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My girlfriend sent me a message before Easter started only saying in bold letters HEX. I didn't know what that meant so knowing she has talked positively on this game in the past I figured I should check this out while shes gone. Miss you!

This game is one where you see the past adventures of various fictionalized characters who have had their IPs warped historically, exploring the different games they were tossed through, using a whodunit style mystery as the main plot conceit. With a motley of small subgames from different genres to play throughout to try and keep an engaging experience. All housed in an dilapidated bar at the end of the earth. Despite its novelty I do not reccomend playing this game unless you are obsessed with the shared universe of Mullin's games, which in my opinion you probably shouldn't be since its as much a marketing gimmick to get you to play them all as much as it is a narrative through point. It's kind of annoying and unfun. If you're really interested you can go watch your favorite youtuber play it or at the very least, have a walk through handy. Now for those interested in a nuanced discussion of the game, read on...

One of the most prominent things that sticks out to me is the culture mashing a generic game and a meta version of it in order to make its point on the thin distinction between meta games and homage (the Legends game being a mix of Final Fantasy & Undertale, or the Shooting game being a mix of Halo/Warhammer/Gears of War & Hotline Miami).

Still, I can't help but think this games strongest moments are nothing in comparison to Travis Strikes again giving cynical homage to Hotline Miami 2 openly in order to make a counterargument to it. In that game, Travis is shown throughout completely addicted to all of these various indie games which you can wear as shirts, all given to the player without commentary besides the origin of the game it came from.

Throughout the game, Suda uses TSA mostly as a vehicle of commentary on some of his older titles, often riffing on them. Only towards the end does it bring Hotline Miami 2 in, it does it with a purpose. Both games hint at an almost unfathomably larger than life apocalypse, one that seems inevitable in the face of life. Why even acknowledge it, why not just cramp up in your shack and ignore it all? By directly using it as intertextuality in the final act, it enhances the whole story about futility and the meaning of fighting in despite it all. It had to use the text of that game as a clear and concise negation point, it also shows Travis sort of waking up from his Walden-esque slumber from a plot position to which makes it doubly effective (interestingly enough, Inscryption here, does obey this open final act negation in its game to).

Compared to that (admittedly niche) example, this game feels a bit trite and hollow. For example, the game will use stuff like streamer spam (which is admittedly the most amusing part of the game and had me laughing a storm in surprise) and shitty mods in order to show how our relationship to games can become warped by the ways we interface with them. This focus on externalities that affect our treatment of a work and their financial trajectory is interesting, but of course the negative feedback needs to seem heart breaking and the mods need to be shitty right? Cheating in the Fallout Tactics clone game needs to be a bit frowned upon.

The problem is all of these micro games felt just awful to play, not just after being warped but right from the beginning to, and whenever they challenged me I just found myself more annoyed than enjoying the experience on any sort of meta level. For example the first game it has you play is a mario clone (which riffs off this little known game Eversion). The base game everyone supposedly likes is ass to play. Why anybody would map their jump to a click is beyond me considering the playerbase and I find it doubtful taken as its own happy go lucky first game people really 'enjoyed' it and that the game was degenerated from steam reviews or that they would express their opinion so simply. In reality I would have probably found this portion both more believable and more amusing had it been on newgrounds, since the flash game community has shorter sentiments as shown there and lower standards. I feel the steam interface was only there instead in order to shock you when your 'friends' leave the negative feedback on the 2nd game, which functions more as gimmick than realistic storytelling. Some of the later sections feel slightly more effective in their cynicism, ie the girl in Legends disliking the game so much she actively seeks its destruction.

