LOST EMBER

Most games of this nature have combat, puzzles (jumping or otherwise), side-quests, leveling up, or just, well, "something" to fill your time besides following the main story. This one was mostly exploration and collecting a few mushrooms outside of the plot. There was a little bit of puzzle to switching animal forms for the different abilities, but it was very minor, and I rarely found myself in the position where I needed to backtrack to get the right animal for an obstacle--a bit like a very easy 3D platformer. I can't decide if I like that or hate it. Story didn't surprise me, really--I had a good idea of who the ember was by the second act--but it was touching and well-paced, very atmospheric. You never felt the game got in the way of the story or vice versa, which is a rare balance to hit. The level design also felt good, where nothing ever felt stale or re-used, yet also just enough time spent in each area that I didn't feel like I didn't get enough of something. I feel like the only thing that could've made this better was the collectables actually meaning something. Not to the gameplay maybe--that flowed well enough on its own--but more detailed tidbits about the world and its lore perhaps, or unlocking a different color for the wolf? I felt it a bit of a missed opportunity when I checked the description on a bowl and it said it was a bowl that you ate out of (paraphrased). Well, yes, I kind of assumed that. ;) I think this studio is one to watch, if they keep their eye on atmosphere, art, and writing, and just expand a little more into the gameplay bit. This is a very interesting potential genre, though in this case I felt it needed a little bit more padding.

The game is beauful, ok. But...Playing eeeh. If you like drizzle path series you'll like this. But with a wolf. It's a matter of taste. I tried to like it, but did'nt have the desire to go on. Like I said, you might like it. But if your looking for something like RiMe(highly underrated) look elsewhere. Got it on sale. Still don't think it's worth the price of admission.Sorry..

Did I mention linear? This game looks open-world but is as linear as anything you will ever find. Go there, do this. In this order. No, you can't explore over there. No, you can't climb that. Oh, find these mushrooms while you're at it. Never mind why. You don't need to know why. But there's a lot of them, and you should find them, because we said so. Oh, look, there's one up there! You can't get to it, because you're a duck right now, and ducks can only fly down, never up. Well, you should have seen it while you were up over there in that place you can't see it from. Too late now. My tolerance for being led around like a bull with a ring through its nose ran out after about half an hour. Yes, sure, the game is pretty and has some imaginative mechanics, but the player is just along for the ride. You're there to rigidly follow the script. If rigidly following a script is your cup of tea, well, hey, there you go, give it a try, this ... interactive experience, I won't call it a game ... is probably perfect for you. If you like having free will and exploring freely? You might want to look elsewhere. Also, just as an aside, Lost Ember features the WORST "wolf howl" sound effect I have ever heard. It sounds oddly like one of the developers trying to howl like a wolf. Possibly in a bathroom.

This was a pretty indie walking simulator game with pretty environments, nice music, and nice character models. I enjoyed running around as Wolf and seeing all of the different animals I could become, but I feel like my praise of the game ends there (and believe me when I say, a pretty art walking sim is right up my ally, I should have adored this game.) Usually interesting/compelling stories are pretty important in games of this nature, and I found that the story of this game fell pretty flat. The 'twist' was... predictable, to say the least. I didn't find the story particularly compelling or emotional, but hey, props for having a strong, non-persecuted lesbian main character. It was a nice surprise and the representation didn't feel performative. The spirit guide narration in English is not good (at all) and a lot of the lines are delivered as if the VA didn't know the context in which they would be given, some of them have completely the wrong tone or feel pieced together from different sentences. Truly weird, and definitely makes the mood kinda strange in some places. The saving grace, of course, is that you can turn off the spirit guide voice, but this really isn't exactly a solution. Glitches aplenty, prepare to be seeing outside of the map fairly frequently, and restarting from checkpoint just as much. I lost count of the amount of times I would get caught on a piece of the environment and not be able to move or do anything but restart from checkpoint. A number of the relics didn't spawn for me, and a number of completed achievements wouldn't register with GOG (this seems to be an issue on the steam version, too) which made it an extremely frustrating experience. The developers responded to a steam thread about this, saying they're working on it in 2019, but apparently it was never resolved. Overall, clearly a labor of love, but definitely not worth the pricepoint. I received this as a gift but could I choose again, would probably ask for something else.