About a Boy

This review was written using a pre-release key provided by the developer. At the time I completed the game, no achievements were awarded. About a Boy is a point-and-click “narrative-driven journey” about a boy with special abilities. The game begins with a cut scene that implies violence, and we see the boy run away. After that, you control the boy as he interacts with a handful of animal-faced characters, goes on a few fetch quests, visits a half dozen scenes, and completes about 12 mini-games (most of which are mechanical puzzles). Flash to a brief cut-scene and it’s game over. Hmm… Having finished this game, I have absolutely no idea what story it was trying to tell. There are no voice-overs. Instead, you have characters speaking gibberish when text conversations occur. As a result, I played with my headphones off. Your progress is autosaved on exit and there are 3 slots provided for manual saves. I would strongly recommend saving after each puzzle is completed to prevent rework. I made the mistake of saving while I was in the middle of a puzzle and ended up having to restart the entire game. About a Boy is short. It should take you between 1 and 2 hours to complete. My time in-game was extended by one puzzle that required many attempts before I successfully moved an orange and green ball, back and forth through a maze of red balls. Sadly, I cannot recommend this game. For players seeking a narrative adventure, they will not find much story in About a Boy. The puzzles themselves will be familiar to those who play escape games, with little added to make them more interesting. For those who really enjoy mechanical puzzles, there are other titles out there that are much more satisfying (The Trials, Havsala, Legacy Reawakening, etc.). [quote][url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/32732116-IndieGems/]Follow [b]IndieGems[/b] if you enjoyed this review and want to see more like it.[/url][/quote]

The game follows the journey of a young boy named Miro, who possesses a rare ability: he can see people as they truly are, and their faces turn into those of animals. But the boy is not happy with it because it reveals to him the terrifying reality of his abusive father. Unable to endure this any longer, Miro decides to flee his home in search of a city said to be inhabited by God, who is the only one he believes can truly help him. From the outset, it’s clear that English isn’t the game’s original language. While the overall story and dialogue are understandable, the translation often feels clumsy. Sentences can be awkward or poorly punctuated, especially when long phrases are broken up with too many commas. Thankfully, the spoken dialogue is delivered in charming, cartoon-style gibberish, so you’re spared from hearing the rough translation aloud. Gameplay is straightforward and minimalistic. As a point-and-click adventure, the game relies solely on mouse input. Players can click anywhere on the screen to make Miro walk, or double-click to make him run. However, the more efficient approach is to click directly on interactive hotspots, which simultaneously moves Miro and initiates the corresponding action. A modern convenience, highlighting all available hotspots with a key press, is missing here. This design choice suits players who enjoy exploring environments and discovering things on their own. However, the game favors smooth progression over unnecessary distractions, so there are only a few hotspots in each area, most of which are easy to find. While this streamlines gameplay, it comes at the cost of world-building. Scenes often appear rich with detail, but ultimately feel empty when your cursor reveals no interactive elements. The left mouse button handles most interactions, typically defaulting to “talk” for characters or “use” for objects. Conversations are brief and linear, offering no dialogue choices or branching topics. The right mouse button, usually reserved for the “examine” command, plays a very minor role and doesn’t contribute much to solving challenges, making it largely unnecessary. You’ll occasionally collect an item and store it in inventory, but a handful of item-based puzzles are simple. There’s never a large number of objects to juggle, and their use tends to be obvious. You just select an item and click on the relevant hotspot to use the item. Instead of inventory puzzles, the game focuses on logic-based challenges. Nearly every scene contains one, and they play out in a separate screen when you interact with a specific object or mechanism. These puzzles stand out visually with a different 3D style, but the interface remains simple because there’s no need to rotate or manipulate them physically. The game automatically zooms in and focuses your attention on the task. The puzzles are diverse, although nothing particularly new or groundbreaking. Examples include rearranging fuses to restore power, guiding a ball through a maze with precision, connecting pipe systems, deciphering codes, and more. That said, there are some shortcomings. Puzzles often fail to clearly indicate which parts are interactive, such as buttons or levers. There's no support for colorblind players during color-based puzzles, and some puzzles lack a reset option, so if you make a mistake, you may have to exit and enter the puzzle again. Additionally, there are no clues about puzzle goals, which could be frustrating if the mechanics are unfamiliar. Despite these issues, the game is short and linear. Experienced puzzle-solvers can expect to finish it in about two hours or less. Unfortunately, there are no rewards, and the sole achievement is broken. While the distinctive art style and fairly simple gameplay might seem appealing, it might be a better idea to pick it up on sale.