While there are certainly amusing moments I can't help but feel a lot of the main messaging of this game (dont sell IPs, dont hoard Gamedevs, dont use money as a power move, don't parade an antagonistic relationship with your fans) kind of comes in conflict with framing those out groups in simplistic ways. The mod community has to be making bad mods that completely undo the actual vision of the Fallout clone. There can't be a fun mod on this abandoned project that increases the games quality it all has to be foolish shit like a texture mod that adds flowers in a wasteland. In reality, the mod community for something like Stardew Valley is so strong they have been able to make expansion packs and stress test it. The mod community of Dark Souls was able to help make the game run on PC when it came out. It kind of makes the point far more murky, regardless of how much you can rationalize it as 'its the main developer who thinks these things' it just feels hollow by conflating targets as way bigger issues than they are. Convenient how the twitch messages grind to a halt so you can actually cheat and bug the game by a person messaging in the chat. The game really only makes clear the artifice of its own gimmicks when it does stuff like this. To be clear here the problem does have a sort of 'both sides' quality to it. Yes corporate capture is going to create buggier messes that don't really capture the charm of the original but using a fattened mole in a wife beater who doesn't care is not only a lazy fat shaming stereotype but also just not what the megacorp would have done. Where you could have had a legitimate point about how not all IP capture is in the main mascot character, and how warping the assets and atmosphere into something still friendly but entirely off, is instead just an easy joke at their expense, there's no punch to any of it!

The game seems to be a fairly concerted meditation on the importance of IP preservation in the face of corporate capture, and how selling out can cause you to become the cycle of hubris in those same corporations you hate. It's certainly interesting as a conversation piece on that and the meaning of meta games as a genre. Whereas I think it only goes to cliches and seems to imply the best IP is the one only held by the original author (something both completely wrong and curiously, effectively overturned in Mullins next game Inscryption what with the technical 'original author' of that one being Hitler and all). The conversation on meta games and their merit as games often being squandered by their own mechanics is actually quite fascinating.

I was able to note the forms of satire and the nods of what meta game was given respect to for almost all of the subgames, Hotline Miami, Eversion, Undertale, ProjectM/Mugen (on the 'making this character overpowered on purpose' stuff). It's interesting because it didn't make the game I was actually playing any better, and now it actually has got me thinking if maybe we are being a little too nice on these other games just because of their 'meta' quality.

It's been mentioned before that metacommentary is probably one of narratively the easiest things a person can do. Compare your text to another text, riff on that text in order to enforce your own. Anybody who sticks around to see it through will by design be an audience in on and amused by the 'injoke'. In that sense not only does meta work as an easy girder for storytelling, but it also works as a filter. We have to assume those people who are not amused by the effect are simply going to leave early. Not much thought is given to them though because they are not 'in' on the joke. They don't get it.

Here's the rub with that sort of dichotomy: While there are obviously people who would leave enjoy due to ignorance with the intertextual jokes at play, it also assumes that the reason somebody would stop playing the game is out of ignorance rather than out of unamusement with the game. Allow me for a moment to try and explain what I mean by this through a comparison point.

Let's use Undertale. Undertale is a game where being in on the 'ingroup' from the outset at least is not at all difficult. If you've played even 1 RPG turnbased game your set. And if your willing to go broad enough, if you played 1 game where you kill monsters at all you're probably fine. As the games purpose is to subvert your expectations on how the game will react to stuff like XP, saving, attacking enemies, tutorialization, etc. So then we can assume that this is a game with a metacommentary so ubiquitous it amuses a broad audience. This is all true but what do we do with the people outside this base audience? Like how in the hell would they have missed the riffing and amusement? That's kind of where our relationship with these games as them being great just because of their meta-referentiality starts to break down.

Almost nobody is going to play this game and get far at all if they don't get the metacommentary. Those people have to be unamused either for how the metacommentary itself plays out as a distracting writing trick or the fundamental game design around it. When we strip back the specific meta elements we find a game that is very boisterous and friendly, with and exceptionally easy difficulty curve, and a lot more distracting spectacle and chatting than actual combat. Personally I found the amount of talking going on in the game vs. the combat actually kind of irritating. I'm not going to pretend I didn't enjoy Undertale at all, obviously its a very flashy game with a lot of evocative moments, but it should be telling that the only time I or most anybody else I know legitimately felt challenged was locked behind content I wasn't supposed to play (being vague here with respect to spoiler). Also while I personally was not so openly bothered by it at the time, man are a lot of these characters invasive as hell. The idea of friendliness for most of them seemed to be some degree of screaming right in your face and pulling your shirt over to something they want to show you. Papyrus whole gimmick is doing this and obviously he is meant to irritate you, but the gimmick is kept for pretty much every character you meet in the game. Obviously the game is trying to egg you to violence, but in a sort of twisted way I couldn't help but feel sorry for the protagonist, who is by design made mute. I only wish I could have them write on a piece of paper 'personal space please!'. Most of the humor and jokes in the game are milked off of this primary interaction with its world, a world so intent on doing dance numbers in front of you that it's telling the only place I legitimately remember fondly is the waterfall for how hands off it felt.

