La jugabilidad es sencilla, los puzzles con dificultad media/alta, la ambientación y la música son excelentes, la historia es una maravilla que se revela recién llegando al final del juego.






https://store.steampowered.com/curator/38286673/

For a one man team, Silence of the Sleep is a huge accomplishment, and I give full credit to Jesse Makkonen for creating something as big and intricate as this by himself, but that doesn't erase its many flaws. There are plenty of good ideas here that feel held back by questionable design decisions and a somewhat unfocused vision. Perhaps my expectations were too high going in, but I feel like it could have been so much more than it is.

On the surface, this is a brutally hard adventure game. The puzzles can at times be obtuse with clues that in some cases are so incredibly vague one wonders how the developer expected the player to reach the solution at all. The design is very reminiscent of early adventure games where hand holding was certainly not the norm and the player had to put a lot of thought into things. As such, there is a great sense of accomplishment when you've figured out that particularly puzzling obstacle. The problem comes in with the survival horror elements, however. Make no mistake, Silence of the Sleep is as much a survival horror game as it is adventure. Death comes early and often, but a bit too often in my opinion. Something that a lot of developers fail to grasp is that while death is indeed scary, frequent death is not, and only leads to frustration and a break in immersion. This is where I feel the game began to lose me.

Chapter 2 started off great, but by the end I wanted to crack my keyboard in half. Not only are you dealing with some pretty difficult puzzles, but you're continually interrupted from your train of thought by monsters that randomly appear, chasing you into hiding to wait them out lest you end up splattered on the wall. Don't get me wrong, I have no problem with difficulty in games, but it's a fine line to walk, especially when you're asking not only for difficulty in thought but also in mechanics at the same time. If you're giving me a puzzle to solve, give me the time to solve it, forcing me to flee and continually reset my thought process is not fun or scary, it's rage inducing.

Things manage to ease up once you move past that particular area, but then we go from extreme frustration to extreme boredom in Chapter 3. Just when you feel like you're finally getting somewhere with the story, things slow to a crawl and you're forced through mundane tasks for far too long before the action picks up again. I understand that Makkonen was steering the narrative in a particular direction, but the pacing is uneven and thematic tone all over the place. I can't help but feel that the game would have been more effective as either an old school adventure with crazy difficult puzzles or straight survival horror with a bit more mechanical complexity. Juxtaposing the two genres reveals the flaws in both while at the same time stifling the narrative flow.

All of that said, the presentation is phenomenal. There is plenty to admire from the unique puzzles to the interesting mini-games that are sprinkled throughout, most of which are stylistically implemented. And then there are segments that pull you out of the standard gameplay and have you crawling through drain pipes or slowly shambling down a hallway that gets darker and darker with the disgusting and disturbing sounds eventually drowning everything out. These segments are excellent at conveying a sense of foreboding and claustrophobia.

The atmosphere is artfully crafted with sound design that brings this horrific world to life. Some of the audio distortions were extremely disturbing in an almost hypnotic way; there's nothing freakier than hearing a baby's cry morph into almost inhuman moans...creepy stuff. But above all, the artwork. My God, this is a beautiful game in the grittiest, ugliest sense of the word. Jesse Makkonen designed everything himself from the ground up, and that should be commended. His eye for interesting and emotive imagery is spectacular with some of the most artistic graphical design I've seen in an indie title.

The story is also fairly good and doesn't quite go in the direction one might expect. Although the end felt a little rushed and some elements seem to come out of left field, it gives you plenty to think about and possibly a reason to play through it again as there are clues spread throughout that will help further puzzle together what really happened.

And that's where I think I'm the most disappointed. Silence of the Sleep is a horror game that tells an interesting story in a unique and creative way, yet its deficiencies prevent its massive potential from ever fully realizing. And that is why I must ultimately give it a lower score despite really wanting to support this developer. I would recommend the game to those who are interested in an difficult experience, but if you're looking for the next great horror story along the lines of Silent Hill or even The Cat Lady, unfortunately, Silence of the Sleep is not it. Given more time and perhaps another try at the genre, however, I believe Jesse Makkonen may yet get there.

Silence Of The Sleep presenta una jugabilidad sencilla aunque no por eso deja de ser desafiante y bastante entretenido. Si bien el juego puede ser confuso y frustrante, logra su cometido de sacar unos cuantos escalofríos con sus múltiples jumpscares y persecuciones de los enemigos que se presentan. La historia es bastante buena aunque confusa, pero sorprendente con una conclusión inesperada. Muy recomendado si te gustan los indies y el survival horror.

A veces, y solo a veces, logramos obtener una segunda oportunidad. Jacob Reeves fue uno de ellos, pero no de la manera que a él le hubiera gustado. Junto a él, caemos en un viaje de introspección para descubrir por qué se suicidó.
Opera prima de Makkonen, una aventura gráfica sencilla y bastante mala leche en ambiente.

