Paradigm

I just finished this game today and honestly, I found it very amusing. A thing to note is that this game has both dark humor and, well, humor almost all over, and you shouldn't go into the game expecting a serious experience whatsoever. Every line, for the most part, was different, and there were a lot of odd turns I wouldn't think would really be in a game like this. Character design was very unique, and even the most minor characters look bizarre or different yet fitting in the world. What got me the most was the voice acting, then seeing the credits for many Voice Actors acting a good handful of characters in the game and then hearing each one which were almost amazing to see the differences in each voice and tone of them. As for the puzzles, some were a little bit complicated but none were overly-complicated that it would stump you for a day or two. The hint system for the puzzles as well does help a lot, even when it is being vauge sometimes you just need to read each word and an idea should pop in your head. So, if you're into a game with a diverse character cast, horrible/dark jokes all around, and want to have some fun, you should try this game out.

Humour, it's pretty subjective. I have a strange sense of humour, and a lot of so-called comedy leaves me cold; it's often too anodyne. Paradigm had me in stitches. It's immensely silly, occasionally stupid, but frequently hilarious. This is the game's currency, a surreal journey through a zany world, but there is an underlying story to it, and it's told with genuine heart. Paradigm is set in a vaguely eastern European world of late 70s / early 80s futurism, computers are tape-based, music is played on LPs and cassettes, games come on cartridges. The main character sports several large tumours on his head, but you quickly learn to love him. Literally every single thing that can be interacted with (and there are plenty in each scene) will elicit a dry or witty response from the character. Not all of these hit the mark, but a great many had me laughing out loud. This is the game's strength, it's incessant and ridiculous silliness. Underneath all this, the game's DNA is obvously derived from the classic Sierra and LucasArts adventures of the 90s. It's not a particularly puzzle-heavy game, relying more on exploration, story-telling and humour, but that's not to say there aren't any puzzles. The inventory is there, you'll be combining things and using them on the environment in clever ways, and several of the later puzzles are moderately challenging. You can expect it to take around 6 hours to finish if you breeze through it, or closer to double that if you click on literally everything and complete the optional minigames (where you can, for example, take a toaster on a blind date). The voice acting is of a high standard, and music by Wrench is excellent, evoking the early retroism of Boards of Canada more than anything else. Overall then, Paradigm is a fine piece of work that feels like a labour of love by its lone developer, and will end up being one of my favourite games of 2017.

Without spoiling too much, the game's story contains a failed gene-engineered prodigy child that wants to become a electronic music dj but has to save the world from a sloth first. So one can already tell that the games doesn't take itself too serious. The fun in Paradigm comes from the weird ideas and the absurd environment the story takes place in. It's beautifully drawn, the voices are well done for such a low budget and it contains a lot of immature weird humor that matches the characters quite well. However, one of the weak points of the game is this humor as well. It's sometimes overdone a bit. Pretty much each comment a character does contains a witty remark, even though it's not really needed at that place. The other weakness is the puzzles. Most of the time the solutions are quite obvious or a comment from Paradigm already tells you more or less exactly what the solution is. I never really got a bit stuck for a bit, so there is not really the satisfaction of solving hard puzzles. It's a cool game to play and it's good that it was crowd-funded so no publisher could tell Jacob what to put into the game and what not. Definitely worth a try when you're thinking about which game to play next. Pro: - lots of immature humor - gorgeous drawing and animation - unique weird characters Cons: - lots of immature humor - the puzzles are way too easy

While "close to a classic" might be a little over the top, it is hard not to draw parallels to old classics like Monkey Island and others when you play this game. Absurdly fun and weird 7 hours playthrough was well worth the money.