Tempering expectations and enjoyed on its own terms, this is a decent non-episodic offshoot of the Telltale games. Plot can get its talons into you and atmosphere good, but overall a little uneven.

Deep in thought about the raised floor blocking the robot vaccum.

I can't offer SoM a single state of mind, and nor, I think, can it - me.

For example, with single flourishes of a puzzle every three hours or so, it suddenly takes it upon itself to jump into the deep end of rudimentary puzzling in its closing chapter like some case of genre crisis. Warding off, as it does so, that ending for an hour or two more until it still manages to end abruptly in spite of a 15 hour playtime. Almost as if it had forgotten to showcase it's puzzler chops, so it saw its conclusion a fine point to eat into time.

This is but one of many oddities with State of Mind. A game that in spite of its issues can deliver a good time, and for which I think it's worth elucidating why.

First, SoM can leave a bad first impression. One that definitely improves on a second playthrough. Let's get some of the offenders out of the way.

The dialogue. This is kind of multi-issue. I think there are translation issues; it sometimes isn't well directed and won't be delivered well contextually; it can come across a mite jejune, unnatural, awkward, stilted and overly expository. The scenes I could appreciate by dint of the concept or a climactic moment being reached would be a struggle to enjoy purely because the moment isn't quite sold by the totality of the acting, lines, presentation, etc. It's a shame for some of the more promising, original moments to just fall flat.

Realistic... realistic... realistic... OH NO.

That's not to say there aren't redeeming aspects or indeed, moments in the writing. A replay of the first acts will reveal an endless stream of well-executed foreshadowing. More than a few moments that felt like awkward performance or wording turned out to be intentional. The slow drip-feed of the mystery of Richard's missing wife and son and his mysterious connection to Adam maintained a talon grip on me for hours on end. There are glorious more playful moments like having to clean a malfunctioning smart apartment before a lover arrives, or flying a drone to decorate an art exhibition balloon that you then ride up for a view of the city. Even Richard, both a tech journalist and luddite, and his reaction to Simon the house bot in the opening act is a joy. Interacting with Simon operating as both a character moment snapping at and swatting him away, as well as conveniently acting as a mechanic by which you can get the AI to move out of a doorway if you're blocked in-game. These moments are at their best when they incorporate some light puzzling or agency. Unfortunately, with so much filler walk and click activity, it can sometimes adopt the feeling of an interactive movie without the choices (bar the ending and dialogue choices) to justify it.

The presentation. It boasts gorgeously lit and stylised environments with pleasing evocations of digital dystopia and utopia, but seemingly juggles this with an incredibly budget look in the glitchy animations, staging, and low-poly characters. The low-poly faces with your peculiar view inside their mouths, unfortunately, didn't ever grow on me. A clever artistic flourish to create uncanny valley between the bots and people? Or maybe to exaggerate the artificiality of both our main protagonists as a comment on virtual realities? Whatever the reason, and I'm a sucker for a reason, I think it was a choice against aesthetic integrity, in this case. So too are there sloppy decisions like being tasked with finding a bearded guy with a drone and having the club filled with the same copy-pasted bearded guy. Or the news readout being exactly the same for days on end on the radio. It's not end of the world stuff, but it contributes to a feeling of the game being more of a budget title. I think this could have easily been assuaged by cutting into the game's playtime for some polish. As it is, I think the game is easily twice as long as it needs to be. I couldn't in all good conscience pass by presentation without mentioning the somewhat glorious soundtrack, however. Nothing perhaps lends more to the two worlds' differing and vivid ambiences.

That's some vent.

And finally, its thematic and genre contributions. I really wish it might have been both more original and expansive. Virtual reality, the main target of the entire game comes off relatively unscathed. I hoped for more than exclamations of 'it's not real', pinprick pointed conversations and cackling villains. The experience of walking through the virtual's 'same but better' environments says a lot more than the game going dialogue-heavy ever could. It often felt more like a listing off of every tech innovation envisioned by the genre than a fully realised world. Ultimately, it leads to a lot of surface-level exploration.

Additionally, it's personal preference for sure, but some of the scientific rules it establishes don't ring true to me. A fundamental one later on that when you transfer your consciousness into a virtual reality you leave your body lifeless and can even transfer yourself into someone else's brain (surely your consciousness is the unique product of your brain's connections if it is anything?) don't seem intuitive to me. My initial assumption was copying your brain in à la Soma, so when all the characters assumed otherwise, I was understandably taken aback. There are certainly a great number of notes in the world that elucidate its approach to the tech, so I needn't argue with fiction.

Perhaps my favourite bit of tech the game does explore is the full-body phoning system. It made the conversations personal and having it relegated to a key made it feel like a piece of the technology available to me. I loved exhausting the contact list anytime I could. Often a scripted and restrictive affair, but great all the same. Controlling drones is also often a welcome change of pace.

Whilst the price point feels high to me, it's definitely in line with the Telltale episodic seasons in their totality. Those seasons of which it also succeeds in borrowing its gameplay principles, length and technical jank. Put simply, if you enjoy the Telltale games and their offshoots, problems and all, you can't go too wrong here. It bypasses the episodic nonsense to boot.

They contracted the evil architecture people.

As a Telltale offshoot, and a more open one at that, walk and click, it succeeds primarily in telling what for most of my playtime was an engaging story. Taken as it is and tempering expectations beyond being on the semi-interactive ride it offers, that is indeed a good time. Excellent moments, dialogue choices that offer contrariwise options with some demonstrable effects (and the usual purely Telltale colouring), a lack of patronising signposting as to where you need to go or railroading with the ability to switch characters as you go - this all adds up to an experience that's altogether a more unique take on this mini-genre and at times more than a little gripping.

Indeed, my previous complaints, as concerned as I am with the price and a perceived technical quality discrepancy there, are mostly bemoaning the potential hampered here. As it is, it's an intriguing enough ride that I'd advise is enjoyed on its own terms perhaps at discount and with a mountain of patience.