When they released their last "game", someone pointed out that one of the developers, chard, was mockingly posting negative reviews left by players along with messages that we "just don't get it".

I posted a reply to this person (who had their message re-posted on Twitter as well) thanking them for sharing this information. I was banned from their forums.

I'm sure they'll delete this post and ban me here too, but I figured I'd try to share the message here as well. Don't support a company that attempts to suppress and censor people. Don't support a company that mocks the player base.

This is just another short and shallow game by developers that ban critics from their forums and attempt to shame reviewers by posting their negative reviews on their twitter account and mocking them.

Honestly, I don't mind them trying to place political messages in their games. And perhaps being a shovelware company isn't a bad thing by itself. But attempting to silence and intimidate players is not acceptable.

Good, very short sequel to The Night Fisherman from the same team. Play that title before, Great visuals and sound. Not so impactfull like the prequel, but still a great title. Some branches alters the end.

Gameplay video:

https://youtu.be/LdrWf4sGxDw

Different route:

https://youtu.be/xcrLqIuh9_k

Considering the title and the game's thumbnail, I thought that The Outcast Lovers was going to be a story about interracial lesbians but it turned out to be about how this lesbian couple poorly handles the discovery of an injured child refugee washed upon the shore. I understand the meaning behind wanting to make a game like this but the story, its characters, and its presentation are so... empty? Inappropriately represented? I was confused by the end and had no feelings towards any of the characters.

To summarise: the couple accidentally runs down a refugee on a beach with their car. Since one of the women is conveniently a doctor, instead of taking the child to receive medical help for the multiple concussions, contusions, shock, possible broken bones and internal bleeding, they kidnap the refugee and try to offer them sweets to make them talk. The other woman is a political cartoonist/journalist/activist so they then argue about politics and what they should do for the rest of the game, seemingly ignoring this slowly dying refugee child beside them, and also ignoring the people approaching their secluded house. Then the authorities that they feared would take the refugee appear at their door and make a final choice. The end? No, the game then asks you to save your current progress so that you may continue this storyline at some point in the future. So, the story is basically 1.5 acts with no actual conclusion. Nice.

All three characters aren't likeable. One of the women comes off aggressive and swears constantly, freaking out the refugee who can't understand what's being said. The other woman doesn't provide a doctor's duty of care and instead chooses to commit malpractice (in my opinion) by continuing to ignore this incredibly traumatised and injured refugee. Instead they would rather argue about how terrible immigration policy is and if they should hide this kid from the authorities, all so that they can make themselves feel better by virtue signalling without actually having done anything regarding the wellbeing of this child. At no point do we learn anything about the child and their backstory, we don't see or hear them speak, there's no reason to sympathise or empathise with their plight. They're just an object to push the story along. What is going on here in terms of narrative storytelling? It feels more like I'm being yelled at by a passionate yet angry writer through the medium of video games.

It's unfortunate, really. There are good intentions here but it's all just so incredibly poorly executed. If you're interested in exploring these type of issues in an abstract way then I absolutely recommend seeing the movie 'HIS HOUSE' instead.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGeZfjmPRJk

A pair of engaging characters lead this bright story, focused on current themes. It has wit, direction and good pacing. The dialogue is sharp and the graphics clean.

There are, however, some caveats.

Since there's no backstory for the boy, the player has no attachment to them and thus isn't invested in their survival. He does nothing to present himself as likeable, which breaks any tension in the story. There are no stakes because we aren't given a reason to care.

This story doesn't suit the game medium in it's current format. Characters don't interact, rather there are stage directions with no corresponding on-screen actions. It works in a short story where the audience is forced to imagine, but in this case it appears disjointed and somewhat lazy. Why have characters if you aren't going to animate them?

The setting/scene also falls flat. It doesn't contribute enough to the story to make this a worthwhile VISUAL experience. The story is fine, but in this medium, it doesn't maximise its potential.


-1 for bashing Werther's Originals

⠀

A nice game can be played, but very, very short

Alright so all your games are gonna be short stories about how bad are the anti-immigration laws with no gameplay at all. Got it.

But there are people that already do that with actual gameplay and deeper story, and most important, an intelligent sense of humour. They don't throw your political message like a 5 year old child story. Not Tonigh, for example.

This game is really beautiful and it has a great soundtrack.

So why am I giving it a "no"?

The story is oddly emotionally disconnected given the topic. It felt very clinical, no pun intended, and although I understood why the characters were saying the things they said the coldness was really off putting given that a traumatized child was sitting there the entire time. The illusion of choice was pretty blatant here- don't give me the option to act lovingly then have the characters still behave just as coldly as before. It made me feel a lot less sympathy for the leads while also causing me to totally check out from the story.

The Outcast Lovers is beautiful game with a great soundtrack that is marred by odd story choices and an emotional disconnect from a topic that should provoke an emotional investment.

I admit I openly ridiculed some of the dialogues in this game. Especially the part with "Werther's Original".
But that's kind of the issue with Outcast Lovers. It is a narrative game, with pretty much the same pros and cons as it's prequel, The Night Fisherman. But this time, instead of making us experience or feel the narrative, the game just force-feeds us it's main message.
And since the main message (Immigration system evil and cruel, outcasts helping immigrants marginalized, brave and warm-hearted) is the same as in the prequel game, all the tension is gone. We know how the story is going to end. And we know why.

It is a classic case of "show, don't tell" rule not being applied to a narrative.
I believe Far Few Giants (the crew that developed and published Outcast Lovers) has some great talent in it's ranks. They have enough programming skill to make a narrative game, the low-poly graphics are beautiful in their own right, the music is amazing at times, far above the average for an indie (or even non-indie) game. But for some reason, instead of using that talent to make a game, FFG decided to give us the "message". A message that is polarizing, but never fully developed through arguments, facts, plot twists or impactful emotions. And it is the same one we got the last time we played one of their games.

Finally, on the side note (and it's a bizarre one). The desktop icon for this game is the same as the one for The Night Fisherman. Is it really one big game divided into episodes, but they never told us that? Is it some artistic, meta message on the narrative that I'm missing? Or was somebody just too lazy to design this game it's own desktop icon?

I'm really starting to enjoy this series of socially aware and politically charged, slightly dystopian mini-narrative games because this one is already an improvement from the first part: Beautifully colourful shot in the opening, a realistic and well-written conflict, a thrilling last minute. The music felt kinda comedic being as blaring and jazzy as it is, but apart from that I enjoyed my 10 minutes. 6/10