Recent reviews by Phelyne

"Don't play this game if you have anxiety or depression."
I don't have anxiety or depression, I have anxiety and depression! :D

But uh, yeah. I should have listened to that warning. That ♥♥♥♥♥♥ me up pretty bad. It's well-written though. I stopped after the... twist.

I can honestly say that this is one of the best games I've ever played, and I've played hundreds. I finished it in one sitting.

The game feels very "real" in a way, and it's like you forget about everything else. It's a pretty amazing feeling.

Pros:
Well-written characters
The game feels very real
You forget about everything else while playing (I guess that's only a pro for some people.)
The art style, is somehow relaxing (Much like everything else about this game.)
Almost nothing in this game is time-based. You can just take your time to do anything.
Amazing story
I could go on all day about how amazing this game is, and I wouldn't have praised it enough.

Cons:
Sometimes your choices in conversation seem annoyingly limited. (This makes sense however, as the writers want to make the conversation drag the story in a certain direction. It just makes the game feel less "real", which it otherwise does really well.)

I feel like this is the most important part:
I can only speak for myself, but I got so attached to the characters that it felt horrible when the game was over. This is obviously not a design flaw in the game, and it's not a critique either. Quite the opposite, in fact. But I think it's important to mention that walking away from this game again, I feel like I've made friends and lost them again.

The black box hides a spoiler. Mouseover to reveal.
You could even say it's like after you finish the game, you can choose to leave it behind forever and lose your friends, or replay it and realize that the characters are just shapes coded to talk to you in a specific way. Of course you already know that, but somehow that fact will become more real in your head.

But ultimately, do I recommend this game?
Eff yeah, I do. Knowing how good it is now, I'd easily have paid double price for it. It's a masterpiece. Can't wait for the Director's Cut in December.

You can skip the first paragraph if you don't care about it. It's not that relevant to the review.

Before you start reading the actual review, know that I received this game from Humble Monthly (A bundle of random games that I receive on a monthly basis.) I did however check the trailer before redeeming the CD key, so I did have some interest in the game judging by the trailer. Not enough to pay full price for it, but considering that I have more than 200 games and that I also do other things in life, even deciding to play a game from Humble Monthly means I do have a fair bit of interest in it.

I know I didn't play this much, but I simply didn't want to force myself to.
The visuals are really pretty in the trailer, but when everything is rainbow, you get really tired of it after 30 minutes. It's at times difficult to figure out where to go (Not at first, but later on), and the map function doesn't help much. At the same time, the game feels repetetive and dragged out.

But more importantly: The horror aspect of this game.
What I like about many horror games is that they build tension, and they seem exciting. This game had nothing like that. I felt myself getting bored wandering around the repetetive landscape of rainbow-colored dots.
And of course, like any crappy horror game, it has jumpscares. Now I'm not saying that jumpscares makes a game crappy, but I am saying it can be a cheap substitute for not knowing how to write good horror. There was one incredibly loud, unexpected and sudden jumpscare around 10-15 minutes in. It was a silhouette of a man suddenly appearing near me and screaming incredibly loudly I looked at it unimpressed, then I stared at it waiting for it to stop. The game developers apparently expected me to be very scared of this, seeing as I had to actually leave the place for the sceaming to stop.
I have anxiety, and this game failed to scare me. I repeat: A game designed to scare people without anxiety failed to scare a person with anxiety.

So all in all, I cannot recommend this game at all. Not for the story, not for the visuals, not for the horror, and not for anything else in the gameplay.

Extremely disappointing. Go play Orcs Must Die! Unchained for a very similar concept executed much, much better.

Amazing story, definitely worth every penny. I enjoyed this a lot.

Messes up my dual monitors, and can't even join a channel, as the game just stops responding when I try.
11/10 best game

Great game to kill some time. It's great to have a sandbox game to play around with when you want a break from all those difficult games like Hyper Light Drifter and Momodora: Reverie under the Moonlight, and all those serious story games like OneShot and The Wolf Among Us.

I definitely recommend this if you need a game to just play around with and destress.

I love this game! I played through the whole thing in one session. Great stealth game, probably not the most difficult one out there once you get the hang of it, but great fun nonetheless.

Challenging, fun, and original. This game has all that a Roguelike needs. It's truly worth its price. I wish they'd add online multiplayer, but I suppose that's difficult in a Bullet Hell game.

I recommend this for any fan of Roguelike and/or Bullet Hell games.

This game has absolutely amazing visuals, and honestly the game would almost be worth full price if all you could do is walk around the world freely to look at it.
Luckily this game offers much more than that. It's really difficult, in a nice way. Don't expect to kill a boss within the first few tries. The difficulty keeps the gameplay fresh.
The soundtrack is great too!

The only issue I have with this game is that it's often really hard to tell where you're supposed to go next. I often find myself searching the map for new accessible places, ending up just roaming around in places I've already been for more than an hour before finally finding the place I need to be to progress through the game.

Nonetheless, I definitely recommend it!