Yet I was and still am a bit timid to point this out because any sort of ingroup can just clammor this is 'the point' and suddenly the exchange is either folded into either you missing an obscure piece of lore or just generally a stress test of how much of an idiot you are. It feels BAD to be in an outgroup on a metatext, you are passively shamed for having such a bewildering and contrarian stance. This is also true in terms of expressing your experiences on passions in a personal sense to.

But like, what if the combat difficulty is just lackluster, what if the writing just gets on your nerves, what if the level design feels like a bunch of meaningless gimmicks? What about the game experience? Do we just sacrifice our in the moment experience with a game in service of an (arguably false) sense of community around having a comparible experience with a fandom? These quiet reservations I have I just buried because look, there's a lot about Undertale to like and it did a great job, but I think I was betraying myself a bit by playing it and assuming it was just about the best this kind of game can get. I guess I must like it because I've yet to experience anything so 'meta' on rpg games. I feel I should have seen it as a test to push forward rather than accept our Undertale overlord with now further questioning. So why haven't I? Far be it from me to make it sound like a problem, but this ingroup/outgroup dynamic functions equally for insights as well. Short simple insights that reflect general consensus are going to be amplified by general appreciation more than longer ones. Despite it feeling kind of bad to be in this outgroup to, I swallowed my envy and stuck to what I want to do anyway simply because I write with the purpose of self discovery, practice, and game experience memory. If I already choose to take the path less traveled here, I can suck it up and start having a more critical relationship with metagames as well, and if you've read this far you probably can to, I believe in you! For me, keeping the comments turned off is maybe just my personal bandaid against people trying to scare me off from doing it.

But having the gameplay in The Hex be so unambiguously fucking terrible it actually got me thinking about it. Genuinely like do not play this game for the gameplay, this game plays like a freeware meme game at the best of times and a schoolyard flash game at the worst. Not even the rpg or fighting sections are that good because the fighting section is a bunch of obnoxious puzzles and the main character of the RPG portion does not want to be in the game, does not want sequels. And a primary plot point is how a lot of these characters in the bar dont want to be paraded in infinite sequels anyway. I think by having the game actually be bad to play it woke me up to this fact though: Meta commentary can not be an excuse for weak game design or a mask for decent criticism. The fact that the game so openly jabs at those sort of metagames makes me rethink my perception on how to approach this fact and whether I was 'tricked' into liking some of those games more than I actually do. To its credit this game does try to mask each subgame by having so many for its short run, but the novelty of a bunch of small bad games doesn't avoid the issue of it then making the overall game bad. Although granted the point and click portions were well designed and appealing, it was nice being able to walk around the area and consort with the other customers as each character, but in a great twist of irony this point and click portion is also by far its shortest part, only barely cushioning my increasing irritation with each part. Each subgame getting longer as it goes on certainly not helping. You could say the text itself gets more cynical with this interaction except the 2 who most desire to escape their IP hells are bookended by the Fallout Tactics game which has probably the most authentic and genuine relationship and character belief this is their game out of all of them so it doesn't really work on that level either. It might have been more effective that way had they moved his chapter right before the chef one oddly enough but that's ultimately not what happened.

The most petty point though is that Mullins decided to rehash the stupid line connection puzzles from pony island and somehow do them even worse. Nobody played Pony Island and missed those puzzles because they are literally everywhere anyway. If I want to play line logic puzzles I'll go play the Witness of something. Move on bro.