《About a Boy》测评。一开始觉得设定挺特别的，未来城市没有所谓“人类”，主角能看见别人的动物性情，这点挺有寓言味，但玩下去才发现故事其实给得很少，除了开场动画，后面几乎没什么叙事，全靠自己去理解。不过显而易见这是个点击解密的游戏。 玩家扮演的是男孩然后在城市里解密，玩法就是传统点击解谜，走来走去，点东西，解谜。谜题数量不多，但有几个卡得挺狠，提示也模棱两可，新人很容易卡住。特别是开头控制室和结尾那几个谜题，感觉难度不太平衡。最好收多点指引之类的或者是提示，除非是解密大佬不然这类游戏没有社区或者是官方的提示要想通关还是很难的。 美术倒是还行，手绘风，有点厚重的涂抹感，氛围算营造出来了。但流程太短，整体玩完像是个小实验，氛围有意思，谜题质量却参差不齐。 要说推荐嘛，如果你本来就喜欢小众的点击解谜，可以花点时间看看；要是期待完整剧情或者逻辑严谨的谜题，估计会失望。 [quote]欢迎关注我们的鉴赏家:[url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/35402982/]走心评测[/url] ←遵从内心，写出真实感受 欢迎加入我们Steam组:[url=https://steamcommunity.com/groups/ZXPC]走心评测[/url]←点击加入，一起探索游戏的乐趣 喜欢这篇评论，也麻烦点个赞，让更多人能够看到！[/quote]

Game was insanely short. Some of the puzzles were good but if there was supposed to be a story it just was not fleshed out enough to really land or even derive meaning from. The last puzzle was really difficult to honestly figure out. I don't mean that in a particularly good way though. Like the clues for the puzzle were just not really helpful. The game feels like a demo for an idea that still needs to be completely fleshed out. The art really drew me into the game and the atmosphere definitely felt interesting but the story and dialogue need a little more work. If I would give one recommendation it would be to add a mechanic similar to I have no mouth and I must scream with the book where it helps direct players though a small clue or anecdote. One puzzle I really want to note is the clock. If you're going to make a puzzle where someone has to use a clock for it please either make the numbers on it more visible or only use intervals of five. I should not have to brute force a puzzle because the numbers are barely visible. Also the chest in the church. You can let players hold onto clues to make it possible for them to reference without having to step out of the puzzle mini game. In the case of the writing. The transition between areas or rather the reason as to why you're visiting certain areas needs more work. It was really random and didn't really flow well for a story. That's about it. I feel like this game has potential to be good but I didn't really get that initially. I do kinda want a refund.

有中文 有成就 《关于一个男孩（About a Boy）》 《关于一个男孩》讲述了未来时代的一个男孩的故事：遵循命运的指引，他不可避免地进入了一座黑暗的未来都市，而这座城市里已经没有了我们所理解意义上的 “人类”。 这是一款解谜类点击冒险游戏，通过角色与核心玩法（通常包括路径寻找、解谜和对话）进行交互式叙事。 《关于一个男孩》将玩家带入一段以叙事为核心的旅程，背景设定在一座丧失了我们所认知的 “人性” 的未来都市。玩家将通过主角米罗（Miro）的视角展开这场解谜类点击冒险 —— 这个男孩拥有独特的能力，能根据人们的 “动物性情” 来感知他们。游戏融合了丰富的交互式剧情与富有挑战性的谜题和对话，邀请玩家揭开这个世界的奥秘：在这里，每个角色都映射着社会的不同侧面。其独特的设定与玩法，将带来一段引人入胜的体验，深入探讨在看似荒芜的未来中，命运、身份以及人类连接本质等主题。 游戏中的每个角色都代表着社会中的一个群体。主角 “米罗” 继承了一种视觉特质：他能将人类按照其动物般的性情具象化地 “看见”。

关于一个男孩是一款短篇的指向点击解谜游戏，你将扮演一名小男孩，在进入城市的时候，帮助几名遇到困难的人。为了帮助这些人你需要克服种种困难，解决一些谜团才能得到其他人的帮助。 本作的剧情可以说是几乎没有，除了开头给我们放了一些动画在进入游戏后，几乎就没有剧情了。游戏的内容也比较乏味，缺少了很多的指引。如果是新手的话可能经常会摸不到头脑。不过关于主线还是会告诉我们应该去那里的，但是解谜游戏却是一点提示也不给，我们连要怎么做都不知道，非常麻烦。虽然有提示，但是提示也需要我们自己找。 游戏的内容很少，只有几个解谜，但是难度还是比较高的，特别是最后那两个解谜，以及开头那个控制室的解谜。游戏的美术还行，偏向于手绘，不过感觉色彩感觉有点很浓厚的涂抹感。 作为一款解谜游戏本作感觉并没有解谜游戏那种逻辑性和条理性，整体的质量很一般，如果对这类游戏感兴趣的话可以试一试。 [quote]欢迎关注鉴赏家: [url=https://steamcommunity.com/groups/DCYXJLB] 大川游戏俱乐部 [/url] 欢迎加入Steam组:[url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/45300930] 大川游戏俱乐部 [/url] 来一起感受游戏的乐趣喜欢这篇评论，也是可以顺手点个赞哟[/quote]