Neue Rezensionen von a sweet dog

Ultrameta fun half hour point and click that must be some kind of record for number of puzzle types per minute.

A satisfying Witness spoof, this one surprises not only with the witty flippancy of its maze puzzles, but also some creative puzzles that could have been in the original game.

Anyone who feels the pretentiousness of puzzle games needs puncturing will enjoy this. (Or, perhaps, try Grand Inquisitor, which does its own ridiculing.)

There are some technical downsides. It's prone to crashes, and often paths need to be redrawn because of pixellation rather than having the wrong idea.

Nevertheless, at the price of free, this is one of the better spoof games out there, and one I can't help wondering would earn Jonathan Blow's nod.

I do hope Bradley Lovell's Subcreation Studio can get to a full-length puzzler – or more quality spoofs – soon. I think the Myst series could do with the treatment...

Good Sunday afternoon fun.

The most meta game imaginable, this art-house story about a self-defeating game designer manages to outdo the Stanley Parable at its own self-referential game.

Like Stanley, it's an superbly narrated visual novel, and while it's not as witty or fun-filled as Stanley, it's a fascinating glimpse into what it takes to create true art in a game, and what compromises need to be made.

Relaxing, gothic, funny, and made me feel somewhat reflective about life.

Gameplay-wise, it's a set of simple physics, item combination and hidden object games linked by a loose story where you're a slightly evil landlord, but that's okay because everyone else is just as bad.

It's part of the new genre of "make it fit" games such as Unpacking or A Little to the Left that can be enjoyed for their satisfying interaction mechanics, particularly animations and sounds. The difference is that Madison Karrh's stories have a macabre edge that gives a feeling of more depth, as well as a bit of humour as you enjoy the bizarre ways the characters live.

All Madison Karrh's games so far have been top notch. She's a unique dev to keep an eye on.

15 minutes of surreal interactive rainbow-coloured claymation.

Free, didn't outstay its welcome and pleased the senses.

The video game version of thinking over your life and where it fits into the universe while looking into the reflections of two facing mirrors.

A surreal, jazzy interactive movie with scenes that you spin around, zoom in to, fast forward or rewind, like a pop up book where the scenes sometimes move themselves.

Full of imagination, artistry and creativity, and low on puzzle solving and clear answers.

I was okay with that, a relaxing trip was what I needed.

No Man's story continues in sequel Nirvana Noir Kickstarted by the Feral Cat Den devs.

Simply the best "choices matter" point-and-click game of all time, a decade before the subgenre became popular, and the top video game movie adaptation of all time, faithfully adapting but avoiding duplication of one of the top sci-fi movies of all time.

That's a lot of superlatives, but however you feel about the dated tech, for those who love the film and have not played this game, it should be an immediate buy.

The main thing you're getting here that almost every other game in the genre lacks for budget, licensing and public perception reasons is the quality of the writing. It's a sad truth that the lack of decent writing is the main thing holding back gaming from going truly mainstream - although some titles in recent years (most often from smaller studios) are beginning to change this. This game has the goldmine of a Hampton Fancher / David Peoples script to use as a base, but then adds its own similar story in a 50/50 mix.

It's very hard to find faults with the game beyond the technical. Westwood had a much more full licence to use movie assets than I think is usual - and they also took that licence further than most, down to recreating specific shots from the movie in minute detail, using parts of the legendary Vangelis soundtrack, using lines from the movie script, using actors from the movie, and even including a surprising police scene from the Philip K ♥♥♥♥ novel that the movie omitted.

The best thing about the adaptation is the good taste, restraint and balance the devs showed in recreating enough of the movie that players will feel immense nostalgia, while at the same time making it clear to players that the story is parallel but not the same - surprises still hit. (If you have finished the game, I would recommend reading the deleted lines and scenes from the game that can be found online, to see the care the writers took in preserving characters' ambiguity).

Surprises are where the strongest two original design features of the game come through - the freedom to end every conflict how you like, plus the randomisation of which characters are replicants. Even today games are very limited by budget in terms of making their stories branch, but Blade Runner was the first time I saw this done in a meaningful way, with changes affecting your path even early game, rather than tacked on at the end.

To be clear, the freedom this game offers is still about choices made at key selected points rather than the kind of line-by-line freedom of expression that some games in recent years can now offer - this is no Disco Elysium or Red Strings Club. But it's a polished movie-like experience in a way they aren't, despite coming 20 years before them.

Downsides
There is one rather bizarre omission from the game, which it's incredible to believe the original devs overlooked, considering the freedom this game offered was more or less unique at the time. At no point does the game tell you that choices matter. You could concievably complete a full playthrough wondering why dialogue options are so limited, not realising that you have the choice to not attack replicants, to let them walk away, or even to help their cause - the game always draws your gun for you. If ever there was a chance to show off a game's main feature with a 30-second tutorial screen this was it... My advice would be: Every time you are about to meet a character you've been looking for, save the game and look for different ways to resolve things.

The game's art is still superb and fits the story perfectly, but there's a tiresome accessibility problem with miniscule pixellated clues you can barely see. It's always been a contradiction in the detective genre, but that shouldn't excuse this game, particularly as it's been re-released a number of times now.

Thoughts on the port
This review won't mark down the 2022 Nightdive Enhanced version of the game, as there is simply no other choice on Steam or GOG. The game is also available elsewhere. I'd still recommend purchasing in a Steam sale even if you are a purist, because the game does include a launch option to play a classic version.

