After a seemingly endless wait, and delay after delay, my #1 wishlisted game is finally out. It's pretty much as good as I expected it to be.

At its core, it's more or less an interactive story with branching paths, dealing with the daily life of young adults in some backwater town in a semi-comical, semi-serious way. It presents itself as a 2D platformer, but the platforming is pretty much only there as a way to go from somewhere to elsewhere, never being particularly challenging. What makes this game good is not its gameplay (though it features a minigame, Demontower, which is pretty good in that regard), but its characters and its setting.

The characters are well-written and easy to relate to; I've had my share of "yup, been there too" moments. Even minor characters were interesting, leading me to hilarity, sadness, or just leaving me thinking. The setting and the plot managed to convey that "things are no longer the same and will never be the same again" feeling pretty well. Multiple playthroughs are probably needed to get the whole picture, and that's excluding symbols and stuff that's open to a lot of interpretation. Oh, and there's also Mae's journal to look at, which gets updated now and then with hilarious depictions of her life events.

Most of the time will be spent talking to other characters or jumping all over to reach them (and dealing with Mae's weird habit of walking on powerlines to explore town), but there are a few minigames thrown in there. One of them, Demontower, is some kind of Isaac clone with mechanics inspired by Hyper Light Drifter, and is so well done it could very well have been released independently from Night in the Woods.

+ Well-written characters
+ Branching storyline
+ Mae's journal
+ Excellent music (release the soundtrack pls)
+ Demontower minigame

- Lots of loadings
- Pretty linear and repetitive, world is a bit small
- Platforming sections don't add much to the experience

9/10 I probably overrate it, like many videogames I love. The characters are great. Particularly the minor roles. People should stop making games with good characters or I'll go bankrupt buying them.

After a seemingly endless wait, and delay after delay, my #1 wishlisted game is finally out. It's pretty much as good as I expected it to be. At its core, it's more or less an interactive story with branching paths, dealing with the daily life of young adults in some backwater town in a semi-comical, semi-serious way. It presents itself as a 2D platformer, but the platforming is pretty much only there as a way to go from somewhere to elsewhere, never being particularly challenging. What makes this game good is not its gameplay (though it features a minigame, Demontower, which is pretty good in that regard), but its characters and its setting. The characters are well-written and easy to relate to; I've had my share of "yup, been there too" moments. Even minor characters were interesting, leading me to hilarity, sadness, or just leaving me thinking. The setting and the plot managed to convey that "things are no longer the same and will never be the same again" feeling pretty well. Multiple playthroughs are probably needed to get the whole picture, and that's excluding symbols and stuff that's open to a lot of interpretation. Oh, and there's also Mae's journal to look at, which gets updated now and then with hilarious depictions of her life events. Most of the time will be spent talking to other characters or jumping all over to reach them (and dealing with Mae's weird habit of walking on powerlines to explore town), but there are a few minigames thrown in there. One of them, Demontower, is some kind of Isaac clone with mechanics inspired by Hyper Light Drifter, and is so well done it could very well have been released independently from Night in the Woods. + Well-written characters + Branching storyline + Mae's journal + Excellent music (release the soundtrack pls) + Demontower minigame - Lots of loadings - Pretty linear and repetitive, world is a bit small - Platforming sections don't add much to the experience 9/10 I probably overrate it, like many videogames I love. The characters are great. Particularly the minor roles. People should stop making games with good characters or I'll go bankrupt buying them.