Crier

"I have a theory—perhaps it applies only to me, but I believe I’ve seen it in others, too—that the most important determiner of whether someone likes or dislikes something is based on whether its premise innately appeals to them. (Or, similarly, that they find a major character relatable.) A work’s technical quality, uniqueness, narrative consistency, and so on are secondary factors in comparison, and when a reviewer brings up these elements to explain why a work is good or bad, they are typically dancing around the core issue." - From a post I read online.

This game's premise innately appeals to me, and everything else follows from there.

In this lushly written visual novel, you're imprisoned and sentenced to wander a dungeon/"subworld" full of the wicked sovereign's prisoners, dissidents, and other things too dangerous to let loose, all warped by time and subworld-induced evolution into something unrecognizable as human. As far as I'm concerned, this is a perfect concept. I like alien biology, physical and mental transformations, strange worlds with an eldritch mien, and surreal evocations of altered mental states. I like weird fiction, and evidently so does the author, since they listed Jeff Vandermeer's Southern Reach series as an inspiration for another of their games. Vandermeer helped to cement "weird fiction" as a genre; his writing often deals with otherworlds, strange biology and transcending/losing one's own humanity, themes that show up in this story. The Southern Reach series, especially Annihilation, is a fun read.

Anyway. The IFDB description made me worry the writing would be too dense for me to enjoy, but I found that wasn't the case at all. It helps that this is a visual novel, and the characters have unique voices to set themselves apart. Some are more florid than others, but even when they're somewhat incomprehensible, the actual descriptions of what is happening are always clear.

I wasn't expecting the visual novel part at first, but the sound design and illustrations are fitting. The phrase "visual novel" dredges up images of anime girls, but the characters in this game are bizarre and inhuman and as far from anime girls as they could be. Not that I'm necessarily opposed to anime girls. But I also like out-there character designs that stray from the humanoid, and this game fits that to a T. I particularly like Phenol Red's design; I think the ex-hivedrone's design was the only one I wasn't fond of, maybe because it read as overtly sexual to me in a way that I disliked. The drone's dialogue is funny, though.

The curious thing is that despite the uncanny designs of the characters, you can have brief and compelling moments of intimacy with some of them. Most of these moments involve you being killed. These scenes are sensual without really being explicit, and don't bear much resemblance to real human acts. I find them aesthetically attractive, while someone else might find them grotesque.

For example: one of my favorite scenes is the one where you agree to (Spoiler - click to show)let the madcap labspider Cynie experiment on you: she dismembers you and conditions your disembodied brain into an obedient component of her god-machine. I thought this was lovely. Cynie's even nice enough to restrict her negative reinforcement conditioning to "the approximation of pain" instead of actual pain. How generous of her! (Your tastes may vary.)

Also, shoutouts to (Spoiler - click to show)the "Duchess of Limbs", an eldritch spider who can bind and devour you in a number of tenderly written death scenes. I liked that part too. Even though you die. You win some, you lose some.

The game is tagged "obscene" on Spring Thing. There are some sexual references, but I found the story, on the whole, to be strange and wonderful more than obscene. Who doesn't want to be lovingly dismembered? No one? Just me? --- Well, of course a lot of this nebulous "character appeal" thing can be chalked up to a player's individual idiosyncrasies, but I still personally thought the characters were cool. It helps that Cynie and the ex-hivedrone, probably my least favorite characters design-wise (though I like their dialogues and personalities), weren't characters I encountered during my first playthrough. I wonder if you could analyze the characters as subversions of common "sexy character" tropes: (Spoiler - click to show)slimegirl, spider lady, robot scientist, but with designs that are purposefully alienating and not geared towards fanservice, even as the writing itself still expresses the essential appeal of these characters. Or maybe the lack of standard character appeal is the appeal, for people like me who find those uncanny designs compelling.

The story and characters reminded me a bit of Chandler Groover, actually. Eat Me and Bring Me A Head have a similarly sensual aesthetic of mad rulers and decaying glory.

I can't go this far without mentioning the writing style, too. It's very in media res, with the kind of worldbuilding that offhandedly mentions things and never elaborates on them, weaving mood and atmosphere out of elaborate neologisms and alien concepts. The characters are quirky, Phenol Red and the ex-hive drone talk like terminally online Discord users, while the main character sounds like an apocalyptic Great Awakening preacher. The combination of it all is just exquisitely bizarre. The default font is mildly hard to read, though it did mean I spent more time deciphering the story's lavish sentences and turns of phrase because I couldn't be sure if something was a neologism or just me failing to parse the font.

My main issue with this game is that it's too short, and I mean this as a compliment because I would have been perfectly happy to keep exploring this world for hours. I wanted to see the world aboveground, I wanted to see the main character get their revenge on the sovereign, I wanted to see the incoming apocalypse. The style of this game is unlike anything I've encountered, and I wanted more of it. I think the shortness is a consequence of the many branching paths this story has. The first time I finished it, I thought I'd seen it all, but I played again and met two new characters (Cynie and the hivedrone) the second time. Having played four or five times, it feels like I've finally discovered the flow of events and what you require to get from point A to point B, but there's a lot of thought put into the structure of the story and the logistical flow that went over my head the first time because it works so well. This comes at the cost of having a somewhat abrupt ending, however.

I should also mention that I've had this vague game idea for a while, starring a ruined Bloodborne-esque underground kingdom struck down by a divine miracle and full of failed experiments run amok, a biological cauldron that changes you the longer you stay. The player becomes infected one way or other, and progressively loses their humanity as they search for a way back up. Progress would require dying multiple times in encounters with other denizens; you'd revive each time because the infection makes you immortal... Death and transformation and failed apotheosis. So this game was like seeing a version of my visions realized. Very satisfying.