qqbert
Fun game with lots of good ideas and great art direction. At the same time it's messy as hell, inspirations are all over the place, there are some laughable attempts to explain things and link them with some of the series' entries... They also make poor job of capturing some of the series trademarks like interconnected puzzle gameplay, growing mutations of enemies, idea of eugenics etc. I mean, it's there, they're trying, but they seems to forgot how those things worked in the first place so results are meh.
2021
It's not that bad - some visuals and atmosphere are pretty good, concept of "trauma upon trauma" is interesting and not something you usually see in media... Thing is, Bloober Team are folks that are making those psychological horrors but it seems that they don't actually understand ideas behind genre, mindset of people with mental illness, works that inspired them etc.
I mean, just take something technical for example like camera angles. You may think it's cool that they took something from classic survival horror games, but if you just come back to Resident Evil (2002) or Silent Hill 2 you'll ask yourself right away what the fuck they are doing, because it's obvious that they don't know how angles works in those classic. With few exceptions, Medium feels like some point and click adventure with one of the most boring and lazy angles that was seen in genre.
Still, it's pretty, sometimes.
I mean, just take something technical for example like camera angles. You may think it's cool that they took something from classic survival horror games, but if you just come back to Resident Evil (2002) or Silent Hill 2 you'll ask yourself right away what the fuck they are doing, because it's obvious that they don't know how angles works in those classic. With few exceptions, Medium feels like some point and click adventure with one of the most boring and lazy angles that was seen in genre.
Still, it's pretty, sometimes.
That was... Something. It was my first time experience with DDLC and somehow I managed to avoid everything that this game was about except that it's visual novel with some really weird and unique stuff and holy crap does it took me by surprise.
My only complaint is that some of the character interactions, psychological revelations etc was so good it almost made me regret that whole game turns out to be huge fourth-wall-breaker rather than something more down-to-earth with main character trying to cope with some tragic events that he encountered.
Still, DDLC is incredible experience that is really hard to explain with words, you have to, duh, play it. Even if you're not into VN.
My only complaint is that some of the character interactions, psychological revelations etc was so good it almost made me regret that whole game turns out to be huge fourth-wall-breaker rather than something more down-to-earth with main character trying to cope with some tragic events that he encountered.
Still, DDLC is incredible experience that is really hard to explain with words, you have to, duh, play it. Even if you're not into VN.