Buen juego

primero lo malo

es corto pero aveces se puede poner lento
los controles pueden resultar molestos
resolver los puzzles aveces es complicado por el diseño poco intutivo
LO BUENO:
Excelente apartado artistico y musical
La historia es muy buena
Da miedo y no depende de los jumpscares

Realmente lo recomiendo tal vez no vaya a ser el mejor juego de terror que juegues pero es realmente bueno

Just what I need after playing Depression Quest, playing a suicidal character known as Jacob Reeves who attempts to kill himself. Instead of ending his existance, he loses his memories and tries to figure out who he is and what happened to him. Silence of the Sleep is a psychological horror game that mixes things up constantly for a refreshing experience.

Story(Pacing)

+Good blend of mystery/horror
+Characters are intelligent and react realistically

This game paces itself well by allowing the player to talk people and walk around the environment without the feeling of tension during the horror sections. Players will fetch them items, solve puzzles for them, or simply chat with them in order to better understand whats going on and solve the mystery.

Basically the game is broken down into two sorts of segments, mystery and horror. The mystery segments are based on figuring out your situation by interacting with the people around you. While the horror segment is solely based on surviving your encounters by using your environment to your advantage.

The characters you meet throughout the game actually act somewhat reasonable and intelligible. The first one being a paranoid guy with a gun asking you to go into another room so that he feels safe leaving, by locking the door on you and passing through. The characters have their own quirks about them, this is especially true in later chapters where the mystery segments are longer.

Mechanics

-No difficulty mode
-Movement can be slightly improved

+ Can interact in 4 directional places despite being a 2D game
+ Puzzles codes are randomized
+ Save Feature is tied to in-game objects (no autosave)
+ Multiple interactions for detecting enemies
+ Multiple Choices in dialogue

Equipping inventory items is important to remember when interacting with the environment. I made the mistake of trying to open a door without having the key selected. Which was a sign of clear brilliance on my part…

You can get key items ahead of time which allows you for example to double interact with a person and complete the task to obtain the reward instead of having to go back and forth. This can happen on accident, during the mystery segments of the game but not during the horror ones.

Keys override each other, meaning that you need to click one direction at a time instead of multiple keys. Going from north to south however is a tad more complicated than left to right. When I went into a room and saw the monster I clicked the opposite direction but since I didn’t click left or right first my guy refused to look that way (since it was a south door and I was looking forward). An improvement to how your character reacts to the keys you press would be welcome, though they only been a problem really once or twice due to close calls. Normally, it’s not an issue when walking left or right out of a room just north and south.

You are offered some choices in the game, like accepting the drink from Bar Mcon though i was rather cautious to accept something from someone with con in their name. Other choices in the game seem to really not have much effect on the ending of the game from what I could tell, which I could be wrong, but it seems more like the walking dead approach where it simply affects your relationships with the characters.

There are multiple ways to tell if a enemy is near the exit of the room by hearing, looking, or having a alert appear. This changes depending on what type of exit it is, if the door has a peep-hole then you are able to look through as an example. It’s nice that the interactions are always changing throughout the game and like the enemy AI does not remain the same. Each chapter feels like a refreshing experience from the previous and never makes the lazy mistake of repeating itself.

Adding a limited amount of records for saving in a new difficulty mode might give the game a bit more challenge that people would like. It's a minor negative that hardly effected my enjoyment of the game it's simply something nice that could be expanded on later.

Visuals (Atmosphere)

+Fluid animation
+Music/Sounds follow events well
+Transparent objects make world easily visible but keeps complexity
+Characters have color to highlight importance

Having alot of background characters can be confusing unless you differentiate them from the important characters who actually further the storyline. In Silence of Sleep this is done by coloring a unique aspect of the person,whether it be their tie,hair, or other characteristics of them.

The sounds from enemies to the crackling of the fireplace is all well done and really help you either feel fear or warmth. The sound just strikes the right balance, and never feels tedious or out of place. It has a certain type of buildup and explosiveness that is missed in quite a few games at certain points.

Slow motion occurs when you hide behind crates which affects the sounds everything produces. It can transform sounds from sounding relaxing to something of horror. The visuals are also affected when hiding and make everything appear red.

Enemy AI

+Progressive AI

Hiding within the environment and sneaking past enemies is the only way to ensure survival.

The game is more of a hybrid between thriller and horror. There are some encounters where they will show a viewport of the monster to give you enough time to react, by finding a hiding place. While other encounters you simply have to pay attention to the sounds they make and use the exit mechanics to your advantage. Think of Chapter 1 as the tutorial for survival, the various encounters you face involve enemies traveling a certain distance and you gauging when to leave rooms or not.. Once you are thrown into the abyss that is Chapter 2 you will face with enemies with better AI that will chase you unless you hide yourself away from them using the environment.

Conclusion

The game manages to deliver a great experience by making each chapter have new enemies and puzzles, sounds that are effected by what your doing, environments that are well done, with a memorable story that comes together nicely by the end.