Toda carreira artística carrega um pouco de quem a faz, né?
Como aqueles livros " a vida e obra de fulano" chegam a ser redundantes.
Nossas obras refletem nossas vidas, refletem quem você foi no especifico momento em que deu luz aquela ideia e a executou. Era você ali, apesar de uma versão morta sua.
Sabendo disso, como vai se ver ao olhar nos olhos desses espelho colorido que você criou de si mesme?
A obra se torna viva por essas memórias, por esse pedaço de humanidade que deixamos escapar em cada uma delas (mesmo nas vazias ou industriais), assim sendo como lidamos com ela?
The Hex sabe brincar com camadas do imaginário que acessam essa humanidade nas obras.
Brincar com essa autorreferência é de se esperar do Mullins, mas usar isso para envolver esse conceito de arte viva é convincente e instigante, ainda mais quando lidamos e controlamos (ou vivemos) essas obras e esses personagens, É difícil não sentir que cada um deles tem um pouco da humanidade deixada pelo personagem que os criou no jogo.
Só é uma pena um jogo que em sua camada interna fala tanto dessa humanidade, deixar sua própria humanidade de lado.
Senti falta de uma abertura nesse jogo, de uma conversa próxima, aberta, verdadeira e vulnerável.
No final das contas, uma conversa humana nunca será substituída pela vida e obra de um personagem que nunca viveu.
Fosse esse jogo sincero e real ao seu final em sua humanidade, teria um impacto gigantesco.
Como não é, se torna um jogo hipócrita e que luta para sobreviver nos resquícios de humanidade não intencionais.

The best way to talk about this game is by spoiling absolutely nothing. I'll just say that it's very much worth playing based on the unique premise and interesting directions the story takes, and Daniel Mullins is perfectly equipped to handle both. That being said, I do have one nitpick to get off my chest. The strength of the genre parodies is WILDLY inconsistent , and just in general how much you'll get out of them depends on how familiar you are (or aren't) with the games they're spoofing. There is somewhat of a justification for this, but I guess it was worth noting. There are times where moments of the game can feel scattershot and directionless but trust me, it all comes together in the end. A game like this is only going to appeal to a very specific type of nerd (like myself) and definitely isn't for everyone, but I'm glad it exists and that I got to experience it. It's just kind of hard to rate this as a "video game" for reasons that only make sense if you've played all the way through it.

I have actually heard of the hex prior to playing Inscryption. However, I dismissed it at first because it looks like a dorkly style "aren't video games wacky" kind of thing, boy was I wrong. While the gameplay is ok, the story is what makes this game so great, possibly my favorite story from Daniel Mullins. I would even argue I like this game more than Pony Island.

The story is about 6 abandoned video game protagonists in a bar called "the six pint inn", who are trying to find out who is planning a murder. Without spoiling anything too big, the focus is less on the murder and more about the game industry and how it has effected these characters.

While in the inn, the game plays like a point and click, however, once an event happens to a character, a flashback of the game they were from will occur with genre dependent on the character, ranging from Platforrmer, Fighting Game, RPG and more. That may sound like the game is unfocused, but thankfully, the controls make the game feel more cohesive, since you only use WASD and the left mouse button.

The soundtrack by Jonah Senzel is also pretty good songs, such as "Coming in Hot" and "Dustbowl Danny".

Since this is a Daniel Mullins game, there are plenty of
creative fourth wall breaks, secrets, and even an ARG that has a hidden ending in another game.

Overall I highly recommend this game to those who like good stories, hidden secrets or even if you've enjoyed Daniel Mullins other work.

The Hex: El Juego de todos los juegos

Explicar de que va este juego es difícil, porque todo de el es spoiler y su historia difícil de explicar, se controla fácil pero te pone en muchas situaciones distintas de distintos géneros. La forma mas fácil de describirlo es como una experiencia original y variada con distintas secciones con un gameplay distinto pero que maneja los mismos controles acompañado de una narrativa bien hecha que une todas las historias y secciones contándote las historias individuales de los personajes a su vez que se desarrolla la trama principal del juego en estas historias contenidas también dando pistas de la historia de fondo detrás de todas estas.

The Hex es uno de esos juegos que termino, me encantan, y cada vez que pienso en ello y los recuerdo me van gustando mas y mas, noto mas detalle me sorprendo a mi misma descubriendo alguna cosa que pase por alto y recuerdo los momentos en que me sorprendí, y este es el tipo de experiencia que me gusta precisamente, profundas pero simples que me permitan apreciarlo todo pero asombrarme porque todo esta tan bien construido que a pesar de ser poco vuelvo a notar nuevos detalles, como una caja de sorpresas y misterios, con otros juegos los termino me encantan pero aparte de los momentos de gameplay los voy olvidando y no me dejan gran cosa a decir verdad, o juegos narrativos que terminan sus historias fueron muy buenas pero tampoco llegaron a volverme loca y si las re visito en vez de notar detalles la sorpresa esta es en hacer otra ruta distinta donde las cosas son nuevas pero con la misma profundidad que la otra ruta.

