Review - Signalis
(originally posted January 10, 2023)
There was a somewhat viral tweet calling it "the Hollow Knight of PS1 survival horror", I think. Which, lol, but... it is really dang good.
What I Liked
The Vibes
No notes.
Okay, one note. As an alleged creative, I have a lot of anxiety around being too derivative of existing media. This game wears its influences on its sleeve and doesn't give a fuck and makes it all work.
The story
Extremely vague in a way that I don't often enjoy, but did here. In a world where people unironically make lore videos about literally anything (and I'm sure there are plenty for Signalis already), this game is intentionally abstracted to the point where it's practically a fool's exercise to determine what parts are literal and what parts are figurative.
It's short
Like 8 hours. Good length.
What I Didn't Like
My own inability to understand German and Chinese
Nobody to blame but myself here, I guess.
What I'm ambivalent about
The inventory
Six slots is incredibly restrictive, and while having to manage that is core to the gameplay texture, it crosses over into "blatantly tedious" a little too often. Maybe if the flashlight didn't take up a slot?
The secret ending
My understanding is that it requires resources from outside the game to figure out, which seems kind of baffling in a game that literally has a screenshot item that takes up an inventory slot as if it's still on the PS1 where you couldn't simply take your own screenshots at any time.
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