Some important context for this review: I was mislead by the screenshots into buying this game - they make it look like there are subtitles, like "hearing" is actually reading. It is not. It is hearing sound, with your ears.

Furthermore, I'm not technically hearing impaired but have significant difficulty discerning words (I have to watch TV with subtitles or I literally can't understand the dialogue). However, I have little trouble with audiobooks because the voices are so clear, the audio quality so high, and there are zero other sounds to muddy the waters.

With all of that in mind, consider that I completed the first three puzzles. It was a struggle, but I did it.

The first was effortless.

For the second puzzle, I got all of the names but had missed two very important details because of the sheer amount of background noise. I eventually had to look it up because I felt like I was going crazy. No, I just literally couldn't hear the answer to the puzzle.

The third puzzle, I got all on my own - but was nearly ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ deafened by the explosion. That's not hyperbole, I had to turn the audio up so much to hear a conversation, and this game outright tells you to use headphones, that it made my ears ring. I almost quit right then. It's worth noting that there were actually a couple of conversations I couldn't hear, I just made some assumptions based on the other details I did know.

I should have quit at the explosion. I should have, in fact, quit as soon as I was struggling to hear dialogue over background noise that physically hurt my ears to listen to.

I'm quitting now because I'm tired of struggling to hear, tired of the pain in my ears, and tired of playing a game that feels like work. It's the most exhausting game I've ever played.

TL;DR: Don't buy unless your hearing is 100% absolutely perfect, and your ears aren't hurt by high pitched sounds

This game, about listening people speak, has no subtitles.

This game isn't accessible for anyone with hearing problems, and the defense is "because gameplay".

Put subtitles in your game. If people speak in your game, put subtitles in your game.

It's a cool concept, but the execution makes it a bit boring to me. The dialogue and voice acting are pretty campy (don't get me started on that "french accent"!) and there's not much deduction to be done, you just have to go through every room and listen to everything, while various characters spell out their intentions plainly using their "evil voice" (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5cFzABv0xMU). So while I definitely support the experimental puzzle concept, for a game that is dialogue-driven to be interesting, I need nuanced writing and emotionally engaging acting.

Unheard is a detective puzzle activity with very little actual gameplay elements.

This consists of a tutorial level, 4 regular levels, and a free DLC level. Each level you load into a building schematic. On the right side of the screen is a list of people you need to identify and questions you need to solve. You click play and the level begins. You can only see and hear audio in the room you're currently in. You're freely able to walk around the level to hear different people talking/doing things. People initially show up as dotted circles and can only be seen in the room you're currently in. Clicking on the circle allows you to place a name on them. Labeling a person stays with them until you remove/change it. A labeled person will show their name outside of the room you're in so you can see where they're going. In order to solve a level, you must label all people with their correct names and answer the questions. You can freely rewind/fast forward whenever you want as well as write very short comments. That's it.

There's nothing that bad about Unheard, but it suffers from several issues.

This isn't a game, it's an activity. There's no real way to lose. There is no penalty for having people mislabeled or getting the questions wrong. If you feel like it, you can just repeatedly randomly guess until you solve the level. It tells you how many labeled people/questions you got correct, so you can narrow it down as you randomly guess. You're free to rewind the scenario and follow every character through all their dialogue/actions, which essentially gives you all the answers. There is no challenge. Labeling people usually comes down to someone saying their name at some point during the level. The DLC level is a little more challenging than the rest, but not by much. There needs to be some sort of actual challenge and penalty for getting the questions wrong.

You're given the questions right away when you start a level. So you know, for the most part, what's going to happen during a first run through of a level which is disappointing. For instance, one level tells you a bomb is going to detonate, so you're not surprised when it blows up. Likewise, another level tells you someone is going to get killed, so you're not surprised when it happens. These events would've been far more interesting and impactful if you didn't know about them in advance. A simple improvement would've been to make the first playthrough of a level have no fast forward/rewind feature along with no questions listed, so you got to see what happened as it unfolded. It's also possible if you're in a different room that you could miss something happen, so you'd be taken by complete surprise when you see a question pop up about something you didn't even hear/see. A missed opportunity really.

The comments feature is sort of pointless for the most part. Rather than a list of things you write, they're set to the time of the level that you pressed the comment button. Then when that time comes up, your comment flies slowly across the screen. The comments are a bit 'fidgety' using the fast forward/rewind buttons or dragging the time indicator. You're also extremely limited in the number of characters you can write for each comment, as you can't really fit in all the details you'd want.

This can be quick or time consuming. If you just want to solve each case and move on, you could be done with this in 3-4 hours. If you want to hear all the dialogue, it'll be more like 6-8 hours

Finally, some of the questions are poorly worded. This can make it a bit tricky to figure out exactly what they want. The DLC level has 2 parts, and the answer for the 2nd part is a big stretch. I won't spoil it, but it doesn't make sense when you watch how the scenario plays out.

