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Interrogation has a interesting concept but it didn't quite execute it well. I like that you have options such as using excessive force or not. I like that you can choose how to spend your budget, choose how to use your team to the best of their abilities, that you can add extra skills and abilities to your character. I didn't like how those abilities were sometimes very vague on how they helped you if at all. I thought the game took some weird turns in the story such as slashing you with a knife over even the possibility that you may have been rough with a suspect. I thought the additions of newspaper interviews was a nice touch. The game really started to be fairly linear in the end as no matter how you get to a spot the same things happen and you have to perform the same tasks to get there. Basically you have to uncover the same questions to ask regardless of your approach. I was also not a fan of many missions having a time limit. I understand it adds tension and in some cases can be justified but it also made me follow the story less as I was more interested in completing the objectives. For instance there is a major character introduced late in the game that I had zero clue who they were or how they showed up. There are different difficulty levels which is nice but once you set a level at the beginning you can't change it up only down so be warned. I also think having to continue to buy HR reports about your team each chapter is a bit annoying. Yes people can change a bit but usually not day to day so much. The graphical style was great. It was like watching a comic book unfold and I appreciate a good monochrome colour pallet. The music and effects were decent but repetitive enough that I took my headphones off ear the end. The game only saves at start of interrogation. A manual save system would have been a better choice. You also can't load saves from different chapters as you just have one save slot that keeps getting overwritten.
The models and object detail are good except food. There is a scene where they pan fry corn on the cob and another where they eat burgers with no buns. Dinner is literally one burger patty on the plate with nothing else that they eat by hand. The music is decent but repetitive. The free roam parts are good because the game does a good job of letting you know where you have to go as well as having a good map. The lewd scenes are well done. The story is decent but the game ends without answering many questions as well as squanders an opportunity to go in a dark direction I was interested in. There is little resolution to much outside of the girls issues. Even with them there is little detail. You don't even find out what events sent many of them there in the first place. The mini game where you have to navigate the mouse cursor inside of a line is decent but overused. There are lots of different maps you have to do to beat it but the mechanics are the same each time. The voice acting ranges from decent to bad even with specific voices. For instance at times Eve sounds normal but other times sounds damn near robotic. There are also a slew of issues related to the voice acting such as the volume of voices getting very low at times then going back to normal, audio not matching the text on the screen, and audio skipping so there is silence for gaps. There is also the issue of them not saying whatever name you choose for the main character so there is just an audio silence gap for his name. I would have preferred not getting to name him just for the audio to not have that unnatural gap. There was also a few times where the audio had an echo after being said. There was also one time where my name on screen simply said "mc". Despite all this I enjoyed the game. I liked the interaction between the girls and the mc and appreciated the growth they had. There were also a lot of choices throughout to branch the game towards which characters you wanted to see more of.
Duck Detective has some of the best mechanics of any puzzle game I have played. You gather clues from collecting objects and words. The words you get from talking to people and inspecting objects. You then use the words to fill in the blanks of your deducktions to figure out what has happened in order to further the plot. It's all very simple and easy to get used to and is helped by the game's fantastic UI. You can get an idea of what to try next by looking at the map where it lists where each person is and if they have an exclamation mark then you should talk to them or show them an object to get their thoughts on it. The game also has a hint system but to be honest I didn't find it very useful as it is extremely vague. You can also simply try various combos of words in the deducktions and guess them if you can't figure it out based on clues. I had to do this a few times. The game will say how many errors you have and obviously if you try something different and that number goes down then you have found the correct option for that blank. The reason I had to do this is that while the plot makes sense in hindsight I had trouble piecing together where it was going by the clues provided and didn't always see it's logic. That being said many of the puzzles are well done, make sense, and have good hints provided by objects and other clues. The voice acting was great as was the humour. I can see kids enjoying this but as an adult I had a great time as well. The art style was very well done. It almost had the look of a pop up diorama the way the characters moved. One thing I didn't like was the fact that at the end I can't choose to arrest no one. I played Duck Detective on Linux. It never crashed and I didn't notice any bugs or spelling errors. There is no graphics options aside from resolution. The game saves on exit and there is just one save slot. Even though the game had no v-sync option it still respected my refresh rate.
