Twelve Minutes caught my eye about two years ago and grew on me with what limited info I was seeing(not looking up info was on purpose); Putting it on my wish-list last year. With it's release it's also available 'free' to play with the Xbox gamepass(Ultimate) which surprised me. So I've been getting hands on with it over the last day or so through that.
Getting hands on with it is a vastly different experience than seeing it in teasers and trailers. More so than I thought it would be.
While it reminds me of the old click and explore games of the late 90's. Broken Sword, Blade Runner etc.... I think my rose tinted nostalgia glasses were too overpowering. My expectations getting in the way of what it is. The way the game plays out is a lot more limited in scale and scope so no running through cities and no reworking clues to make a story play out 999 ways. I both expected that (it is set in an apartment after all) and yet I expected more freedom in what could be done.
There are 6 endings. Some are 'main' endings and others 'alternative'; Which all depends on how you decide on story elements.
The game time loop mechanic is a good premise but if you don't do things the way the story needs to be played out then it punishes resets your current loop. So the loop is both a help and a hindrance. A help to understanding the games story/progression with your characters experience/discoveries carrying over(as it should); And a hindrance in it feeling like a gameplay straight jacket as a gamer playng a game(which it shouldn't).
My previous posts questioning of the games replay-ability was mostly right(in my view). Repeating things can did get frustrating but once you find information/items and use them in a 'proper' order you can move on with both gameplay and understanding the story. There's no way to use items to break the story cycle to 'do' things yourself. You can follow what your supposed to do or do things for the sake of them, just doing them which is pointless; And ultimately usually leads to a reset..... That's when the illusion of freedom is broken(for me). The games loop leads to an inevitability, like the looping itself.
While I get that that can be seen as an immersive thing(your in a loop just like your character and can only find an ending as your character does) I found the process more frustrating than illuminating. Lacking payoff for the hassles. For this game things/items only matter until their part in the story is understood. Then you use and forget them. There's no complication in trying to combine and use items and information in different ways to get 999 different outcomes or to expect someting outside the box.
Doing X and trying to find out more leads to a reset; Doing the same thing but a little differently leads to a reset, repeat, reset, repeat reset..... Try something else, reset, learn something new, trying to find out more leads to a reset; Doing the same thing but a little differently leads to a reset, repeat, reset, repeat reset..... Till you know enough to get the right order to get the right outcome that moves the story on.
There's only so much fun doing stupid non consequential actions. These turn into more frustrations when your end up doing things out of 'order' and have to reset on purpose to get back on track.
At least there is a fast forward button for conversations.... I used that at lot...
So yea, a rat in a maze. Many dead ends and no way to brute force a hole in the walls.
The time loop gimmick is a classic trope; From Twilight Zone to Star Trek TNG and non sci-fi like the classic Groundhog Day; I guess I thought this game would be 'more' than it has turned out to be.
There are already plenty of guides and video walkthrough's of the game. It's not a long game. Maybe if I bought the game to get value out of it I would 'do more'....Even getting to see and play it for free via Xbox Ultimate I'd rather watch a play-through than do it myself. Frustration is not a compelling factor for me. I think I'd be disappointed if I'd spent money on the game.... Thankfully I didn't.
From my view as a casual gamer... The game really isn't for me; That's my biggest initial gut reaction, hot take, takeaway...... I've gone from wanting the game to realizing that fact. One side of the coin to the other.
Twelve Minutes; It is what it is and I see it how I see it.
Reading up on 'professional' reviews I'm seeing a lot of BS, shill talk. Such as .....
"It veers away from stereotypical point-and-click adventure tropes"
Beware the bullshít and watch some gameplay first!
No comments:
Post a Comment