En cambio The Hex es tan original, tiene tantas cosas y tan buen gameplay que es de mi tipo de juegos y eso sin llegar a mis favoritos absolutos porque de el mismo creador inscryption hace lo mismo pero también rompiéndola en el gameplay.
Vamos por partes

Apartado Audiovisual

Visualmente, horrible, los diseños son feos y poco estéticos, los gráficos parecen de cartón y todo el mundo que vea este juego va a creer que es un juego nft o alguna cosa rara que nadie jugaría (Cosa que refuerza la narrativa ahora que me doy cuenta pero esos son spoilers). Realmente el apartado gráfico es muy feo pero con sentido y propósito, artísticamente los diseños son geniales ya que representan muy bien los conceptos que se suponen que están representando, los diseños son claras parodias o referencias y en cuanto sepas un poco de videojuegos podrás ya imaginarte que tipo de gameplay manejara el personaje que te toque llevar, siempre claro con sorpresas de por medio que no revelare aunque bueno si te dijera que tiene de por medio dudo que puedas atinarle a que personaje es el que aparenta ser lo que es o cual tiene un giro en su trasfondo.

Pero a pesar de ser estrepitosamente horrible el apartado visual es tremendamente ingenioso no solo en sus diseños si no en su uso de la interfaz y los elementos en pantalla llegando a jugar con esta en algunos instancia combinándola con el gameplay, el juego usa todos los elementos visuales que presenta de formas originales y que no te las esperas, tanto para reforzar el gameplay como la historia. Para resumir el apartado visual es tremendo aunque sea horrible hace cosas originales y usa todos sus elementos y sus detalles aportan a la historia y no se quedan como una pequeña curiosidad, el juego te recompensa por leer una cosa que sale en el fondo y es interesante y vistosa pero que fácilmente puedes ignorar o crees que te esta contando algo irrelevante pero para darte cuenta que si te estaba contando parte de la historia y no solo un complemento, y son pocos los detalles por lo que tampoco vas a ir de paranoico y no importa si no lees o no te fijas en esas cosas al final todo se junta y se explica por lo que el fijarte en los detalles solo recompensa tu atención al darte cuenta que tus especulaciones eran ciertas o esa cosa que viste era importante o tenia un significado.

En cuanto a lo sonoro. Pues es resulton el soundtrack tiene algunas canciones que si son demasiado buenas pero de resto no diría que es el apartado sonoro mas increíble, cumple, no falla y en momentos es tremendamente bueno. Pero no me parece la gran cosa la verdad.


Gameplay

El gameplay es tremendamente bueno, en las propias capturas de steam y por la premisa del juego se deduce y ya lo sabia antes de jugar así que bueno lo diré.

En the hex pasamos por distintos géneros de juegos, desde rpg tactico hasta plataformero. Esto parecería un desastre y algo que no se debe hacer jamas ya que no se puede llegar a pulir tantas mecánicas. Pero the hex si lo hace. El control siempre es simple nunca necesitaras nada mas que el teclado y tu mouse, todos se controla con eso olvidate de inventario, shift para correr agacharte, etc. así que al tener controles tan limitados el juego tiene que presentarte niveles y situaciones creativas que se sorteen bien con estos en los distintos géneros que presenta, y vaya que lo hace, todo se controla de manera simple pero te pone en situaciones tan locas y originales que hacen que esas mecánicas simples tomen una vuelta o acompañen al evento, y esto lo hace de constante. El gameplay no llega a ser profundo pero si lo suficientemente cómodo para poder pasar por tantas cosas distintas y que se sigan sintiendo parte de una sola cosa y no un complicado de minijuegos que nada tienen que ver. Porque si todo lo que pasa esta conectado y eso me lleva a hablar de la historia

