Последние обзоры Truewhit

I first played the original browser game “Gods will be watching” over a decade ago when I was still in high school. I discovered on the pc gaming news site “rock paper shotgun” where it was described as a difficult and gruelling strategy pixel art game where you had to optimize a stranded crews resources on a deserted planet to survive.

I still have memories of many of Burdens men resorting to cannibalism and eating the groups dog to survive or destroying the robot for spare parts. Many hours in the schools computer lab were spent trying to come up with the perfect solution. I only survived a few times with some of the crew not being able to make it.

I remember being delighted to hear that a full game not just a single scenario was being developed to expand on the story of those survivors. It was going to be one of the first games I ever bought on steam. However when it first released reviews were mixed so I held up on playing and buying it. Now over a decade later were those mixed reviews right?

I can understand peoples distaste for the difficulty of the puzzles and I only was able to finish the game of original light which is a little easier then the original difficulty setting. However I enjoyed how the game challenges the player to find the solution when all things look hopeless and nothing is more satisfying then winning against what at first seemed a hopeless situation.

The story itself was engaging science fiction with a fun setting, very show don’t tell. The ending was a little bit predictable with time travel being involved but the epilogue (which I believe was post launch free dlc) helped improve what would have been an ok ending into a great ending.

In the epilogue we get to see the repercussions of our final choice in the main game in a 20 year timeskip and I must say I actually wish the main game was more like the epilogue. Almost every turn of the puzzle (climbing a steep mountain) has all the characters talk to each other about what had happened in the 20 years since the last mission. You really get to see a lot of depth and humanity with all the characters and I wish in the previous missions you got more character banter as in previous missions some characters felt a little one note.

All in all as long as your ready for a difficult puzzle with resource management and some si fi shinanigans I highly recommend this game. It may not be for everyone but it’s a true gem.

It seems that this game is quite successful when it comes to being an indie point and click adventure with very positive reviews. I sadly am an outlier.

The games central idea is fun enough, you are a Detective working for the twin lakes police department and there are mini “cases” that you must solve. This gives the story episodic gameplay with self inclosed short stories like a tv show. However though it prides itself with being a comedy game the jokes in this game are just… not funny.

The humour ranges from breaking the fourth wall, references to other media properties and snarky immature “adult humour”. It feels like a bad forgotten adult animated fox cartoon given video game form. None of the characters are really likeable most are unpleasant or just boring and apathetic.

It’s fine to have little references to other media in stories but when the vast majority of jokes are just references it feels like the authors have too little to say about their own work or are just lacking in creativity making jokes.

Even the adult jokes are not really clever. Here is an example of some books found in the children’s section of a library in the second case:

“Grumpy Chris hates to play”
“A guide to baby safe shots”
“Daddy’s little disappointment”
“Bad baby incites a riot”
“Kindergarten Kate summons the devil”
“Little and big poop save the day”

Most of these jokes are ether edgy snark or just bathroom humour.

I was really looking forward to a comedy anthology of supernatural crime stories but I had to stop playing this unfunny game before even finishing the second case. If you want a good point and click adventure with comedy I recommend the classics “Sam and Max hit the road” or “Day of the tentacle”.

A fantatic creepy short story that showcases mental illness with great empathy but also
warts and all. The reveal at the end caught me by surprise. I love all the little details that slowly paint a portrait of a small rural town in washington and its people. Great protagonist with flaws and heart. A great short horror story.

a short and unsatisfying game with little roleplay options. Could have used a richer conversation system and better dialogue.

A charming and amusing game, though some times a little too random. looking forward to future updates and end game, though it already feels complete besides post run content.

Dark, terrifying and also sometimes strangely Hilarious. A horror game that despite its simple graphics really draws you in. Very satisfying getting the good end where the intruder gets their just deserts. Also teaches us that fire fighters kick ass!

A fun take on cultist simulator but more grounded. Artist life has you living as a starving artist in a fictional 1910s city. Balance creating a painting to change the world with paying the bills. managing passions ideas and emotions as timed cards is really clever. Its nice to have a game where the goal isnot to kill orcs but make art. really my cup of tea.

Man, this game caught my eye browsing a strangers steam reviews and I feel so lucky that I found this gem. One of the best horror experiences I have played this year. You play as the voice in the head of a woman whose life has gone on a downward spiral and you get to choose how you will influence her fear and depression. It’s eight dollars in steam and I finished it in an hour. It really reminded me of my favourite horror where the protagonist slowly loses their grasp on their sanity. If you like psychological horror then you really should give this game a try.