I can certainly say that Trust No One was one of the most unique games I have played. It made me think outside of the box more than most games. It made me do web searches outside of the game, email actual email addresses, and really pay attention to hints and info provided. I would say that about 80% of the time it had me impressed but other times I found it could get a little convoluted in what it wanted you to do and made you take farther leaps of logic than I feel was warranted. I will also say that while the game was very unique that could be it’s downfall down the road. If the email servers the game is tied to go down then you can’t complete certain puzzles. The art style was well done with a soft almost painting like quality. There wasn’t much in the way of music or sound effects but what was there was decent to good. I would have liked to see more of an epilogue to see how my choice at the end effected the in game world. I played Trust No One on Linux. It never crashed and I didn’t notice any bugs. There are no graphical options at all. You can manually save outside of the first scene but there is only one save slot. The game ran great even on my Intel onboard graphics. The game had no v-sync option but respected my refresh rate anyway. Engine: Unity API: OpenGL Game Version: 1.1 GPU Usage: 13-82 % CPU Usage: 1-4 % System RAM Usage: 2.1-2.2 GB Frame Rate: 145-165 FPS Despite the few times I was a little annoyed at a puzzle I will say Trust No One made an impression on me and I would recommend it. I finished it in forty three minutes and paid $4.23 CAD for it. I would even say value wise it could warrant a $10 CAD price tag. Hopefully the potential issues I mentioned with email servers down the road don’t ruin what was a decent puzzle game that tried something new and mostly succeeded. My System: Intel i5-12600K | 32GB DDR4-3200 CL16 | Intel UHD 770 | Western Digital Black SN770 1TB | Trisquel 11.01 | Mate 1.26.0 | Kernel 6.10.8-gnu | Mesa 23.2.1
I had heard a lot of hype about Summer’s Gone before finally playing it. I had heard that it stood out in the AVN genre as it actually had zero sex scenes but was worth it for the fantastic story. After finishing season one I can agree with both of those points. While it would have been nice to have some great lewd scenes to go with everything else at the same time the rest more than makes up for it. There was also a decent explanation as to why there were no lewd scenes which I won’t spoil. The story is fantastic. The characters were all interesting to me and I can’t wait to learn more about them in future seasons. The pacing was great as I can’t think of any parts of season one that dragged on or were boring to me. The production values were top notch from the animation, models, objects, to the menus and music. The game actually felt like a full season unlike many visual novels that split this way and feel like a short setup for the next one. Even if there were no season two there was so much which took place and so much growth and exploration with characters that I would almost be content albeit sad. I played Summer’s Gone on Linux. It never crashed and I didn’t notice any bugs or spelling errors at all. You can save any time you want and there are fifty four save slots. One oddity I found was the API was listed as WineD3D. This was weird because I was playing the native Linux version and usually Ren’Py games use OpenGL that way. In any case I had no issues so I didn’t really care. Game Engine: Ren’Py 8.1.3.23091805 Graphics API: WineD3D GPU Usage: 1-11 % VRAM Usage: 1019-1588MB CPU Usage: 3-12 % System RAM Usage: 2.1-3.3 GB My System: Intel i5-12600K | 32GB DDR4-3200 CL16 | Gigabyte RX 7800 XT 16GB | Western Digital Black SN850X 2TB | Artix | Dasharo 1.1.1 | Mate 1.28.2 | Kernel 6.10.8-artix1-1 | Mesa 24.2.2-arch1.1
The story was fantastic with a good amount of choices. That being said I found some to be vague. Without going into spoilers some options were far more extreme than I expected them to be or just go in a direction I had wholly gauged wrong. It didn't happen often so it wasn't a huge deal. I played through the game in it's original mix which means it jumped around from year to year a lot and everything was out of chronological order. I actually liked it like this and still found everything easy to grasp and understand. It's nice that the game gave the option to play it in chronological order if i wanted to. The controls were a bit of an issue. I found dodging during combat to be a bit of a pain. The game gives an indication as to which way to push the stick but for whatever reason I seemed to misinterpret this quite a bit. For instance sometimes the game wanted me to swing away from something or towards something but for whatever reason I seemed to do the opposite a lot. Another controls related problem I had was the camera. I found it very difficult to adjust it so see what I wanted often enough for it to be annoying. It did pick up my F310 and change the prompts for it which was good. The graphics were fairly well done with keeping it in context of a game released in 2013. Everything from the hair, clothing, environments, objects, etc were all either average or above average. The music was pretty well done, especially one scene which had Ellen Page singing a song on an acoustic guitar. The voice acting was great throughout. One thing I will say is that using Aiden's abilities was very inconsistent. Sometimes you could use him and others you couldn't with very little logical reason as to why. There were a good variety of things you could do with him but you were railroaded into which ability you could use at that moment. Why could I strange some guards but not others, possess some but not others, etc. Overall the great story trumped the poor controls for me. 8/10
I felt that Purgatory was the strongest story yet from Different Tales. It had better pacing than Heart of the Forest. It still had the same great lore as well as did a good job of incorporating characters from Heart of the Forest. I felt that Purgatory was less rushed and had a better fleshed out narrative. I would say that the only thing I would say was lacking was the main villain's motivation. You are after them due to a murder they committed but by the end I can't really say it was well explained why they did it or what they had hoped to gain from it. Purgatory also added a depression factor to the things to manage along with rage, willpower, etc. It was an interesting addition but to be fair the game would have worked just as well without it and it was very easy to keep in check. I also have to wonder what the developers have against the citizens of Poland. In both Werewolf games so far the people of Poland are depicted largely as hostile and antagonistic and the protagonists are foreigners who come in to tell them how to run their affairs and enter their country illegally. Just seems like the developers have a very specific message to say and an axe to grind. I played Purgatory on Linux. It never crashed and I didn't notice any spelling errors or any bugs. The save system was an auto save system. It has one save slot that gets saved over each time. One improvement over HOTF is that the game now tells you when it's saving where Heart of the Forest didn't. I would have preferred a manual save system with multiple slots. The game ran great and the issue with high GPU usage that heart of the Forest had has been fixed for me. VRAM usage was much higher in Purgatory than in heart of the Forest but it's nothing even low end GPUs can't manage. There is a setting for resolution and one other graphics option. Game Settings Used: 2560x1440, highest GPU Usage: 6-49 % VRAM Usage: 1392-1627 MB CPU Usage: 4-8 % RAM Usage: 2.4-2.8 GB