Historia

Una maravilla de verdad, al inicio no me había encantado pero después de ver todas las conexiones y eventos mientras estaba pensando al azar me di cuenta de lo buena que es, esta tremendamente bien hilada presenta personajes carismáticos todos con un trasfondo, y todos estos trasfondos están unido o dan pie a otros sucesos, por lo que no es un jrpg o gacha donde te ponen 7 kilómetros de texto de trasfondo de un personaje para que empatizes con el porque durante toda la aventura sera el mismo. Si no que en estas historias exploramos cierta jugabilidad y mientras vemos mas de el personaje vamos desarrollando las 2 tramas principales de el juego conectando con otros personajes o dando detalles que enriquecen a el mundo o misterios que se resolverán mas adelante, una historia tremendamente inteligente que en 6 horas te desarrolla todas sus ideas para que tengas una experiencia redonda pero te deja con la intriga de saber mas porque construye misterios con sus detalles, Ojala la mayoría de narrativas fueran así de dinámicas y divertidas. Aunque eso si es simple y hasta cierto punto lineal, y lo importante aquí es como te cuentan todo porque lo que te cuentan tampoco es la cosa mas profunda o los personajes son ultra tridimensionales, son cosas simples pero tan bien contadas que hace que sea inolvidable porque al final es mejor 6 personajes simples pasando por una historia divertida interconectada que te involucra a través de un gameplay único donde te premia por ver detalles y te presenta algo que no volverás a ver , Que historia shonen generica personaje anime tira al gacha por este personajes porque le hicimos todo un evento ultradivertido que consiste en recoger 80 partes de su estatua de macarrones y en donde puedes ver sus características muy divertidas como moveset copiado de vergil y personalidad sacada de un anime shonen.

Sin ganas de desprestigiar los otros tipos de historia que también disfruto. Siento que estas que se esfuerzan en sorprender de buena manera sin buscar shock barato y que la sorpresa venga mas de revelarte algo que cambia tus expectativas pero a su vez ya presientas porque era la conclusión lógica de los detalles que has estado hilando y te vuela la cabeza o te deja con una buena sensación, que fue mi caso aquí porque ya realmente me olía todo y no me voló la cabeza por la narrativa si no por como la implementaron y uno que otro detalle, pero si quede gratamente sorprendida y al filo del asiento con interés en todo momento y la resolución fue magnifica. No es el magnus opus de la narrativa, seguro the witcher 3, the last of us I, o como ejemplo de algo que si he jugado: outer wilds y disco elysium, tienen mejor narrativa the hex no es la ultima panacea no es la historia de historias pero si es tremendamente buena e interesante con giros y complementada con el gameplay de maneras originales y muy creativas que te dejan con buen sabor de boca, o almenos con mejor sabor que estar jugando un JRPG por su narrativa profunda y que 50 de tus 80 horas de juego sea peleándote contra monstruos genéricos que no aportan nada y que serán motivo de que dropees el juego o te lo veas en youtube si estas jugando el juego por su historia y no porque te apasione un combate lineal basado en atacar esperar curar atacar esperar curar, combate que the hex parodia y por eso lo menciono porque eso me deja decir que

Si te gustan los juegos y has jugado varios tipos de estos vas a disfrutar mas the hex y su historia que si eres un gamer casual ya que esta tremendamente cargada de parodias y referencias a la industria y mundo de el videojuego. No parodia tipo: Undertale 100 iq porque el vendedor querria comprarte lo que le intentas vender jakajakjakaj.

Es una parodia mas orientada a lo que es la industria de el videojuego en si lo que estos representan y una movida muy distinta donde el foco de burla no son las mecánicas si no lo que están detrás de ellas.

conclusión

The Hex es tremendo quisiera hacer un análisis extenso pero es un juego que casi nadie ha jugado y de el que decir cualquier es spoiler y puede arruinar sorpresas que yo disfrute y si me hubieran contado no seria lo mismo. Si este juego fuera no se skyrim podria dar ejemplos de porque me gusta mas la historias secundarias de skyrim ya que mientras que esas te llevan a situaciones vario pintas con hasta aveces giros de guion, la historia principal solo te lleva a un viaje genérico de salvar a el mundo en el cual participas por coincidencia y no porque llegaste a el pareciendo mas una historia de algún jrpg que un mamador elitista de 30 años pondría como la cúspide de la narrativa cuando parece escrita por un niño de 15 años fan del anime o por alguna loca que como no puede decir casi datos de el juego tiene que llenar la review con criticas a un genero de juegos distintos a el que the hex pertenece. Salvo que nada te puede garantizar que the hex no pueda ser un JRPG. Ya veras tu si lo es o no lo es habrá que jugar para averiguarlo

