Update Two Hundred and Sixty-One: 13 December 2018
the Red Strings Club
18.4 hours playtime, ~5 hrs actual, 19 of 19 achievements
8.5/10
☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆
The biggest problem this game has is one of the best problems a game could have—I wanted the experience to last much, much longer than it actually did. The Red Strings Club packs a hell of a stylish, silk-smooth punch, and I just wish I could’ve spent more time with it.
A pixel cyberpunk game situated comfortably between other games like Read Only Memories and Va11 HALL-A, the Red Strings Club has two player characters (and a third that you play temporarily)—Brandeis, a young, hotshot neural hacker, and Donovan, an older bartender that has a way with spirits (both kinds) and, somehow, cannot leave his bar. The two uncover, what else, a megacorp’s plot that could have catastrophic effects, and they decide to get in the way of that happening.
Ideally, in a perfect world, this game would be triple its size—to get more chance to settle into the characters, the world, just flesh things out some more. The setting has a really interesting, unique blend of mysticism in its sci-fi. During its very fun, very satisfying drink-mixing minigame, ‘you’ play as Numen, a literal spirit Donovan summons to help him mix the right drink to pluck at different emotions in his clients’ souls. Based off of Brandeis’ reaction, that’s not out of the realm of normalcy. That’s fascinating! What other kinds of fantastical practices are melded with sci-fi in this world? What’s presented is like the perfect pilot of a show—this is great! Give me more!
From the first moment of the game—which made me give a start and gasp—to its last—the final choice had me pause for a good couple of minutes, heart in a vise—the game weaves its atmosphere really well. The soundtrack in particular is stunning, something I enjoyed just having play in the background. It elevates the admittedly not bleeding edge, never before done plot, and the characters are charming easy to like.
Do yourself a favor and have the stars align so your fate is to pick up this game. It’s a good way to spend an afternoon or two!
Next up: SG Win December continues! I’ve heard good things about this, and the screenshots sure do look lovely. It’s time for -
See you soon!
This is on the old wishlist. It is probably not something I’ll jump into right away, but it does look interesting.
That’s the great thing about contained little experiences like this - they’re not going anywhere.
Yeah exactly. I love having a backlog of smaller games that are more thought provoking and not particularly difficult to play, but nice to play through with the wife.
Same here. Glad to see it’s worth playing. If I didn’t have so much to play already I’d get it during the winter sale. Maybe if I make more progress I’ll get it during next summer’s sale…
Haha yeah sounds familiar. Unfortunately the steam winter sale is coming up, and because I’ve made some good progress this year, the temptation is going to be high to just drop a few new games into the basket. My wishlist is close to 350, and when I look through it to try and clean some of them off, just about all of them are still games I actually would like to try out. We are so spoilt for choice these days.
Yeah definitely. My list of once-wishlisted games that I haven’t played is simultaneously depressing and thrilling.