gameplay impact
- It's hard to offer a plot synopsis without spoiling the mystery. Briefly, you're a special agent with hangups about your ex who is charged with protecting a political dissident leader who is visiting your planet. Things predictably turn south, and it's up to you to solve the mystery and try to ease the tensions that could boil over into interplanetary war
- As you might expect, there's multiple possible endings. Your adeptness as mystery solving and dialogue choices can be very important in determining which one you get
- Overall, it's a pretty good mystery. Lots of intrigue and twists to the narrative to keep you guessing. The romantic/family subplot (should you choose to pursue it) feels a little throwaway, though
Playability & Replayability
- If you've played any investigation and narrative focused adventure game in the past decade, this will feel immediately familiar to you. If you haven't, you walk around, talk to people, and look at things to gather info to help you further the game's central mystery and solve puzzles
- Narrative and gameplay are closely intertwined in a game like Lacuna. It's pretty cool how your choices and mistakes affect things like puzzle solutions. The game will actually punish you for making the wrong choices by making future puzzles more difficult or removing some of your options
- Given the multiple endings, there's probably some replay value in here for completionists. My only gripe is that there's an achievement for seeing them all, which is a tough sell in a mystery game where you already know what's going to happen
Overall Impressions & Performance
- Lacuna does a lot of things well. The story is a pretty motivating mystery that kept me interested and invested. The fact that there were actual consequences (positive or negative) to your choices and actions was also great
- It also does some things pretty poorly. The great mystery (even if you get what is presumably the good ending) ends in a somewhat unsatisfying manner. All the loose ends are tied up, but not in any interesting way. Even the good ending for the subplot involving your ex-wife and kid is kinda understated in such a way that it doesn't emotionally register at all. After you get let down by the game's mediocre conclusion, you're then serenaded by the worst ending credits song I've heard in a long time
- It ran well on Steam Deck, at least
Final Verdict
- 7/10. Playing this game is like eating a delicious, satisfying meal, putting the last bite in your mouth, and finding a bug in it. It was a wonderful experience that unfortunately doesn't stick the landing