Stories Untold

This is a spoiler-free review ---------- The game conists of 4 parts and took me 2.5 hours to experience. Overall a superbly-crafted game with extreme potential, but the ending marred the experience to the point of retroactively ruining the whole game. Acts 1/2 got me hooked, and act 3 was the same until the very end, where there are hints that things are not as they seem. The last act was unexpected and its goal was to connect the loose strands from the previous acts. Sadly, the overall narrative in which they are connected effectively put a steel wall between my perspective and the characters. I ended up acting out what the character did, while not being able to change anything. I'm sorry to say this, but the narrative felt forced, and forcing such a perspective shift on the player caused the previous experiences tyo be tainted. I suggest buying it on a sale, and playing acts 1-3 (avoid act 4).

Warning: To review I might have to spoiler a little bit! ------ Let's put the last first: This game is way too short for the price and the ending is disappointing. The studio seems to have been in a hurry making this game. The game itself is some fun: You have different episodes in which you solve different puzzles. You need to crack codes from easy to hard, have a little walking-simulator all mixed with a at-first spooky story which comes together while you advance. But you will be disappointed if you learn the story in the end... One major issue is, that you might not get past the first episode if you are too young and never played textadventures - even so the first two episodes are the most fun in my opinion. Atmosphere of the game is spooky and great (until the last episode), graphics and sound are good for an indie game - I liked it so far. It runs smothly without any problems on my end. So if you like puzzles and spooky games get it, when it is on sale. I wouldn't pay full price for it.

The Presentation is fantastic and the gameplay is really cool but the story reveals itself to be ass once you get past the half way mark and really makes you feel like you wasted your time once you hit the last episode.

Stories Untold was a game that won me on the merits of telling a story through the technology involved. If you are not into a text adventure game with some elements of suspense happening around you, then you probably wont enjoy the game. For me, the interactions with the technology and the downright creepiness some of the scenarios play out is what kept me hooked until the bitter end. Sure, you will come across some sections where you know it wont even come close to the one before in terms of enjoy-ability. But overall its a wonderful experience. I highly recommend it to lovers of old technology and nostalgia but don't mind it to be modern enough to be enjoyable. In closing, It has the graphics and mechanics and a good atmosphere, it falls short on the narrative as its spread out in a loosely connected fashion which means you wont enjoy it all and the ones you do, you wish had more. So devs...I am down with a full play-through of House Abandon anytime you want to make that happen.

Difficult to figure out. Had to look up stuff to get through it.