Update #1

My favourite aspect of this game was undoubtedly its atmosphere. The minimalist art style and moody soundtrack fit well with the post-apocalyptic setting. There were many tense moments during the exploration phases, partially due to limited resource availability. Looking through the abandoned buildings and reading notes left by the residents was genuinely fun.

I can’t say the same for the combat, which felt tedious and unrewarding. There was a decent variety of enemy types, but dealing with them quickly became boring due to the overall simplicity of the combat system. The Infected felt merely like obstacles to be shot or punched until a path was cleared, rather than actual threats. Annoyingly, the game tended to place large groups of them in small rooms. I could either rush in and waste resources killing them as quickly as possible, or exploit their AI. Neither option was particularly enjoyable.

The train sections were the most disappointing. I expected these sections to serve as the main source of exposition, but the passenger conversations added little to my understanding of the game’s world. For the most part they were just boring, when they weren’t being interrupted by the train maintenance tasks. The writing overall was marred by an awkward translation and grammatical errors. I just couldn’t get invested in the bland characters or incoherent story.

The Final Station was also painfully short; my playthrough took about 5 hours. I don’t have an issue with short narrative games in general, but this one felt unfinished. There were several locations on the map that I assumed would be playable but weren’t, and I had stored up a good amount of money during the final stages with no opportunity to spend it.

I don’t regret playing The Final Station. It was unique and the atmosphere made up for some of its flaws. I doubt I’ll play it again though.

The Final Station - The Only Traitor

I slightly preferred the DLC to the base game. The train sections were removed and replaced by less interactive car sections which allowed the characters to converse without interruption. A major change was that only one passenger could be brought along at a time. Each passenger had different stats, determining their ability to heal the player and craft items between exploration settings. They also had different personalities and information to share with the player, which formed the main incentive for replaying the DLC.

Combat was improved and melee in particular felt much more effective. There were a few new enemy types with their own gimmicks, but they weren’t much more threatening than the others. Beyond that the DLC was just more of the same, both good and bad. The exploration was still good, with some beautiful environments to visit and interesting notes to find. The writing quality was no better than in the base game, and the story just as ambiguous. The protagonist was a bit more interesting. Unlike the base game’s protagonist, this one had his own dialogue and more of a personality.

The Only Traitor took maybe 4 hours to complete. Due to the linearity of the gameplay sections and the weak storytelling, I probably won’t bother to replay it with different passengers.

I won this point & click adventure game on SteamGifts. The artwork and setting, inspired by Norse mythology, were very well done and set this game apart from others in its genre. I found the game to be somewhat on the casual side, with straightforward puzzles that mostly relied on memorization. With a few exceptions it was easy to figure out where to go next, or where to find clues about a puzzle. The Old Norse voice acting sounded great and really added to the atmosphere. The story could have received a bit more attention, but this short game was definitely worth playing.

My thoughts about this one are, in a word, ambivalent. Well, to get some of the more obvious points out of the way, the animations and graphical quality were amazing. The soundtrack always fit the setting and was quite epic when it needed to be.

The characters were charming and often quirky, but lacked depth and backstory. I never got attached to Otus or his companions, which made the game’s more emotional scenes seem a little pointless. There was a bit of forced drama which didn’t make much sense even in context, and seemed to be there just to temporarily remove a companion from the party. There were many cutscenes that felt like a waste considering how generic the overarching storyline was. The parts of the writing I was actually interested in—the lore and setting—received far less attention.

There were several things I liked about the gameplay; the flying mechanics felt great and the companions all had unique abilities with their own uses during boss fights. Enemies were well-designed and had interesting behaviours. I liked the bosses as well, and had little difficulty with them once I learned their attack patterns. Any issues I had with them were mainly due to the controls. Playing with a controller I found that certain combat mechanics felt sluggish (ex. throwing).

I really liked Owlboy’s open areas where I could simply explore and enjoy flying around. Bafflingly, most dungeons seemed to be at odds with the flying mechanic rather than take advantage of it. Tight corridors and slow stealth sections are not quite what I was hoping for. Puzzles were simple and repetitive, but not offensively so.

I did enjoy the time I spent with Owlboy, despite some frustrating sections. I don’t think it lived up to its potential, but I would be open to playing a sequel.