Don't hide single-player features behind online connectivity checks.
I played the first Simulacra and enjoyed it thoroughly. People said "phone voyeur/haunted phone games" are a whole genre, but that it was the best of them, so I decided to avoid others until this. If you're not familiar, it's a point-and-click FMV adventure, where the whole setting is someone's phone. The story in Simulacra 2 is good (though I personally prefer the first's better). I felt like I really got to know the characters and personalities involved. The plot screams "we want to be a franchise." The dialog trees have enough branching not to feel like you're not having any input, though sometimes it is obvious when you are railroaded. Once you reach one of the endings (there are at least 5), it shows you a chart of the plot paths, both possible and taken. It doesn't tell you what you skipped, but it shows you where the branches are, and how deep they go so you can try to get them on future plays (which can be sped up for faster replay!). This is actually a killer feature for a game like this. The puzzles are good, never repeated, and sparse so that you don't get sick of them. I would change the "clue discovered" mechanic. The "pick up this clue" icon can sometimes spoil a reading since it pops up as soon as you see something on a page, rather than having to click on an area specifically to get the clue added to your journal. If you really want to, you can just open every page and scroll through them and click on them as they pop up. You won't catch everything for the puzzles this way, but you'll get a lot of it. The game plays great with keyboard and mouse; full screen or resizable window; minimal options (but more are unnecessary since the game is UI and video). Install size is huge for what you might expect, but it reportedly supports 4K. Why only 4/5? There are some timed dialog choices that happen so fast you can't even read the choices before they disappear, including one in an ending sequence (with a checkpoint right before it, so not devastating).
I'm not done with the game yet, but I do need to point out: The game is fixed full screen on primary monitor. No going to windowed mode or choosing which screen if you have multiple. The controls are also fixed and unchangable. The default keyboard controls are unplayable for me how they're used (WASDQERF_, at least). Will come back at it with a controller later, but I'd rather be able to remap keys to useful keyboard and play that way. The game itself is a fun actiony puzzle game.
