Most bad games aren’t really a terrible experience. Usually, it takes a few minutes, maybe an hour max, to realize “wow this game is bad and not worth putting any more time into”.
I think the worst games are the ones that can suck you in with the promise of being good. For me, that was Catherine.
The game has 3 main phases. The main “gameplay” is 3D block pushing puzzles that are presented as dream sequences for the main character. They start off simple, but add mechanics and complexity as you would expect from any good puzzle game. Then there is the time you spend with the main character awake hanging out at a bar, talking to other characters as a social sim game. The characters seem varies and like they could be interesting. Finally, there are animated cutscenes that are pretty good looking that show what your main character does throughout the day, between waking up and ending up at the bar every evening.
The biggest problem is the writing. The main character starts off as a pretty shitty, selfish asshole. At first I played hoping to see him learn and grow as a character. When it became clear that wasn’t going to happen I instead started to hope that he at least suffered some consequences for his actions. But… No, he doesn’t. He just stays an asshole the whole time. None of the other characters really go anywhere either. And while the gameplay started off good, it quickly burns through all of the block pushing mechanics they thought of and turns into a repetitive slog. It really felt like they only made the first 1/3rd of a complete game and decided to just copy and paste that to pad out time instead of actually finishing the game.
I think this might be a puzzle game getting too niche for its own good with a wider audience, in your case. I only played through to the one ending, but it had enough trappings of a VN for me to guess that you get most of your character growth or punishment after redoing the common route (basically the prologue leading up to where you get locked into one ending or another), once you get set on course for a particular ending and play it out. It’s common enough in visual novels for me to expect it and not be bothered or caught off-guard by those faults, but that’s obviously not going to play out with a wider audience if they’re not made aware of those conventions.
Most bad games aren’t really a terrible experience. Usually, it takes a few minutes, maybe an hour max, to realize “wow this game is bad and not worth putting any more time into”.
I think the worst games are the ones that can suck you in with the promise of being good. For me, that was Catherine.
The game has 3 main phases. The main “gameplay” is 3D block pushing puzzles that are presented as dream sequences for the main character. They start off simple, but add mechanics and complexity as you would expect from any good puzzle game. Then there is the time you spend with the main character awake hanging out at a bar, talking to other characters as a social sim game. The characters seem varies and like they could be interesting. Finally, there are animated cutscenes that are pretty good looking that show what your main character does throughout the day, between waking up and ending up at the bar every evening.
The biggest problem is the writing. The main character starts off as a pretty shitty, selfish asshole. At first I played hoping to see him learn and grow as a character. When it became clear that wasn’t going to happen I instead started to hope that he at least suffered some consequences for his actions. But… No, he doesn’t. He just stays an asshole the whole time. None of the other characters really go anywhere either. And while the gameplay started off good, it quickly burns through all of the block pushing mechanics they thought of and turns into a repetitive slog. It really felt like they only made the first 1/3rd of a complete game and decided to just copy and paste that to pad out time instead of actually finishing the game.
I think this might be a puzzle game getting too niche for its own good with a wider audience, in your case. I only played through to the one ending, but it had enough trappings of a VN for me to guess that you get most of your character growth or punishment after redoing the common route (basically the prologue leading up to where you get locked into one ending or another), once you get set on course for a particular ending and play it out. It’s common enough in visual novels for me to expect it and not be bothered or caught off-guard by those faults, but that’s obviously not going to play out with a wider audience if they’re not made aware of those conventions.