It doesn't show its hand until it will have tested the patience of many, but I think in the pantheon of modern FMV titles it's sufficiently interesting to recommend (with some caveats).

I'm not actually in denial. I just speak in non-denial denials.

Consider me an avid indie FMV game dabbler. Over time I've realised that the real beauty of such interactive films, much like VR games, isn't that they continuously break new ground towards some singularity future entertainment form. It's that indie creator spirit that flows through their design and writing and all the quirks and eccentricities that come with that. I'm British, so I always love the underdog.

As I've reviewed multiple FMV and 'choose your own adventure' games, be it The Walking Dead, She Sees Red, Late Shift, etc, I've really taken to finding a potential readable message in the totality of the choices. One of the unique things about such games is your ability to enjoy the intertextual narratives told over multiple playthroughs and the totality of the choices. The actual narrative is told over multiple playthroughs rather than a single viewing. Rather nifty.

I saw Black Clouds (ISBC) has got my number. Without spoiling too much, ISBC opts for a more advanced form of The Complex's method of choices contributing to a character profile. The narrative very uniquely allows for a flexibility in diverging timelines and subtly splitting them in a way I've never seen before. This is a more mature approach to interactive films. Less about choices for merely choices' sake, but weaving them into the premise of the narrative itself. You could scoff at that and say the premise just justifies what would usually be bad practice in such a game (like cosmically shifting pieces on the board for dramatisation purposes), but I think that would be uncharitable. One set of subtle choices splits the game's events in a significant and impressive way that can be easily missed.

If anything drags the game down it's just some of the basics. Choices don't segue from scene to scene smoothly, resulting in a jagged cut of an audio-visual experience. It's something you get used to, but it really undermines the perceived quality of the overall product. Also, until the game won me back at the end it feels EXTREMELY slow. Scenes drag on without much front-end intrigue or hook. It's much better as an overall experience than it is a first playthrough.

Otherwise, it's very competently shot and acted whilst dialling up the seriousness of its premise and themes significantly compared to its contemporaries. Whilst this means it lacks some of the delightful quirkiness of other FMV games, ISBC takes advantage of its themes and tone to great effect. Nicole O'Neill is especially believable as the protagonist and acts her heart out. The aforementioned split in the game's events effectively doubles the scenes with a different cast and alters existing ones. It must have been a significant production undertaking. All impressive stuff.

Whilst ISBC pushes the binary choice mechanic into an interesting place (and remains a very mobile friendly solution), I do hope FMV games start to go in a more interesting direction. At Dead Of Night's blend of live-action and graphics to allow you to freely traverse around an environment whilst avoiding an AI character shows us how FMV games can be more mechanically experimental than the 'choose your own adventure' delivery. The Infectious Madness of Doctor Dekker's finicky (and Her Story's perfected) text entry also show an alternative.

Still, where some have seen black clouds I see silver linings. For all its technical hiccups, slow pace, and initial lack of hook, it takes binary choice FMV into just about as interesting a place as it will go. Whilst I hope for more experimental FMV games at some stage, ISBC is a worthy addition to the mobile-friendly binary choice genre. Just make sure you add an extra spoonful of patience for all its foibles.