I don't hate the 2022 version, but Nightdive have done little to justify the game's new subtitle. (But then Ridley Scott hardly added much between his various versions, some of which detracted from the experience...)
The main changes are to the interface, which is cleaned up and made more user-friendly, and subtitles are clearer to read.
It does add a graphic smoothing filter that can be toggled on and off. I don't mind that either - because the original 1997 version was always a grainy mess as it was downscaled for computers of the time.
However, Nightdive missed a big trick with their interface changes by not adding an accessible "show interactive items" button, as several objects are tiresomely tiny - I found several clues simply because I remembered they were there rather than by sight.

My personal preference short of a full 3D reworking of the whole game (please, someone, it's been 25 years!), would be for future editions to focus on value added: Developer commentary and interviews, soundtrack (for the non-Vangelis parts), and either the option to play with deleted content, or a separate deletions gallery. When a development team has shown such good judgement in their adaptation, I think they would have a lot to say.

The road home
The only other adaptations I've seen that come close to this would be Star Trek: 25th Anniversary and Judgment Rites, but they don't have the polish of BR.

One of the absolute high points of point-and-click games, movie adaptations, detective games, and sci-fi games. A landmark in gaming history, with some janky pixels.

Hallucinogenic neon city nights, smooth synths and wry nihilistic goth/emo quips and artistic statements can't cover up for a cyberpunk world as thin as a pop-up book.

The excellent visual artists do all the heavy lifting in this game, because for 90% of the first two acts of the same, most conversations in the game are limited to two or three stilted lines - partly because of lead character Fyn's depressed and drug-addled ex band-member world view, but mostly because not enough dialogue was written. This is a problem when the whole joy of cyberpunk storytelling is to listen to people's tales of how they have been affected by the messed up way of the world - without that, you feel no connection with the game world or its characters, and it's a matter of trudging aimlessly from one location to another to progress the action - I avoid saying story, as there largely isn't one.

Making the aimlessness problem even worse, the game relies on actions that are split between several arbitrarily named locations with equally arbitrary actions that need to be completed in a set order. This despite the fact it's usually immediately clear to the player what to do - leading to a playstyle involving repeatedly revisiting locations until an interaction or passage of time triggers the game to progress by revealing a new, equally superficial character or path, allowing them to take the action they had already worked out, or even tried before with a failure response.

If you were to write out the actions needed to progress the game from start to finish (Episodes 1 & 2) without the circling it demands, I am fairly sure this could be summed up on a single page.

Somewhere in here, there is the germ of a story about how lack of access to gender-affirming care is limited by a cold corporate system accessible only to elites, but this is largely implicit until the very end of the second episode (the end of the game at the time of review). At that point, the game's final area which actually features perhaps four coherent conversations in a row, and does not require any pointless backtracking to other zones to complete its story, makes you wonder why the rest of the 20-odd locations in the game weren't designed like that - it would have made a passable if brief visual novel.

If this game is going to continue development, I would suggest the developers first revist the first two episodes and write out full conversation trees for all character interactions, allowing the player to question the characters properly to flesh out the world and story far more. This would make a world the player would want to spend more time in - and also would allow clues on where to go next to be hidden there. Secondly, and on a related note, if the game is going to spontaneously generate a solution to a puzzle somewhere else in the game world, either provide a clue to the new location, or simply tell the player to go there. There is no joy in making the player randomly revisit locations in the hope of finding the change. Finally, on a basic technical/accessibility level: please place a brightly coloured (neon?) outline around the black mouse pointer, which regularly gets lost on black backgrounds, and include a keyboard button that reveals the text of all interactive items within a scene.

The art got me through this game - I hope that one day this skeleton will have the flesh added on.

Unsettling ethical choices round off this dour, polished and relaxing Nordic-style sci-fi point and click adventure as an augmented detective in a small-town setting.

A branching skill tree based on a few key decisions adds a layer of flexibility not usually seen in Adventure Game Studio games, which should be applauded - and picked up by other titles, if they can stomach what must have been quite a bit of extra development time. However, the reality is that the choices outside the empathic path seem awkward and unappealing.

The ethical choice raised at the ending does add interest to the brief ending, but I suggest the developers should have taken it further and allowed any of the characters present at the end to be selected for the final action - that would have given the chance to end the game on an Outer Limits-style high note rather than the whimper it goes out on.

The overall level of retro polish, on visual, audio and systems levels is so high that I think any point-and-click fan, and most sci-fi fans will enjoy this. Except for one puzzle with a bit of guesswork with a password, puzzles are deductive and avoid the surreal game-logic pitfall that is usually the genre's weak point.

Where the game could disappoint some is that it doesn't come close to genre benchmarks like Red Strings Club or Blade Runner in terms of really hitting the player with action, with emotion, or presenting them with genuinely challenging or opaque choices. But then again, who does...?

It's a relaxing, downbeat, and at times thought-provoking look at the direction of the world. If you are fine with a game that stays serious, grey, matter of fact and logical throughout without any real highs, there is much calm sleuthing action to enjoy here. That may not sound appealing to everyone, but personally I was in the mood for something sad, slow and steady, and it worked for me.

If you're looking for a fast-paced game, one with dramatic set-pieces that really get you tearing up, or gives you real dilemmas, I suggest looking elsewhere.

Overall a quiet win for Clifftop and Faravid - ones to watch.

This bloody point-and-click visual novel about an emotionally and physically abusive relationship doesn't show that abuse, but describes it through graphic novel-style cutscenes, voice-overs and simple first person sections.

The story is stylishly told through a series of little repeated vignettes, but in the end the story's too thin to even sustain interest into the first repetition. The story should have started to affect the scenes, changing the gameplay each time.

I would not describe this a puzzle game, because the scenes are solved by randomly clicking on items until animations occur and the action plays out.

There's only half an hour's gameplay here, but the varied approach to storytelling does show promise for Szymanski's future projects.