Celestial Return

Good narrative, immersive gameplay, cool art style. It provides everything that i expect from a game.

The witing is solid, like actually. So far, everything works, the save system is forgiving, the art is great, the audio is excellent, the UI simple. I usually finish a game before writing a review but I can't find a reason not to recommend it to you now.

Cool premise and an interesting idea for gameplay make this a Disco-like with its own identity. At the moment, there's some kind of a bug that causes the screen to go black and only partially light up with blurry colours when playing the game in 4k fullscreen. This impedes the experience since there's no borderless option and the windowed one cuts off the bottom of the screen. I kept playing despite that and opted not to refund, which should tell you how strong of an impression the game made despite that. I'm a sucker for interesting world-building and cool tabletop ideas, of which this game has plenty.

Celestial Return is a fascinating aesthetic experience that succeeds at implementing some very interesting mechanics. The way the dice are handled, the encounters, and the unique characters are standouts. Very exciting to see where it goes in the future!

Haven't played much yet, but the game is a total vibe, amazing art, writting and sound design. Really looking forward to playing the rest, just wanted to write a review now to support the game! Will be hunting for that platinum trophy. Just found a bug where the game becomes grey at the beginning but a quick restart fixed it.

Great style and visuals, story is pretty interesting and writing is totally awesome. I recommed players who find these aspects important to try this game and support the developers. That being said I did not finish the game due to the dice system. You have a limited amount of dice to execute certain dialogue and action options, but the thing is -- the dice are not renewable. Its an interesting system, but I like games where I can do a lot of stuff, and not only hope that the amount of dice I have left is enough to finis the mission properly. Also, maybe I did not notice it, but the tutorial and explnaton of the system is almost absent from the game, so I found out that the dice are not renewable after I spent 4 of them on an unnecessary action in the bar. Some people might like the system, but I personally found it restraining. But a great game overall, would love to see the developer's next project.

I quite like the game. I like the weird art style, music and style of videos (even though I don't feel it is polished or authors have a lot of experience in production, but the very lack of experience make it more natural, alive for me). I quite like the writing and the story (I am not a native English speaker, and neither are authors, so it is possible writing and phrasing that seems natural for me will not be seen the same way by native English speakers). I also enjoy the gameplay with dices, but there is a catch: authors are not, in my opinion, very experienced game-makers and made some mistakes in both balance (balance of items in shops is just not right, on the other hands, you don't need those items anyway), and you can easily miss many side activities, quests, etc. And if you miss them, dice economy which was planned as plenty generous, may become extremely restrictive. Authors are working on both fixing bugs and improving dice economy, I've added some advice on forums, and hopefully they'll improve the experience. As such, you can pretty much freely save, so save a lot and try not to advance timeline accidentally before you've visited all the optional places on the map. Yes, this is not perfect, but I think the game is interesting enough to give it a chance. :)

[h2] Sanity Shaken, Not Stirred [/h2] It reads like a comic, plays like a [i] light-CRPG [/i], and pulls from the "us vs them" (minority vs mega-corp.) energy setting that can be seen in other game/movie titles (for some players it [i] might [/i] spark a memory of Katana Zero, Cyberpunk, Citizen Sleeper, or even Dredd - but the gameplay for each of those, is entirely its own thing. This is a point and click). [h3] [b] [u] Gameplay [/u] [/b] [/h3] Transitions between loading screens was minimal if at all existent (which was a good thing). However, when I launched the game the first time, I could hear the music and the sound of menu options being hovered over with my cursor without a visual (minor error). As I went through Act 1 (Chapter 1 -Chasing Smoke) I only had two more crashes: [olist] [*] The bar after [spoiler] I decided against asking the bartender out to dinner [\spoiler] [*] Right before entering the first side quest location. [/olist] [h3] [b] [u] Controls [/u] [/b] [/h3] The game bounces between allowing the keyboard for navigating the non-dice menus and then having to use the mouse. In the system settings, you can adjust two categories (for now) [olist] [*] Sound [*] Display [/olist] It would be great to see more accessibility in choosing one over the other. This includes font size, type, and contrast(s) - but since a lot of the game is bathed in neon, this is a big ask. [h3] [b] [u] Music [/u] [/b] [/h3] The action-dependent music goes hard (sometimes a bit much). Sort of like pulling up in a kindergarten drive-loop while blasting [i] Bring Me To Life [/i]. But this is still cool in itself and the art direction is unquestionably rad (in the best way). The sound effects for certain actions can feel out of place or a tad "empty". Such as hovering your cursor over the sub menu options on the left side of the screen and/or clicking items/people/dialogue boxes for more information. But if the sounds are not to your liking, making the SFX adjustments in the settings allows you to listen to the great soundtracks and narration (where present). While waiting to make a decision, it would have been astounding to hear a song from the playlist that is long enough that you could idle and listen to it, instead of a short sound effect loop. But this is not [i] that sort of game [/i] . This game has the energy equivalent effect of pop rocks and mountain dew on your younger self vs having a spot of chamomile tea and a nap. [b] High energy, high stakes. [/b] [h3] [b] [u] Story [/u] [/b] [/h3] I want to refrain from spoilers, but from my limited gameplay (until the full unlock), if certain dice in x-quantity are used, then interactions between Howard and the characters play out differently. So for the achievement hunters out there, buckle up for a *return* to the story (get it? Return? Because the title...oh never mind). [h3] [b] [u] Summary [/u] [/b] [/h3] A very interesting twist on the CRPG genre by a unique team that made this feel like an interactive comic. I am still weighing in on the gameplay mechanics + overall story, so the review will be updated after a complete playthrough! As a KS-backer of this project from Metaphor Games, it has been an absolute thrill to see the behind the scene updates that brought this to a successful release. The development team is really responsive, so sending a message on Discord will get things squared away. [i] Time to let the dice roll, success is what lies in store [/i]

So, not really someone who plays these types of games, but I was hooked by the art. A little less than an hour into it, I feel like this is going to be a very slow burn to the end. The pacing is fine generally no complaints but just the way it's going I can see why these types of games can turn people off. That said if you like the slow progression of character development as you yoursellf explore this world, and the minor seeming inconsequential actions that play into the bigger pictuer type games, then this could fit the bill. I can feel myself slowly getting invested, and just need something to take me over the deep end

It makes you think about why you do what you do in game