Heart of the Forest has some really good buildup. The game spends about half of it's length introducing characters, setting up Maia's backstory, and giving you context and an idea of what the main plot is about. Then just as the game starts getting really interesting and you start your journey as a werewolf it is over soon after. It just seemed like a lot of setup for so little payoff. I would say that there was maybe thirty minutes of story left after choosing a tribe. Choosing a tribe should be the start of something not signal pretty much the end of the game. I was hoping for more time with my new pack and tribe. I would have loved to know more about the inner workings of it. Aside from my nitpicks on the second half the game had a lot of good things going for it. The dialogue was well done. Different Tales has always seemed to have a knack for describing and detailing environments and people. The music was well done although maybe a bit repetitive. The visuals were well done although they were just still images with little to no animation. The game made up for it with atmosphere though. I liked the character sheets detailing my own attributes and how I was viewed by others. I played Heart of the Forest on Linux. It never crashed and I didn't notice any spelling errors or any bugs. The save system could have been better. It has one save slot that gets saved over each time. I don't really know when it saves to be honest. I thought it saved on exit but sometimes when I exited and loaded I would be a little back from where I exited on. I would have preferred a manual save system with multiple slots. The game seemed to max out my GPU but at the same time it ran fine. I just don't see how a visual novel can max out the GPU usage on a 7800 XT. There is a setting for resolution and one other graphics option. My Score: 7.5/10 My System: i5-12600K | 32GB DDR4-3200 | AMD RX 7800XT 16GB | Artix | Mate 1.28.2 | Kernel 6.10.2 | Mesa 24.1.5 | MSI G2730QPF 2560*1440
As Dusk Falls is a fantastic game. It has a lot of choices to make make and actually has some good story branching. The game bounces between characters and points in time a lot yet does so in a way that didn’t confuse me and actually ties things together nicely. There are also a decent amount of game play such as QTE events, and searching the environment in a point and click manner. The music is very well done. One part that is weird is the motion. The game isn’t still images or FMV. It is a weird hybrid that is kind of like watching an interactive comic book without the voice bubbles. It’s a decent style and certainly different but at the same time I can see how many people might think that the game is lagging or that there is some kind of glitch as the lips don't move with the audio. The game has good object detail such as on cars and buildings but seems to go for more of a comic book style look for people and it's a bit jarring at times. I can't tell if it's a lack of detail on people and clothing or if it just how it's supposed to look. I certainly hope the game gets a sequel as it leaves on a bit of a cliffhanger. There's enough closure to leave me pretty content but at the same time there's a few characters who I feel needed more of an epilogue or needed more time in the last book. For instance I wanted to know more about how Joyce's son Ash faired in the future parts as well as just what happened with Sheriff Romero. I could have even done with more explanation on what kind of journey that Paul and Sharon had. That being said I really enjoyed watching Zoe and Jay unfold and liked the options given there. The game has a great story map which has a very detailed layout of what route your story has taken while not spoiling what elements the the other routes would have introduced. There are also "insights" which are supposed to give you an insight into your play style but to be honest they were a little vague at times.
The Mildew Children’s free chapter did it’s job. I am most certainly interested in the full game. The setting is delightfully eerie. The characters are interesting. There appears to be a very deep lore to the game with a lot going on behind the scenes. That is almost my only real gripe that the game drops you in this world with little to no explanation as if you already know all about the traditions and people. A codex would have been nice. This didn’t harm my enjoyment of it though. If you pay attention you can pick up enough. The art style is fantastic. The music is well done. The sound effects are good as well, used often enough to break up silence without being overbearing. The game does a good job of being more than just a visual novel. You move around places, there is an in game map, there is a decent rhythm game as well as a decent QTE section. The QTE part actually is pretty challenging as you not only have to contend with keeping the bar in a certain section but you still have to click through the dialogue to further the game. There are two difficulty settings to the mini game as well as the option to turn them off so it should satisfy everybody. One other thing I would like to see changed is when it says you can “proceed” certain places it would be nice if it said where or what that place is. I played The Mildew Children’s first chapter on Linux using Wine and DXVK. It never crashed and I didn’t notice any bugs. There was one spelling/grammar mistake. There are no graphics options at all. There are three audio options. There is an auto save system but I could not tell when the game actually saves. The game ran on my Intel onboard graphics but at a frame rate in the 30’s and 40’s. It ran without any issue at all on my RX 590. I used both my keyboard/mouse as well as a Logitech F310 game pad. I would highly suggest using a game pad for the QTE section as I found it nearly impossible on keyboard. It was still tough but was far less strenuous on the wrist.