Now before I start, I understand that the term underrated is nothing unique to a review, in fact I guess it's like putting a huge red arrow on a YouTube thumbnail. But with all the things I truly look at as underrated, this game is nothing but. The dialogue is witty, the world oddly engaging, and the characters interesting. Throughout this review, ill provide images of the game, as it's one of those things that can only really be grasped by sight and not some text mumbled out of me. to start, i want to talk about the artistic approach of the world. And i have to say i like it. It reminds me a lot of Little big planets tutorial level. Using a mix of different media formats to truly stretch out the definition of creativity in a creative medium. One thing that has been more true than ever (in the gaming space) is the focus on working upon what we live already. Humans and the world, This is my opinion, is where games like this shine. Creating something out of small little assets of different eras to truly bring something new to the table. It exaggerates the possibilities of the creative mind, something that as said before most games now miss. Try comparing the mindset youd have to be in to create a new cod game to this, you see with a cod game things are drawn from the things irl, guns humans and a world. Games like this take a completely different and more difficult approach. And again i appreciate the world that this game has. the story: without trying to sound like a rick and Morty fan, i think there is a right workflow in trying to not understand but follow the story. Because it's so insane and yet the writing can hit pretty deep, it's best to take a mix of taking the world at face value and taking the writing more seriously. Obviously the approach will fail at some points as not every piece of writing is some ocean level of being deep. But for the fact that this game is free and yet offers a little focused story and yet a big world is praiseworthy. The story on some level does follow a simple approach, you know who the Nîmes are, so It's quite straightforward narratively, but there's a choice to dig a little deeper into the people around you. so with the world and story behind, what's next? Not too much, it really is a game in which you see what you get. I have talked about the mix of art styles, and I personally like it. It's not something focused on being super realistic and yet has some of the most 'huh I guess that's true' dialogue I have found in a game. Now with the main praises out of the way, the praises being 1: it's free 2: you get a surprising amount of content 3: the art is interesting 4: the writing is pretty good. What are the negatives? Well there are a few that set the game back, I want to say that generally its good to separate the art from the artist, I want to say that I like Michael Jackson and r Kelly's music but would I trust either with my kid? Probably not. You see in this case if i do or dont the artist's writing is quite literally how the artist speaks in real life, so disconnecting the two is difficult to say the least. In my short research about the game i found most of the issues i have is just how odd the man who created the game itself is. in looking at forum boards of him replying to negative comments, he comes across pretentious and insecure about the game he created. Speaking, as he thinks, he's some sort of walking messiah. in reading his defensive style of criticizing a person talking openly about his game, this for sure rubs of on the game's writing. After reading into the forum discussions it comes across like instead of the game really being viewed as art it reads more as if some edgy, 'deep minded', r/im14andthisisdeep person created it. In what was something I could have appreciated is now something that comes off a little corny. Seeing someone argue speaking like all those three mentioned things combined in a way to address criticism is nothing but un professional. in a random turn of events a while back i watched a clock work orange and came across this review on rotten tomatoes. it summarizes how i personally view the weird direction the developer took in responding. now obviously i can't present all information here, and admit idly I can care less about the contents from the reviewer, it's the response and how many times the guy felt he needed to respond that left me a little bit stumped. I'll link the fan wiki, it goes into detail about predatory behaviour, so be warned. I didn't want to talk about it here, as personally i think it's cutting the cake a little bit too deep for a review about a game. But id advise reading the information and using it to come up with your on conclusion, or don't. I can't tell you what to do. So I'm going to leave the fan wiki, leading to the forum postings, say goodbye to this review and recommend that more people check it out, even if you're not interested on the shady acting of the artist, the art is still pretty impressive for a free game.

TW: predatory behaviour. Fan wiki: https://middens.fandom.com/wiki/John_Clowder

I hope everyone has a good day and I should be back for the next game I find interesting to talk about.