So I played Dustborn first, in which I wasn't really a big fan of personally, but I played this game, and good news, I liked it quite a bit more, although it isn't exactly perfect.

I think this is a perfectly fine game. It's not amazing, but its certainly worth your time for a narrative driven game.

For starters, this game has a focus on three main parts, Betty, your own character in relation to other characters, and the mystery. That is literally it. It is admittedly pretty dry with its delivery of its story, but I felt that despite it taking quite a while before I had gotten invested in the story, I felt that it did carry my interests until the very end. I greatly prefer this type of storytelling compared to just, trying to do everything at once with equal importance, simply scattered all over the place in a messy manner.

I really like the approach to this story a lot more. This isn't a "we are telling you exactly what happened" or "we're just going to be vague about this just for the sake of it" or "you see this? You have to believe it or not believe it." This is a game in which you essentially create your own interpretation of events and your own interpretation of what exactly happens to your own character or characters within the story, and its a really cool way to tell a unique story that, has its foundations within Norwegian folk lore while as to not simply copy and paste the actual mythology. To create its own unique story, while having these elements elevate and improve the overall experience as you will. I also feel that this perfectly fits the whole "being led on by a red thread" story telling that encompasses the studio's style.

I think another aspect of this game that I just liked a lot better was the way that the quote on quote "unlikable" was handled here when it came to characters. In this game, the characters are all still pretty much likable in their own ways, and they also have their own flaws, in their own ways, but you get to see and experience these characters, as you find out what happens in the story, actually try to address their own flaws head on, have actual importance in the plot, rather than simply ignore them or overly praise the characters just for the sake of being told "the characters are likable" even if that isn't necessarily the case. I think the other aspect of this is that this is definitely a mature and serious story, which again can at times make the game feel a bit too dry, but I think that it was for the better.

The soundtrack, perfectly fits the game. The soundtrack, is actually really good, one of the best parts about the game for sure. Not only does it really fit the overall setting and time period, but it also gives off that "mystical, mythological, mysterious" vibe that it should, while still having the diversity and creation of atmosphere and ambiance that aided the overall experience. It is really well done.

Graphically speaking, also a lot better, although this is where the flaws of the game start to show.

I almost wished that with its black and white mode, I wonder what this game would of looked like if it were to be graphically designed to be either just black and white or perhaps black and white within a slight tint of color, or perhaps a select color type of look. I feel like even though the game looks decent, I just felt like at times when switching between the two different modes, I felt like something in between the two modes would of been best and really make the game stand out with its visuals a lot more. Perhaps a neutral color type of look? I don't know, just something that makes the best of both worlds.

Speaking of which, level design. Much like with their other games so far, it's still not great, too linear, barely anything to explore, and when you find something, yes it's still better, but its only really story specific information and that's it, nothing else. It's interesting, but there really isn't anymore established world building here besides from the main story, which again is just the creative style of this game much like their other games. This game would of benefited massively from more lore within the game. This time, there is an even more interesting world here to do that with, but that isn't the case. You get the plot, and that's it.

The other aspect is the run time. Yes, it's not too long, but this to me feels too short and in the opposite direction. I feel like this game could of been much longer than it was, perhaps two or three times the length. About 3 hours? That is way too short.

I feel like this is also reflective in the points when the story didn't provide enough context in certain important aspects of the plot. It's not that it didn't make sense in these instances, it just needs more time to develop, more time to learn additional clues and details, more time to build up tension, etc...

Still, this was really cool to play, and I greatly enjoyed it, and it makes me want to play their other games. I am going to give this game a 7/10.

As Dusk Falls is a fairly interesting take on the visual novel genre. Primarily, the way that choices work in particular make this for an interesting buy, especially if you perhaps want a more unique experience with multiple players making choices for different characters at the same time. Multiple perspectives at once is definitely the game's strength, as it not only provides its unique interactions and game play, but it also makes you think differently and take more consideration for the choices that you do make. This is typically seen at the end of chapters when you realize that you're often making choices for two or even three narrative paths in the story at once, in a simultaneous manner.

The game does a great job of keeping its overall serious but hopeful tone. I felt like the music was very reflective of this, and so is the writing, which has its flaws, but for the most part I felt that the writing was overall compelling, and still worked well with going between different characters and different time periods. I was worried that perhaps the story would jump around too much or maybe the pacing of the game would get thrown off, but that isn't the case here.

I also felt that overall, the game never took me out of the experience either. This is a very "grounded in reality" type of game, and it certainly sometimes feels a bit unexciting for it, but overall I don't really see that as an issue.

What I do see an issue with is the visual style, and it isn't necessarily with the game's graphics itself, but rather the character models and the decision to use still like images for the characters to display emotions. This to me hinders the game when it comes to the overall delivery of the actors, and it honestly took me out of the experience more than it helps it. Emotions, are pretty dynamic, both in game and just in the general real world, but this isn't reflective of that here, and I found the overall visual style to honestly hold back the game, almost as if "if the game had a higher budget, then they could of afforded to make player models, even if they were not as realistic."

Another issue I had with the game was the audio mixing. Sometimes the characters talking was a little too quiet for me personally, granted there are ways to adjust this, but I'll still mention it since I noticed it enough in the game to where it was an issue that occurred on multiple occasions.

I also felt that although you do get a lot of choices that you can make that do in fact change the game, at times the game can feel like you're being funneled into going back to a singular factor, and then making a choice again, which to me removed some of the magic of having such open ended choices in the first place. This game would of definitely benefited more from a "Detroit Become Human" style of choice system, whereby it is simply as open as it can be all the time.

On a final note, the story isn't without its flaws, particularly when it came to the endings, in which some endings just don't make any sense at all, while even getting "good" endings felt strangely, not satisfying? I don't know, I just felt that the game's endings just feel very anti-climatic, and the ending, after the endings, which again is just confusing, felt like a random cliffhanger for a sequel.

Overall though, I did enjoy this game, and I do recommend this game, especially if you are a fan of visual novel games. I am going to give this game a 6/10.