i first played it in... 2009...? when i got my first computer that could only maybe successfully run Word 2003 lmao. well it was enough to play it, but i didnt get far because i was just a pretentious kid who was bad at videogames, but i was already captivated by the world of the game. i read everything about it i could get my hands on, and i still vividly remember the igromania walkthrough for it - that miraculously still is preserved on their website: https://www.igromania.ru/article/2097/Rukovodstvo_i_prohozhdenie_po_'Mor._Utopiya'.html

i played it again as an adult after the series experienced a minor boom after the release of pathologic 2. and i feel like it really came to me at a right time. artemy's story in particular, being an outsider to your own culture yet still closer than someone completely foreign, trying to save what you have, breaking through the absurdity of life and accepting that even if nothing is real, as long as a choice is willed it is real... it really resonated with me in a way nothing else quite had since. the metafiction layers, the way different characters' stories intersect with each other, how their abilities recontextualize how they view the town... it's a fantastic little game that could have been even better if they had more time, but i already love what they had with it

i do not mind the graphics and if anything i feel like the uncanny valley-dness and shabbiness of it all adds to the presentation, and i get that the combat is meant to be frustrating on purpose, but it's still frequently janky in a way that does not add to the experience and of course there is all the Walking................. the haruspex and changeling routes are also obviously less finished than bachelor's, so i can't in good conscience give this full 5 stars but it definitely is one of my most favorite games of all time