Lacuna – A Sci-Fi Noir Adventure

Pros: Tight story, satisfyingly told - no time wasting or filler High stakes - only autosaves, no redo's unless you start a new save Most of the mysteries require some real thought I've only played one run so far, but it appears that the choices made are seriously impactful on the ending and some of the events throughout the game Cons: Quite short UI is a bit clunky. Most of the really important information is in the sections for logs and emails rather than the clues section. I wish there was a way to rearrange and pin things I wanted to remember. There's a Chehkov's gun which makes the 2nd most important mystery pretty obvious from the jump, which was deflating when I knew the answer but my character probably shouldn't have NOTE: I gave the game 5 stars because the dope below me gave it 1 star because he's annoyed that a detective game has too much writing and uses pixel art... If I wasn't trying to balance out such a nonsensical review, I would have given it a 4/5.

Be a real detective: * You talk to witnesses, * Investigate crime scenes. Sometimes bursting open doors with weapons drawn (no shooting in game) * review evidence that you collect at your own discretion (this is a central aspect of the game. I was surprised by this simple but great mechanics creating a thrilling feeling of somewhat "doing real detective work". This was awesome!) * Possibly great story (I did only see a part of it). Downsides? #1 The game - imo arbitrarily - forces you to make decisions about the case at a certain point in time: You went down this road? Well, bad luck: Now you can't go back anymore and collect more evidence. And the game just saved your gamestate. Or just NOW you have to decide "who did this?" or "What does this part of your investitaiong MEAN?". The game - imo arbitraily - forces you to make decisions at some point. There's no way around that. That feels ... well... like a game. I would have loved to go to make decisions somewhat more freely, i.e. I would be able to first go to headquarters and talk to people some more before making a decision. #2 The game saves for you. I see why this is appealing. Yet, I can still "go back and load a previous save to undo a decision" by quitting the game. Yet sometimes, the game saves at really bad points and I WOULD HAVE LIKED TO BACK because while pushing the wrong button, I realized I'm making a mistake, yet it already was too late. Walking down the wrong alley. Oh, now it saves. Fuck. Can't go back. Maye: Always save the current state (go all in with this idea - I'd be up for it). However: Now I finished the game. Did not really solve the case. And I'd rather NOT PUT IN THE TIME, to make basically every decision all over again, except for one or two. For me the best case would be that someone has a youtube video where I can watch the other endings. Suggesionts: Please more detailed summaries about people. Conversation logs are great. But surely, agents have dossiers about suspects.

I liked the game but when I stopped for while I had to start at a point much earlier each time. The autosave function does not save the game enough times.

The first similar game that comes to my mind is Firewatch (the second is Blade Runner). Although it is vastly different, the core idea is the same. It tells a story from the perspective of the main character and allows you some agency over how the events are unfolding. While the main story is strong, and the atmosphere is good, the interactivity will not shake the foundations of the genre. Different decisions may open up new dialogues, or new sequences in some cases, but you can never really deviate from the main story line (like in Firewatch). There are main plot points, and you can reach from point A to point B in slightly different ways, but even if you try to avoid point B, some (un)fortunate accident or coincidence will always steer you back. This is not necessarily a problem, however there are 2 things that bother me. The first one is the sheet system. You have to submit the findings of your investigations through sheets. However, you can only submit the sheet once you have all the necessary information to fill out the sheet. And there is always a logical solution. At this point it feels really weird to fill out the sheet illogically. But this is one way to affect the story line. You have to do intentionally something stupid to see another outcome. And the other problem is with the inconsistencies in the plot. As I said, there are slightly different parallel threads between point A and B. And sometimes the path you take between point A and B is inconsistent with the path you take between point C and D. Definitely not the strongest of its kind but it is a solid piece.