Skip to main content

On Sale: GamesAssetsToolsTabletopComics
Indie game storeFree gamesFun gamesHorror games
Game developmentAssetsComics
SalesBundles
Jobs
TagsGame Engines
(1 edit) (+3)(-3)

The worldbuilding is interesting, the characters are fun and colorful to read, and there are elements of mystery that keep you going forward. But I must emphasize the massive pile of missed potential that this story is.

So the game starts with the MC in a seriously troubled place, where they purposelessly wander the lands and wallow in their sorrow. It is a cool starting point and it makes you wonder how they ended up in this situation and what they will do now. But instead of continuing the story from here and giving the answers about MC's past as the story progresses, it pulls the rug under you and sends you back to MC's birth, from where you play as the MC is first five, and then eight years old. And I only assume that as the story goes on, we'll spend more time with MC's childhood and adolescence. 

Don't get me wrong, these two chapters aren't too bad to read. But they nowhere near make it worth the narrative taking you away from the way more interesting state that the MC was in early on. There's just so much that this story could've told in the MC's lost and miserable state than their childhood does. 

(1 edit) (+3)(-2)

I agree.To be honest i was hoping that the backstory will be told to us through small flashbacks as the story continues in the present.Although i dont particularly hate the way the author has taken this i just feel i got bamboozled by the prologue.

(+4)

I expect it is to make the readers more emotionally invested in the tragedy than simply being told there is one. As long as it's done right, I have no problem with it. 

(1 edit) (-3)

I was thinking the same thing!!! The writing is good but I couldn't help getting bored halfway through... and it may or may not be because of my poor attention span

(+4)(-1)

...I'm going to be quite honest, I just think you-and those agreeing with you- have different preferences that the game never said it would cater to. the prologue with the mc as an adult was never meant to be the only version of the mc you play as, nor did the game ever state that was to be expected.

the reason you flash back in time to play as a child is to grow more entrenched in the world and to build up to the mystery of what will happen in the future, the events mc is reacting to in the prologue. *that* is what the game is building up to- and the reason the mc is an adult in the prologue- not for you to be an edgy 30 year old or wtv in the countryside. 

and the story is barely even past the second chapter yet- you don't even know half of the plot, much less the reason why mc was so miserable in the first place. you're meant to experience it along with the protag. you're creating ideas of what's more 'interesting' based off of some tepid idea of what the adult plotline would be like rather than an actual analysis of the existing content so far in the story. 

it just doesn't seem  like you enjoy playing games that have childhood sections. that's not a moral failing, but to be quite honest, your 'criticism' of the story and assertion that it has lost potential is nonsensical. you, aemonisbck, and masoada, just do not like this genre of game. and as a result, you've made judgements and evaluations that are entirely  nonsensical and reaching for something to critique, when your dislike is purely subject to what you enjoy in if, not to any actual fault in the writing. 

(3 edits) (+1)(-2)

First of all; let's stop talking like your idea is the objective truth and the best scenario in the world. Just like I speak based on my preferences and what I believe is the best, so do you. 

Second of all; "the story just has two chapters" argument doesn't work here. In an average book, that still would not be acceptable, because, unless you're a widely popular author like Sanderson or G.R.R.M. then, never mind the first two chapters, you only have the first three pages to hook your audience in. It especially doesn't work here, because while a book's first two chapters are 10k words at most, the story we're presented here is 350+K words, equal to two and a half novel. If you trim all the alternative texts in the story, it would still make 150K+ words at worst, equal to one big novel.

Third of all; I do like child protagonists. If done right, they can add a different nuance to a story. What I don't like is how little they always have going on compared to an adult protagonist in almost any story. They have very little agency to sustain the reader for a long period of time, and they can only explore a little variety of topics as opposed to an adult protagonist that can go through many directions. And when a story tries to put a child protagonist into the shoes of an adult one, it most often goes with an even more bizarre taste. 

Fourth of all; agency. Agency is the one thing that will keep you actually interested in the protagonist of a story. When you read a story, you expect the protagonist to do some shit, preferably cool shit. But when, like in many cases of child protagonist, the protagonist loses the agency they have due to their age or some other reason, the story becomes a chore to go through in order to reach the cooler stuff instead of being something that you can enjoy thoroughly. You wouldn't want to follow a character who's basically a cameraman, would you? Well the childhood portion of the story is where the protagonist is a literal cameraman.

And fifthly; the "tepid" idea presented in the prologue is much more interesting than the childhood portion of the game. Sure, you can like the other one more, but I would rather have a character who goes through an intriguing period of their life instead of a child with very little agency and have just boring slice-of-life childhood sections that nowhere near deserve 350+K words.

Oh and you can add the whole "growing more entrenched in the world" and "building mystery through smaller flashbacks" thing without stealing the entirety of a story as well. That's called good writing. Shoehorning it into the story through an insufferable amount of time isn't that.