I just finished the game and I have a lot of mixed feelings about it. The idea is great the problem is the fact that the story is just too rushed and in some points underdeveloped.
In most of other aspects the game does a great job, the ost, character/environment designs, and the general atmosphere is well executed, with a bunch of subtle details to be picked up on, like the twins literally having no face - symbolising the absence of any sort of personality, will & freedom, which is genuinely great. The amount of detail in this game is also impressive, especially with actual historical/cultural context.
Okay, but now let's talk about the story. It starts off with a cool prologue that I really like. It does everything that is needed of it. It presents the setting & characters well, as well as some ideas that will later be important (eg. P-3's memory loss). Everything onwards until the theatre segment is where I feel like it exists to purely progress your equipment & loot, which, in and on its own isn't something that bad however the story just feels too stretched out there especially considering such a rushed finale. Nonetheless the interactions between Charles & Sergey in this part of the story are very strong and I think that their dynamic and what it really turns out to be in the end is where the writing of the game truly shines. Not to mention the whole Charles is the true antagonist thing as well as him not being a robot is really great as an idea but the "reveal" in either of the finales is what really bothers me because it doesn't fell satisfying at all because of how rushed the endings feel.
Another problem that I personally have with the story is the way it presents its themes. It starts exploring them in an interesting way and just drops them and moves onto other ones. Like If you are going to have one of the crucial parts of your mc be the fact that he has memory loss as a mechanism from past traumatic experiences - explore that more. Explore the way limbo affects P-3 more, have him take a moment to reflect on everything he found out after watching the cassettes on the Neptune base, show us how he feels after finding out that he has been manipulated by the people(well, and non people) he thought he could trust by how he was lied to and used for others selfish purposes. Don't tell us or allude to the fact that he is on a verge of a mental breakdown show it to us and let the moment breathe and be felt.
Ah, yes, and then there are the endings the supposed canon one, the "good" one, with P-3 siding with Sechenov and the bad one where you confront Sechenov and find out that this whole time Chariton was the one to sent P-3 to Limbo & switching him to "killer" mode. What I hate the most about both is the fact that they just seem to forget that Sechenov is also evil, like, are we just forgetting the whole mind control thing?
The idea that both of the endings are bad is cool, don't get me wrong, it's even refreshing to an extent, and incredibly funny with it being set in ussr. It's just the way one of them excuses Sechenov's actions purely because Charlton is more evil? Which yeah, he is worse, but that doesn't make Sechenov an angel though??? But I digress.
Overall, it's a story with a bunch of potential that has some cool lines & ideas, and is pretty good for a first major project, however it could have been so much more, and the fact that it isn't is truly unfortunate.
In most of other aspects the game does a great job, the ost, character/environment designs, and the general atmosphere is well executed, with a bunch of subtle details to be picked up on, like the twins literally having no face - symbolising the absence of any sort of personality, will & freedom, which is genuinely great. The amount of detail in this game is also impressive, especially with actual historical/cultural context.
Okay, but now let's talk about the story. It starts off with a cool prologue that I really like. It does everything that is needed of it. It presents the setting & characters well, as well as some ideas that will later be important (eg. P-3's memory loss). Everything onwards until the theatre segment is where I feel like it exists to purely progress your equipment & loot, which, in and on its own isn't something that bad however the story just feels too stretched out there especially considering such a rushed finale. Nonetheless the interactions between Charles & Sergey in this part of the story are very strong and I think that their dynamic and what it really turns out to be in the end is where the writing of the game truly shines. Not to mention the whole Charles is the true antagonist thing as well as him not being a robot is really great as an idea but the "reveal" in either of the finales is what really bothers me because it doesn't fell satisfying at all because of how rushed the endings feel.
Another problem that I personally have with the story is the way it presents its themes. It starts exploring them in an interesting way and just drops them and moves onto other ones. Like If you are going to have one of the crucial parts of your mc be the fact that he has memory loss as a mechanism from past traumatic experiences - explore that more. Explore the way limbo affects P-3 more, have him take a moment to reflect on everything he found out after watching the cassettes on the Neptune base, show us how he feels after finding out that he has been manipulated by the people(well, and non people) he thought he could trust by how he was lied to and used for others selfish purposes. Don't tell us or allude to the fact that he is on a verge of a mental breakdown show it to us and let the moment breathe and be felt.
Ah, yes, and then there are the endings the supposed canon one, the "good" one, with P-3 siding with Sechenov and the bad one where you confront Sechenov and find out that this whole time Chariton was the one to sent P-3 to Limbo & switching him to "killer" mode. What I hate the most about both is the fact that they just seem to forget that Sechenov is also evil, like, are we just forgetting the whole mind control thing?
The idea that both of the endings are bad is cool, don't get me wrong, it's even refreshing to an extent, and incredibly funny with it being set in ussr. It's just the way one of them excuses Sechenov's actions purely because Charlton is more evil? Which yeah, he is worse, but that doesn't make Sechenov an angel though??? But I digress.
Overall, it's a story with a bunch of potential that has some cool lines & ideas, and is pretty good for a first major project, however it could have been so much more, and the fact that it isn't is truly unfortunate.