En fin un juego Original, una experiencia única, pero que a nivel jugable no llega a una profundidad que me hagan considerarlo una hiper obra maestra o no me llego a sorprender a niveles astronómicos y seguro le agarrarías mas cariño a genshin por invertirle 80 horas en sacar un monito, que a este juego donde pasas 6 horas viendo una historia con malos gráficos y que si solo has jugado juegos de teléfono pues te parecerá rara, divertida y simple pero no descubrirás todo lo que tiene para ofrecer o te perderás el punto de esta haciendo que sea una experiencia buena pero olvidable lo cual es valido y no tiene nada de malo. Pero si descubres todo lo que tiene para ofrecer y jamas has jugado nada como esto (cosa que no fue mi caso ya que inscryption es muy similar y me vine a este juego sabiendo lo que me espera) te digo que no encontraras nada que se le parezca

9/10

English | Español

A very original metagame that honors (or parodies) games themselves, from concrete games to the industry as a whole. One of those very particular experiences that Daniel Mullins always offers.

Un metajuego tremendamente original que homenajea (o más bien parodia) a los juegos en sí mismo desde títulos concretos hasta la industria en general. Una de esas experiencias muy particulares que siempre ofrece Daniel Mullins.

While I do continue to appreciate this outsider perspective to a meta-narrative that we get bits and pieces of, and the gameplay here is more varied (even if only literally) and gives me more of a reason to give a shit about what's going on, it still doesn't quite hit enough when it comes around to the end. It definitely feels much more realized and put-together than any attempt Pony Island made, and there's some very important things he learned that show in this project. It's just unfortunate that a lot of the animation is still fairly simple and not super personable, despite fairly decent design and character. Attempts to subvert the 4th wall still felt fairly laughable and simple, even as narrative elements, but do a decent job of keeping you on your guard for what comes next, because you won't really ever guess. It's fun in that regard, and funny in terms of its satirical elements and industry commentary, if at times wildly absurd. Overall a positive change of direction in development in my opinion, one that showed a lot more promise for the developer Daniel Mullins has become today. Now it's finally time for the biggun.

The Hex: A love letter to (and some critique of) video games, a story that simply cannot be told in any other medium. There are hits and misses here, but there's no denying Daniel Mullins is quite the creative... and he needs help ending his games.

The Hex is a lot of things in one, I guess I'd describe it as a meta-narrative puzzler at its core. The “meta” and “puzzle” parts are pretty solid (though “puzzle” gets too absurd), but the “narrative” could use some work.

For meta, expect references galore. There's direct references to older games like Mario, Sonic, and even Tapper, and then some to newer games like Hotline Miami and PUBG. A pompous developer makes light of crunch culture, you'll see a Twitch chat and Steam reviews while you play, and GameShark-like cheat codes will help you even the odds. You, the player, will be referenced and spoken to directly. This is clearly a favorite concept for Daniel, I think he's 3 for 3 with this.

For puzzles, there's a few layers here. There are plenty of puzzles in the game to solve, including ones that'll have you using your cursor on screen to block lights as though it was a physical hand. Plenty of this sorts of stuff. But linking back to “meta”, if you want to know how far the rabbit hole goes with The Hex, you need to download and play an entirely different game (on Steam) just to find codes that work here. It's ambitious, but I think it's also absurd. I downloaded that other game but then decided I'm not going through the rigamarole, thank god for YouTube. This should be reined in a bit.

I found the narrative to be the least interesting part. Since I don't want to spoil anything, I'll say obviously this game is far more than its Steam page says. Starting with the easy surface stuff, I wasn't super interested in any story to keep me going, more so just wondering what the next gameplay change or meta reference would be. You can go way, way down in the story behind the scenes, and after reading up on it a bit I still don't care very much. It barely gripped me while I played the game, so it's not likely to grip me afterwards.