Chapter 1 is actually pretty good. The atmosphere and the environment is nice and it promises a decent horror adventure game. Just the controls are really clumsy, for some reason you can't turn 180° when facing the wall, you first need to turn left or right. Also the hero can run only for about 3 seconds before getting tired.

Starting with Chapter 2 you get randomly attacked by monsters insta-killing you on touch, often giving you little chance to avoid them. Yeah I know you can learn their paths and how to avoid them, but at the same time you are supposed to find your way in a labyrinth of same-looking rooms, find hidden items and solve complicated cryptic illogical puzzles. Even after an hour of playing when I knew the level pretty well, I still got regularly killed resetting my progress to the only savepoint in the level. Also it forces you to spend a lot of time just waiting for the monster to finally go away (over and over and over again). This is not scary at all, it's just annoying, frustrating and boring.

Chapter 3 is completely different but not better. The monsters are gone but so is the atmosphere. This chapter consists of a bunch of dumb fetch quests (find a lost bunny, get a toilet paper, ask everyone some question, ...) and running around trying to find out what the game wants you to do next.

Chapter 4 and the monsters are back. This time it's actually a bit better. There are two savepoints in the level, plenty of places to hide and a MAP! Finally! I realized why I had liked Amnesia so much. Unlike this game Amnesia didn't throw a monster on you every 30 seconds and it didn't kill you every 2 minutes.

Chapter 5. This one consists of a ton of cutscenes (this game has more endings than The Lord of the Rings trilogy) and pointless "walk right" sections. The biggest problem is that there is no savepoint and the cut-scenes and dialogues are not skippable! On my first playthrough the game crashed after a few minutes, returning me back to the end of Chapter 4. So after restart I had to watch the cutscenes and click through the dialogues again. Then I got to a level so dark I could barely see anything. I heard a telephone ringing but couldn't see it so I continued walking right and suddenly I got instantly killed by a monster. Back to chapter 4!! The third time I didn't miss the telephone booth but the game crashed again. BACK TO CHAPTER 4!!! Finally I was able to finish this damn game. The ending was... ok, I guess. Not very surprising, I expected something like that, but it could have been worse.

Overall: Not many games were able to make me scream on the screen like crazy. Silence of the Sleep did it several times. Both thumbs down.

Game is very pretty. Atmosphere isn't bad. Puzzles are relatively easy and not all interactable items are apparent (sometimes you need to randomly search places to find things). What really brings down this game is the shoddy writing (... ... ... ... ... ...), crap controls (so unresponsive, especially when a monster is chasing you), lack of autosaves, and the monster dynamic. Having to -constantly- run and hide and WAIT for long periods of time while moving from room to room completely breaks the immersion. It soon becomes more frustrating to deal with the monsters rather than scary, especially since death means you restart from your last save point, and the ability to save (using gramophones) can be few and far inbetween.

I got this game for a dollar. I wouldn't pay more for it. I put two hours into the game and know from the experience that I will never touch it again.

wow. Silence of the Sleep is a unique game. furthermore, it's a good game

the aesthetics is definitely the high point in this game; it has Jesse Makkonen's trademark dark palette of blue-violet-red mixed with gray and black (sounds weird, works really well), the characters are real life human-modeled dichromatic silhouettes, the movements life like reminiscent of Prince of Persia (but better), the character photos in the dialogue boxes are real faces reduced down to a carbon copy with BloodNet feels. the backgrounds are stunning. the music is weird but very high quality. the atmosphere is at times really tense, with most of the game falling under the horror category with clear Silent Hill influenes (especially SH3), however, the game is more than that; it has a moving story that's fed you piece by piece as you progress with characters surrounded by mystery but all with their own personality

it's not all positives, though. the game is hard as f-ck at times, too hard, unenjoyably hard. some of the objectives are dim at best, a lot of puzzles are not easy, many items are hard to spot, and certain gameplay features are confusing even after the tutorials. the controls could really do with an overhaul, that this game doesn't have controller support is more than mildly surprising. overall, this game could have been vastly improved with some play testing (yeah, i'm looking at you, Jesse - hit me up)

as for the gameplay, i guess it's best described as a Siren in 2D; hide, or get brutally murdered. i love the death sequences, right in line with 2D trial and error games like Another World

the first two or three levels give you the impression that it's going to be the same thing dragged out throughout the game, but that actually isn't the case; the game keeps surprising you with new environments and what i thought were novel little mini games that are part of the story progression. also, first time i ever remember having an NPC whistle as the sole source of music. annoying as hell! but A for innovative

Steam's binary grading system doesn't leave room for much finesse, so:
10/10 aesthetics
2/10 controls
9/10 atmosphere
8/10 story
3/10 difficulty

in brief, it's more an experience than a fun game to play, more a work of art or a story to be told that an enjoyable gaming experience. if that's your cup of tea, and you can appreciate rough gems and quirky gameplay elements, then get this game
great story, characters, atmosphere, art - not great gameplay, too hard and not intuitive

go Finland!