Stray Children

[url=https://medium.com/the-pile/stray-children-god-the-absent-father-5eb2b98c51fa]Full review here.[/url] Excerpt: [i]Stray Children[/i] is a beautiful game. Its beauty crept up on me until I couldn’t look away from it, as did its subtle themes questioning the idea of a parent, a father, a model for living, and the heartbreak of learning that maybe there is no meaning to life. Not one that another person can give you anyway. For all the games out there advertising themselves as a Ghibli experience on cutesy aesthetics alone, this is one of the few that I think captures the twinned peaks of the warmth of humanity and the inescapable sadness of being alive, with a feeling much like those moments in a Ghibli film where there is only silence, characters and audience alike sitting in the shadows of the two distant looming truths. It’s irreverent, it’s melancholic, it’s fun, and it’s heartbreaking. I love Kenken. I hope I get to see him again. Open sesame.

Being among the dozens of people who played moon I was really excited to hear it had a spiritual successor in Stray Children. moon was a very unique PS1 game with a distinctive visual style that really defied categorisation. At first glance, Stray Children definitely looks the part. This would not look out of place on the PS1 and I don't mean that in a bad way; it's great to see games like this releasing in the modern day. Each character is uniquely designed and full of personality. Exploring the world is a joy and they even include parts of the main hub area of moon in the opening acts of Stray Children as a cool throwback reference. Unfortunately, Stray Children suffers from a series of poor design decisions when you actually start playing it. Unlike moon, this game does have combat. It's a bit closer to a traditional RPG in that you fight monsters to gain experience, level up and increase your stats. It works like a typical turn-based RPG but there are a lot of real-time mechanics within battles. Apparently Stray Children takes inspiration from Undertale, but I haven't played that game so my frame of reference is Paper Mario. Like in that game you can increase your attack power…

It is frustrating and obtuse, but if you meet the game where it is at then you can almost learn to speak its language, and the result is all the more satisfying for the effort required. The vibes are on point and it is very thoughtfully composed. Strong recommendation for anyone with the patience to push past its restrictive nature, because those same pain points are their own kind of charming.

One of the only games that left me bawling my eyes out... The game really felt like an ode to life, with all the pain, happiness, sorrow, and laughter that comes with it. Just a really beautiful experience.

Amazing

a narrative-heavy game with beautiful visuals and strong writing. as others have noted, this is a very linear RPG, which is often stated as an issue, but that's only an issue if you dislike linearity (does it make sense to criticize a steak for not being chicken?). the gameplay can be frustrating, although i do think this is a bit overstated as a complaint. personally, i was lost for a bit in the first community you fall into after the Dragon Quest parody stuff because [spoiler]i struggled a bit with the paths hidden by the perspective, but i eventually figured it out without consulting a guide[/spoiler] other than that, there were no spots where i felt lost on how to progress to the next areas. of course, there's also the battles themselves. you can win by fighting or by talking. fighting is straight-forward, but talking can be difficult. i'd say 3/4ths of the time, you can find enough hints to be able to find the correct sequence of phrases to say to save the Older. but the other 1/4th can be obscurant, requiring guessing and rote memorization, specific items you may have missed, or a combination of both. it still may be worth trying to save these more tedious Olders, but i wou…