The Last Secret

I have mixed feelings towards this game.. [CONS] **You could be locked out from certain endings, making 100% clear not possible (e.g. always redirects to 4th-wall ending) - If you encountered the above (like me), get ready to learn RenPy to debug the game yourself - No seriously, I changed the code myself to get to the proper ending **100% clear is annoying (potentially have to play the game 8+ times) - Some achievements are bugged: "Laser Tag" one didn't popped up until my 30th attempt **If you like good graphics, this is not the game for you **Some puzzles require prior knowledge of Go & Math [PROS] - Good puzzle design, some puzzles are challenging indeed - Story is ok - Game is free - "Save & Load" and "Back" options reduces time for trial-and-error - I learnt RenPy when debugging the game

The Last Secret is another of those visual novels which astound me with their scope, complexity and entertainment - and it is free, so a real labour of love by its developer. I missed this game when it first came out in 2022 and I actually played its successor - Sweet Science - first. It seems to me that many of the ideas, characterisations, and plot structures which are trialled, sometimes with rough edges, in The Last Secret are refined and honed in Sweet Science. Both contain a variety of romantic or friendship routes under an overarching sci-fi premise [spoiler] (space travel or time travel) [/spoiler], puzzles, some relatively gentle science and maths tuition, and a collection of good, bad and middling endings. The Last Secret may not have the polished veneer of Sweet Science, but I liked its dialogue, characters, and music, and even its occasional change of graphical style. I am not brilliant at working out the many branching routes of complex visual novels, so I relied a great deal on the "back", "save" & "load" functions to try new paths, as well as using the two invaluable guides available. I liked the way that the different natures of the NPCs - shy, volatile, studious, j…

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"The Last Secret" isn't a game, it's a cringey non-game high school anime club dropout fan-fiction that's been dumped on Steam into the games section. As a visual novel, it doesn't have any gameplay. It's just a lot of clicking through bad, cringe dialogue that no real publisher would ever accept. When people can't get their work published in print, they pay the $100 fee to dump their fan-fiction here instead, where we have to put up with it when looking for things that are actual PC games. Square in the middle of what we expect from garbage Steam Direct e-books, this one tackles the author and his suspiciously underaged looking pink haired imaginary anime girlfriend, prompting us once more to ask why these high school anime club dropout fan-fiction writers are so creepily obsessed with underaged girls. Anyway there's some plot about the author exploring LGBTQIA relationships with his imaginary girlfriend. It's enough to make you throw up. The cringe is extreme. Because this was put together with the Ren'Py e-book construction kit, it didn't require any actual coding or development. It's a tool for failed authors to push their garbage high school anime club dropout fanfictions…

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I would die to a robot again.