Recent reviews by gNat

I can't say it's terrible, but it just didn't do it for me. Probably just due to the fact that none of the characters were that likeable and were fairly flat (hence the unlikability).

The game's poor graphics are also a fairly big detractor from its enjoyability (especially the character models).

It's a bit under 2 hours to finish, which is disappointing as well.

The scarier parts generally aren't that scary, and squeamish parts just don't do it for me. I think the issue is that most of the real events weren't that well done, and the more surreal parts honestly are along the lines of "player character takes longer to do XYZ than most people would - here's some surreal walking bits for you to 'play'".

To be fair, I liked the horse and boxes bit - too bad it only lasted like 2 minutes. The beginning/intro wasn't too bad either.

Level design, I think there could definitely be some improvements:
(1) One part involves clicking on the Medical symbol on the door in order to have your character talk. That was a bit unituitive, as most of the focus would definitely be the NPC to the left or the door handle (or searching the ship to find something usable).
(2) There's a part where you have to use the kitchen - the design for the material dispenser could definitely use some work too, as it looked very much like speaker for a sound system (and there was even music that got louded when you approached it). For that kind of dispenser, I think it'd be more reasonable if it were placed on the wall and looked more like a soda fountain or vending machine

100 minutes for the playthrough. I paid $5 (I would recommend waiting for it to be about that price before buying it)

Overall, I came in with lowered expectations just because "how can it be all that good?", but I have to admit that they managed to combine a great narrative experience, fun and varied minigames, a deeper mystery, with a great sound design.

The first thing I'd like to compliment is the minigames, which I would say no two are that alike, and that all of the minigames actually contributed to the story (unlike some other games where the gameplay feels disconnected or just simply exists to say "hey we have a game here and not a movie")

The narration is great - definitely top tier.

And finally I think the overall story was well done in that there is an overall mystery to answer, there wasn't an over-explanation of ertain elements, and there's a fair amount of emotion as well as touching upon some darker elements of life

17 hours for first playthrough, and I'm a fast-reader and clicker. Sorta felt like there should have been a second half to the game, but it's still pretty long.

Managed to get (one of?) the 5 star endings in that first playthrough, and I made a good number of mistakes (not using up all resources) on some of the initial days. Feels like I was supposed to lose a certain battle towards the end of the game and one character during that battle said that the father was supposed to be dead by now, but then it just cutscen-ed to the father being completely normal. Rose became the wealthiest person in the world, and father was alive and fine. So that's one reason I feel like I ended up with a perhaps unintended first-time ending, because I don't know what they were talking about

Combat was pleasantly challenging. I lost a few times on harder modes, but towards the last 18 or so months I was able to semi-reliably clear the hardest level. Basically, whicher level is the lowest level that says its difficulty is "HARD" is doable, as long as RNG doesn't end up killing you. Most of my late game losses was due to one of my party members getting mind controlled and killing an ally in one hit.

I do recommend the game though - it's a normal stat management game like many others, it has english problems, but overall the length and depth of the game left it enjoyable from start to end, though days towards the end dragged a little bit (especially the battles, as I'd fight the toughest battle each day)

Fun game overall, drags on a little bit around the 25 hour mark

I hate to say it, but I wasted 6 hours. I started out hoping for something in the the vein of Oneshot/Omori/Undertale/..., and I ended up with, well, basically nothing

Probably the biggest issue is that the characters and setting aren't great. I'd say that maybe one of the characters (Bea) is well-enough written, and the fox was fun with his enthusiasm at the beginning. But overall, the dialogue is not compelling, nor is the main character's struggles.

It's bad when after 1 hour of playing, you're just wanting to get the game over with it. And then it dragged on for 5 more hours.

Most of the gameplay was non existent - it's like a visual novel that someone was like "hey let's make this a video game instead". So they did so, realized they didn't really have a video game, and added in a few random side games (guitar hero, some random move and shoot stuff, some random barely-platforming dreams) to say "well we made a video game because players can move and jump".

The plot was pretty atrocious - main character is unlikable, most of the cast of secondary characters are forgetable, the main mystery going on was hardly expounded upon (and there are many better versions of this story found in various horror movies which only consume 2 hours of your time).

I can't help but keep going back to the dialogue - I kept seeing all over the place signs of the authors wanting to try to be deep but ending up with some fairly terrible lines. Honestly, this game needed heaps more of show-don't-tell, or if it had to stick with the telling then it needed a more compelling way of doing so.

And a minor complaint, but the character designs needed some work as well - I still am surprised that the main character is not a 40 year old man. That probably would have been a much better story to be honest, as a 20 year old reminiscing about the good old times of being a troublemaker in elementary/middle/high school just falls flat.

Sadly, I can't recommend getting this game at any sale point. The game Oneshot is a more cohesive version of part of this story, and Life is Strange is probably a better version of the first part of this story (even though Life is Strange shares similar issues with character writing)

One of the best games I've played - play it blind (don't do any research or video watching). It's similar in feel to Omori / Oneshot / Undertale / etc...

Honestly not terrible, but it's just lacking something (perhaps replayability?). First playthrough was basically 40 minutes, in which I got 4 or so the endings (since you can reload that day if you get an ending). But overall, wasn't really worth the 50% off sale I got it during - I'd say wait til it's 90% off.

Probably the biggest issue is that it feels fairly fake. It also doesn't really feel like what happens is a consequence of your actions. First run was pretty much normal, second run I rushed to 100 mental darkness. There wasn't really much difference at all. Most of the streams have their own sort of mood, and prior choices don't change the streams at all (e.g. milestone videos are the same, regardless if you keep her happy, or if you have her maxed out on mental darkness, or stress, or affection).

At first it was a bit of a chore to get started - but once you commit an hour or so, it actually becomes pretty fun. Still, it was a bit of a slog in the middle at times, and I never finished the DLC stuff.

It's interesting - but sort of a one-playthrough kind of game. The last hour or so of the game was disappointing compared to the first few hours, and there needed to be more planets.

A bit hard to get through, but somewhat interesting.