Joy Malignant

horrible and wonderful

The day learnt about this game I knew it was going to be special. I love everything about this game. The eccentric yet beautiful art style, the atmospheric soundtrack, the rich lore of the game, it all comes together to make a wonderful experience of the game’s genre. I find the strategy and challenge addicting, the unpredictably of each outcome making for a lot of surprising fun. I can easily get lost in this game and the stories of the many different characters within this world. To note as well, I’ve been playing on steam deck and have been finding the controls of the trackpad quite immersive and have had no issues with reading dialogue. Please play this game, it is truly an enJOYable experience.

Absolutely fantastic game, very well written the only negative is its too short I need more pleeeeease T^T

Art is an invitation to dialogue. When I think about Joy Malignant, what I am left with, is the hope that the conversation could have been longer - Some would consider that a mark against the game, I consider it a mark in its favor, because it means the game managed to present enough interesting ideas that I wanted to see more and have a deeper exploration of them, both mechanically and narratively. The Citizen Sleeper style system could use additional refinement, particularly that the Mosaic stats being linked to your Ego, rather than a strict game over, which could have been used to force significantly harder resource management, and hammer home the suffering of Visceria. The characters were interesting, and I enjoyed the insight it immediately provided, to be able to read their mosaics - If anything, I wish those were more complex, and less immediately telling - The symbology being up to interpretation, as it were. I also appreciated that the dialogue choices overall contributed to your stat gains, rather than a more simplistic one-two-three decision, even if it sometimes wound up leading me to places I didn't expect. Ultimately, the best I have to offer to this game is a recommendation - Because I want to see more works like it, and more, longer works from its creator(s).

This is a cool take on the Citizen Sleeper format. It is *quite short*, so keep that in mind when buying it, but there's something so tangible about the game that it definitely feels like you are in a grimy, terrible world. Everything also feels kind of gory and gross. I can only imagine how terrible Visceria smells. Which is great! Good worldbuilding!

Милая короткая игра. Система мозаики крута тематически, но на геймплей влияет не слишком сильно. Сюжет хорошо написан, пусть и по сути представляет собой базовую антиутопию про злое правительство (церковь в нашем случае). Покупать стоит, если понравился визуальный стиль, он здесь офигенный. В довесок к нему идут интересный мир и неплохой саундтрек, так что свою цену игра оправдывает.

good, not too long