Update Ninety: 6 December 2017

☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆☆

While the reviews on this game are mixed, I thought it was pretty all right!

Asemblance is a kind of walking sim first person atmospheric recursive puzzle-lite game. The premise and execution is vague, a little too on the open-ended side to completely suite my tastes. It’s another game where you’re trapped in a science-y facility with only terminals and a robot voice. This robot voice is quite animated and natural-sounding most of the time, which is a nice choice that does set this game apart.

So, you’re in this facility, and this robot voice guides you through three recursive memories before you have to take control of the reins yourself. You hear bits and flashes - there was an accident, it’s your fault, your wife wants you to come home but you can’t - and to be honest I didn’t super care until I realized the player character was a woman.

I still have a knee-jerk reaction where I assume, if I’m not told otherwise, the faceless nameless POV character one plays as in games like this is male, especially when science and wives get brought into it. When I found a photo, though, in your house of two women of the same age holding a child together with their faces all pressed close, and one was the wife character, I knew that the other woman was me. It was a bright, electro-shock moment that made my interest in the game double - that was me!! I could relate to this plot more deeply now, now that I knew it was from my viewpoint, and that I didn’t have to FORCE it to be through my viewpoint.

The plot - such that it was - is still really vague and shoestring, and tbh I can see why people didn’t like it. It’s short, not super actiony, and a little repetitive. It had nice production value, though, and really good VFX and visual metaphors. I can’t deny I enjoyed my hour spent with it. Getting the different endings can be counter intuitive (and the True End has timing-based requirements and you all know how I loooove those).

But if you’re looking for another walking sim and want to be confused and look at some pretty settings and chase, eternally chase after your creepy memory of your tragic science wife - you can do worse than Asemblance.

Next up:

See you soon!