Fragments of Him

C'est la 1er fois que j'ai senti un mood en moi après avoir fini ce jeu. Il faut dire que Fragments of Him n'a rien d'un jeu joyeux. Non ici on contrôle l'esprit de Will qui viens d'avoir un accident mortel de voiture et va voyager à travers ces souvenirs, de l'enfance avec sa grand mère, son 1er amour d'adolescence jusqu'à l'homme qui partagera sa vie. Le jeu mise tout sur son scénario jusqu'à le partager à travers ces scènes. Seulement, pour ce qui est du gameplay, c'est autre chose. On se contente uniquement de cliquer sur des objets aléatoirement où sur les personnages pour faire avancer l'histoire. Au début, ça va mais au bout de 15mn, couplé avec des chargements à rallonge, on développe également un sentiment d'ennuie mais pas du a l'histoire mais justement par ce dite gameplay lent et chiant ! Pour finir, le jeu n'est pas en français alors qu'une traduction devait avoir lieu. Bon, on est en 2021 donc on à pas vraiment d'excuse mais ceux qui persiste à ne pas vouloir apprendre l'anglais (comme moi) se verront sévèrement pénalisé. Fragments of Him est donc un excellent jeu narratif qui aborde avec brio le sujet du deuil.

I found this game kind of stilted and slow, with a lot of looking for things in silence. The environments were great, the narration definitely was fantastic, and as a queer person I thought the story was pretty good. (Hey other reviewers, it's not a "bury your gays" story if only one dies, come on.) I love walking sims and I love interactive fiction, but here it felt off-putting when the narration felt like a storybook, but each page turn took 10-60+ seconds of hunting for things to click on. I would've preferred to freely navigate while the narration was more automatic. I also thought the character models - while effective at conveying grief - lacked personality and made it hard for me to emotionally buy into what I was seeing. I was far more invested in what I was hearing than anything else.

love and cherish these people around you

This is a mature, thoughtful rumination on the life of a person and how, in that life, other lives intersected. This is a slow and poignant story. taking its time. Might be a bit slow for some, sure, and the mechanics are just a means to cycle through the story, but it's a heartfelt one and that can only be good. I'm brought to mind of an episode of the television show "Cucumber" of a good few years ago. In it, just before the untimely passing of someone, an entire episode is spent on their life leading up to this unfortunate incident. This plays much like that; a life in stolen moments, in fragments, by those around them. If I am to be critical, I'd say the character models, well, the faces, don't really work. Of course these are the hardest to get right, but at times I really could have done with some eyes. It is a good attempt at "styling it out" though, so I do appreciate that. All in all, an enjoyable way to spend a couple of hours, even with the heartbreak.

Meaningful.

Fragments of Him is a visual novel about the complexities of that human emotion we call "love" shown in a series of short scenes. The story is told by four individuals: the main character, Will, who dies in an accident, and three people who loved him. Btw, I'm not giving anything away by mentioning his death, as this is established very early in the game. Sarah, Will’s ex-girlfriend, recalls her relationship with Will and how much she still loves him. Sarah, however, is a compassionate and selfless young woman who understands and accepts Will's relationship and love for his new partner, Harry, despite her continued love for him. She's happy for Will and that he found his true love. Before Will dies, we hear how he feels about these three individuals who are most important to him. He reflects on his love for Sarah and the good times they shared. However, his relationship with Sarah and his love for her wasn't the same as how he now feels about Harry, his true love. Will also recalls the grandmother he had good times with as a boy. And, just before he dies, Will ponders on the deep love he feels for Harry. As Will's feelings come into sharper focus, he knows he wants to spend the rest of his life with Harry and urgently wants to tell Harry how he feels. Will’s grandmother, Mary, is very close-minded about her grandson’s love for another man. She has fond memories of Will as a child and reflects on her love for the little boy she knew, yet bitterly expresses her disappointment in her grandson’s ”liberal ideas” as a man, which she believes “damaged” him. I see Mary’s bigoted attitude and conditional love for her grandson as a disappointment. Unfortunately, people like that do exist IRL. Some reviewers were annoyed by the grandmother's character; however, I don’t think the writers intended to annoy us, much less expect us to forgive or understand her behavior. All too often, this is a sad reality, so as much as we might not like it, including this narrow-minded old biddy in the story of Will makes the narrative more realistic. Fortunately, however, Mary eventually comes around, and she starts seeing her adult grandson for the kind and loving man he is. She also questions her flawed judgment and can see how shallow and misguided she was. If only all a**holes like this were capable of being enlightened, the world would be a better place. All in all, Fragments of Him is a poignant story about love and the many ways in which people perceive this fundamentally human emotion. It’s also about grief and how people choose to remember and deal with the loss of someone they loved. I choked up a bit and got a little teary-eyed in the final scenes, but I’m kind of sappy that way. This visual novel is short. It runs about 2.5 hours. So, you might want to catch it on sale. I picked it up for $1.99 on a Steam sale. I enjoyed the story, and at that price, I’m not complaining. One more thing I wanted to address are the complaints I’ve read about the lack of “gameplay.” As described on this page, Fragments of Him is a VISUAL NOVEL (see tags). And as almost all visual novels go, there’s not much in the way of “gameplay.” You’re not hunting for anything, you’re not solving puzzles, or walking around doing stuff. In this one you click on highlighted objects or individuals to progress with the story. So, just bear that in mind. You’re not going to find much “action” in this game. That’s how visual novels generally work. It’s all about the story. I give this game an 8/10. NOTE: There are 30 short scenes in this visual novel, however, for some odd reason, I never got to see Scene 10 as it remained “locked” even though I played the game straight through from the beginning to the end credits. After it was over and upon seeing that one scene was "Locked" and realizing I never saw it, I played Scene 9 over, thinking it would go right to Scene 10, the one I missed, but no, it skipped right to Scene 11 as it had when I played the game straight through. Hopefully, the devs can look into this.

An interactive story more than a game. Powerfully emotionally moving. Somber and touching. A sad experience, but a deep one that gave me a lot to think about.

Emotional, touching, and a beautiful story.

Não curti.

💜