This was an interesting... game? Experiment? It was an impressive mimicry of a smartphone and Replika-style apps, especially if you register for facial recognition and it "scans" your face, which is likely to be right in front of the game window as if it were an actual phone. I appreciated the ability to change the text colors, and while it would have been nice if palettes besides the default also had matching backgrounds, the lack of it hardly ruined my experience. You nailed the bland pleasantness of digital assistants and the chirpy, supportive persona of Replika, and it was obvious when it 'shifted' to an official notification from Prometheus and then back after it was resolved. I did a couple of playthroughs and it was interesting to note what changed: Ex. I turned Anonymize Data on and turned off some other options on my first playthrough and went with the defaults on the second, which resolved the 'suspicious activity' flag much more easily. It did make me think about the give-and-take we take for granted with our devices and digital identity, which is... not reassuring. Interesting to play around with and it gave me something to think about, so thanks!
Viewing post in Ember: Your Personal Household Assistant comments
Thanks so much for playing! You've definitely hit on some of the key points we were hoping to bring up through the app with regards to things like privacy vs convenience. And I'm glad you like the messenger setup! I'll keep in mind your suggestion for the themes, too, as it's something I'd be interested in expanding on in the future. Thank you for the thoughtful review :)