Another Love Story

This is a Ren'Py story that uses beautiful photography with a mostly linear story broken up by binary choices.

These binary choices always have an immediate effect, but I don't know if their influence lingers later on.

I love the type of story. It's almost like a romantic version of the Turn of the Screw. The hero is confused, foggy--possibly non-neurotypical. They have someone at home--sister? caretaker? spouse? And they encounter someone in the woods. But who and what are they?

The answers are never fully revealed, but gradually hinted at more and more. I found it effective.

Another Love Story presents a tale of obsession that features a series of photographs of open, remote places in nature that are woven into the story.

It’s unclear to me how much choices affect the course of the story, but it seems as though the protagonist can make decisions that either show more compassion and understanding for their live-in partner in a remote town, or drift further and further into a sort of outdoor dream world in pursuit of a shadow that becomes a lover.

The rapid pace of scenes helps build suspense and keeps the reader hooked, though this ends up feeling a bit at odds with the vast, dreamy locations that the characters inhabit. I occasionally found myself wishing for more space for the prose, and story, to breathe. However, there is undeniably a strong sense of isolation, beauty, and mystery that permeates the story and holds interest to the very end.