Used to play the original when I was a teen, back in 2010 or so, so I'm quite happy and surprised to see a remaster here.
Storytelling:
Game starts in a unique way: You're some random guy called Lucas, who gets a seizure and kills another man in the restrooms of some diner. From there on, the game starts. Your only focus is really to somehow resolve the situation and get home without being caught by the policeman who is conveniently also having his diner there. Some time later the police sends two investigators after you and you get to control them too, so you really play both sides, which is interesting imo.
The story is fine, but goes objectively batshit, which is sad, but I don't want to spoil.
Gameplay:
You mostly control the characters with the usual keyboard combos, but interact with stuff using the mouse. It's a bit clunky, when you have to click and pull the mouse as prompted, to do stuff, but one can get easily used to it after a while. There are quick time events in the game where you are supposed to press both the up-down-left-right buttons used to move the characters AND on the numpad, which is really weird and clunky. The fun part is that you get lives, so you can fail a few times before you fail the whole event. You get unique animations if you don't get a part right. Interesting mechanic but very unpolished.
There's also a somewhat important "emotional stability" mechanic in the game. Any time you do stuff that stresses the characters out, a meter shows where their stability goes down. If the meter goes to 0, it's a unique game over where the character just gives up their life to do something else. The game overs are really interesting, there's even a few youtube videos showing the different game overs you can get. In response you can also do stuff that helps stabilize characters, like Lucas can take his meds to chill out. Fits perfectly into the gameplay and adds a lot to immersion.
4/5, really recommend it