The ending bit with the walking simulator was a total drag. The voiceover sucks and obviously that's the intent, but knowing I'm not supposed to like what I'm experiencing doesn't help me all too much in these moments. So for the game to just slow way down before an ending I don't care about? I don't know, just not a very strong exit, here. As previously mentioned, I felt this with other games by Daniel Mullins: I don't remember much of Pony Island's ending except for not liking it, and Inscryption goes into this fourth wall-break shit even deeper for a longer time. Really, this may be my favorite final act of any of his games, but I don't like it. So.

The Hex is very interesting in many ways. This kind of game is more of a mystery than most are willing to delve into; layers upon layers and even a companion-piece game is needed to get a semblance of a final picture. You can read on its Steam discussions how far down this whole thing really goes. For me, I simply wasn't hooked enough to get that absorbed.

Check out The Hex if you love games, especially light horror ones that play with your head a bit. I guarantee it's not like anything else you've played, but it's up to you to decide if that's good or bad. I'm still not totally sure, but Daniel? Keep making games, please.

ENG: It is a stormy night. In a seedy bar/hotel, the owner receives a call warning him that there will be a murder. Dismayed, he gives the warning to his 6 tenants. 6 playable characters. 6 different ways to play. 6 stories with their conflicts and disenchantments. Following the line of Pony Island, here the meta-narrative goes even further. With a plot a thousand times more interesting and more elaborate that tells us about the development and the video game industry, egocentrism, delusions of grandeur, free will, and existence.

ESP: Es una tormentosa noche. En un bar/hotel de mala muerte el dueño recibe una llamada la cual le advierte que allí habrá un asesinato. Consternado, da el aviso a sus 6 inquilinos. 6 personajes jugables. 6 maneras distintas de jugar. 6 historias con sus conflictos y desencantos. Siguiendo la línea de Pony Island, acá la metanarrativa va aún más allá. Con una trama mil veces más interesante y más elaborada que nos habla del desarrollo y la industria de los videojuegos, el egocentrismo, los delirios de grandeza, el libre albedrío, y el existir.

Minor spoilers ahead.
This game defied all of my expectations.
Daniel Mullins has really outdid himself with this game (I still haven't played Inscryption). Every microgame is a joy to play and the story, the characters and the relationships between them is really something.
And speaking from a game development perspective, being able to make a 2D platformer, a (not so complex) fighting game, a turn based RPG, a tactical RPG, a top-down shooter, and an FPS is just awesome, especially considering the dumb gameplay of Pony Island. The little references to Pony Island was also a nice touch.
It's been a while since I've been hooked to a game this much and I even finished it in one sitting.
This is one of the most games I have ever played and it's certainly a must-play.

This is the most meta game since Pony Island.
And this is probably the best meta game i have ever played, because it's not only good at being meta, but it's also great at actual gameplay and content.
It's a unique, one of a kind game that is only comparable to The Beginner's Guide and Pony Island (of course).
It's a game full of actual secrets besides main game content, secrets that lead deep down the rabbit hole.
This game was one helluva wild ride, wilder than any Kojima's wild ride.
The Hex is a game about industry, about games, about developers.
But most importantly, about the vicious cycle of...
No, this is too much of a spoiler.
Go and play it yourself, for the story, for the characters, for the themes.
Daniel Mullins is a genius, support him, and let him take you on his wild ride.

Coming from Inscryption, I expected a fair bit of meta elements, and this game lays it on thick which I enjoyed for the most part. I think the game is pretty funny and tells an interesting story. The endings wrap up the game well. I do think the gameplay had a few lulls which had me hoping I could just move on with the story, but other than that there were a lot of highlights in the gameplay that were actually pretty interesting and fun.

In conclusion, The Hex is a really unique experience that has me interested in the overall "Daniel Mullins Universe."

I'm fascinated with how Daniel Mullins thinks about games. Pony Island was super interesting, and The Hex even moreso. However, neither game is terribly compelling to play? Especially since important aspects are intentionally obfuscated, or even located in completely other games. I would recommend watching a good stream of this game, but even that would lessen the impacts of the themes found within this game. An extremely hard game to rate, but please play it if it sounds interesting to you.

Very excited to play Inscryption!