While a few of these stories are interesting the lack of being able to skip through dialogue really makes some of the stories drag. The epilogue to afterstory also was really weird and confusing. I cant recommend this.

This review Contains Spoilers:
I just finished Clannad and I must say it is deserving of its praises of one of the great visuel novels of all time. Truly a tear jerker that will connect you to its world and remind the reader of their own life experiences and their own family, the good times and the bad.

The game tells the story of a young man on his last year of highschool who has given up on his future and just idling his time loafing around with his idiot friend. A chance encounter with a girl on his way to school leads him to reach his hand out, and thus a new chapter of the protagonist unlocking his empathy and forging new connections takes place.
After the prologue the player i able to choose diffrent paths for the protagonist, which may lead to him forging a strong connection with someone in his life or go back into his shell of nihilism.

The most entertaining part of the story is how each path tells a different fact about the world, and how in later playthroughs you will be informed about other charicters behaviours by previous playthroughs. This helps let the setting feel like a breathing living town. Its like looking at alt histories, and seeing how the same characters react to diffrent situations was amusing as well as moving.

This was the first japanese visuel novel I had ever read and I greatly enjoyed how their was a "dangopedia" that explained refrences and terms that most non japanese people would not get. The music is very charming. The only real problems I had with the presentation was the art, which feels dated and distracting at times, though the story is able to forgive the strange presentation and make the player feel empathy for its characters.

I first played the majority of all routes two years ago, ending it with the Tomoyo route. Right when i finished that I played the "sequel" Tomoyo after, the after story for the tomoyo route. Though at the start I felt like it was a little too different from what I enjoyed about Clannad I came to again be engaged by the story and characters. The end of Tomoyo after really gripped me the most, which was a tragedy when the protagonist of the first game dies during brain surgery. The message of moving on from hardship and helping others by sharing and support others was very moving and I cried for two days straight after such an end.

Though sad the ending spoke to me as it reminded me of my Grandfather taking care of my grandmother when she had dementia, always being faithful. After her death he was able to move on and live the rest of years happy after finding a girl friend who was able to take care of him instead of the other way around. After such a great experience I decided to take a break from clannad and move on something different as I was getting a little burnt out by the common route.

Two years later I play clannad again and it was even better then I remembered. I think more years of life and experiencing the separation of my parents really made me more receptive and understanding of the stories themes of what a family means. Playing the final route with the main girl "Nagisa" was touching and reminded me of many of my own life experiences. Through the entire after story I was constantly crying, no wonder the genre of visuel novels this game is a part of is translated to mean tear jerker!

What really moved me was how the game depicted the depression of the protagonist after losing his partner. Seeing the start of their relationship from high school from its highs and lows to end of their relationship when Nagisa dies in childbirth had me in tears, As the reader I could feel how numb and lost Tomoya had become after five years had passed since his daughter had been born and he had lost his wife. Thus it was very rewarding seeing him reconnect to his daughter and become a doteing parent. Indeed they even lay seeds of a new romantic interest and a story of a single father takeing care of his daughter. However it ends in tragedy again with his daughter coming down with a sickness and the protagonist clutching her body in the snow. It then cut to the menu.

I knew that there was a "true" ending so I do what a walkthrough told me to do and in the true ending.... a new timeline plays where Nagisa lives. I was shocked. Though I felt happy that in this timeline she survived It disappointing. In the original after story ending I see the protagonist go through great hardship as a single parent only for an arbitrary illness take his last reminder of his wife away from him. The "good ending" erases all the development and hardship that the previous stories protagonist by having Nagisa live. I feel like a better development would be the miracle at the end saves the daughter from sickness, instead the true ending restores the status quo. It makes all that Tomoyo went though in the original after story feel meaningless.

In one of the extra side stories in the Higurashi series a character name Rika leaves a timeline that has all the heros living in a world where none of their hardships had occured. Rika appologies for leaving a world where all her friends had experienced no hardship to satisfy her own desires but her friends say that though what all of them went through was sad they became stronger people for it. I feel the same thing about the "true" ending of Clannad.

What could have been a strong ending where a single father is able to move on from the death of his wife becomes a magic fantasy where wishes come true. Perhaps its because I had played Tomoyo after and had expected an ending more bittersweet. It does not help that we do not see any real secnes of the happy true ending after the birth of the child, making it feel even more fake and unreal. Despite the "true" ending being disappointing and not what I had wished this visuel novel is truly a great collection of stories about a town and a boy who grew to love it. I would recommend it in a heart beat.