Unheard is fine for the most part. The stories are decent, the characters are fine, the voice acting is fine, and the dialogue is mostly fine. It's fine to play if you want to kill an hour or two. However, it's not a game, there's no real challenge or anything to puzzle out, and the questions being available from the start spoil some of the fun of the stories. It feels like a good idea that wasn't properly executed.

Cool idea, thought it would be my type of game, butr after playing it I decided it's not for me. Gameplay consists of listing to a scene over and over again from different perspectives until you can piece together who is who and what is taking place. In theory sounds fun, but in practice was a bit tedious and boring.

Interesting idea, with really questionable execution. It's hard to tell whether the game wants you to use extrapolation in deduction, or to just put very gamey A to B circumstantial evidence together, while throwing out a lot of logic in the process. This was very evident in the second case in the art gallery. You're supposed to find who stole a painting, and it involves a lot of switcheroo points, but it also has so many logical plot holes and makes little sense in the end. After seeing this case, I had little faith in this game's attempt to be a detective game more than it is a really one-dimensional game like Clue or something.

So that was A LOT faster than I expected. The story is meh (predictable) and it can eat up a bit of time if you listen in on all the conversations, but the ability to skip to whatever part you want, makes it that much faster.

This game isn't great but I do like the potential it has and what it can become. That being said (like every game I buy) I have high expectations for their ideas in the future.

I am not recommending this game for the fact that I was trying hard not to pass out while listening to their conversations. Some had cute personalities/dialogue but the majority was just waiting for key words to pop up. Though I promote the idea of supporting the creators and paying full price, I would rather pay $5. No replayability.

Feedback:

- I don't like that you have to sit through the entire video just to receive an achievement. I've never been someone who goes back to collect every achievement, but even this is ridiculous. There are parts where characters sit there in silence but you need to sit tight to make sure they don't say anything? No thanks. It just didn't make sense for me, and since you only get a fragment of the actual mystery, rewarding someone for sitting there for 15 minutes, waiting to piece it together, is silly.

- Visuals: I'd like to see something in full 3D. Whether it is overview or not, I don't know. I just want something to do other than sit there and stare at these name tags and stale blue environments. The fact that it makes you walk is pointless. You have no interaction with these invisible characters.

- The sound doesn't actually have a lot to do with it. Yes, people talk, and sometimes when you walk away the voices get quieter, but there's literally nothing beyond talking. You can see where the character names are positioned so it's not as if you have to listen to know if their steps made a left at the end of the hall. Someone slams their fist on the table, people scream and holler, someone drops something... sure, but there's no actual purpose for it. It's not like you have to remember someone dropped something on the street and character X came and picked it up. I want something more intense like "Hey I heard someone sharpening their knife before a sudden scream" or something, y'know? Or something like Hellblade (except the voices are more than just inner conflict everyone deals with on a daily basis).

Maybe some kinda murder mystery solving? Something with a little more depth and environment? Maybe get the noise on a stealth/heist game to be this intense?I only say that because there are some stealth games where you can hear someones voice through stone walls and it ruins the immersion... but if you had something cool like that? Reward someone for picking up on a hint/clue? :D

Underwhelming. The concept is good but not much is done to flesh it out. There are only a coupLe of moments in the game that require the player to do anythIng more complex than follow each person around one by one then answer the obvious questions, and By that point I guarantee you will be sick of most of the scEnarios. Mystery games should build to an "aha!" moment that Rewards the player for using their wits, but in this gAme it's more of a "oh, okay I guess".

The writing and voice direction are corny and unoriginal. These voice actors have done good work elsewhere, so iT seems like a poor directing decision. The script is melodramatic nonsensE that, no, is not justified by the twist ending (itself an eye-rolling cliche). The Half-baked endings feel like an afterthought.

I expected something along the lines of the brilliant Return of the Obra Dinn or Her Story, but instead I got a bOring, poorly writteN piece of fluff. Save your money - this Game isn't worth supporting Tencent.

Oh, and this is definitely one of the most unrealistic depictions of bacKstage practices I've ever seen. Assigning actors tO roles fifteen minutes before a performance? I can't eveN begin to unpack that. What the hell did you put in the proGrams?

Kinda neat concept. Way too short. Over the top voice acting made it sound goofy. Cases were too easy to solve.
Buy it if you're bored and it's on sale, but if you're looking for tricky investigations don't bother.

the game tries hard to be scary but the english dub voice acting just makes it cheesy. the "puzzles" are time consuming, repetitive, and unchallenging. i literally finished it in 2 hours. definitely not a "ground breaking game" as some of the Overwhelmingly Positive reviews stated and i dont know how people have more than 3 hours on this.

the final part in the psychiatric ward also plays into gross stereotypes about mental illness and is very cringey

save your money and buy a sandwich or literally anything else instead. i am now going to get the last achievements and then delete this game off my PC forever