Letter Lost

This game is such thrill. It's fun to play, the challenges are just challenging enough–they hit the sweet spot of being difficult enough to be interesting and to have a sense of accomplishment when you conquer them, without being so difficult that you're bashing your head against the wall in frustration because of something overly complicated. I love all of the mysteries you solve along the way, the characters are so fun, the artwork is gorgeous, the voice acting is impeccable (everyone killed it, from Liz to everyone you hear on the radio? Just a spectacular job!) and the sorting itself is just so addicting and fun. So fun! I have a save file that is just zero mission progress past where you can unlock more sorting boosts, it's dedicated solely to the art of mail processing (don't worry, I was crazy before this game). It's such a beautiful world, excellently presented, and is just over all a spectacular joy to experience. I love being met at my level, and this game does it in so many ways–I love playing any game and trying to think of things that developers might not have thought of and I was so delighted to find that the gameplay does encourage that to a big extent (ie I screamed with joy when [spoiler] I gave Matilda Sedna's package just to see what would happen, and got the 'better her than me' achievement [/spoiler] ). The story that is here is so so good, my only complaint (and it's not really a complaint, it's really just *I love this game so much, I would so so love to watch it evolve*) is that the story itself, while beautifully done and fun to play, feels incomplete in act III. Not in the sense of "oh I want a more fleshed out ending" (I do to some extent, there's only one ending that provides any sort of cutscene after but I can so live with that). Indric. There's no resolution to his storyline that feels like 'ahh yes okay he's in the rearview mirror…directly in the rearview mirror'. Shelly is less of a foe than he is, and she has multiple endings to her storyline–he has none that I can find. I wish he was more fleshed out other than being a cryptid, he should either hold some role in act three, or have a definitive "this is what he is, this is the purpose he serves in Kharnym" it's unclear if he's a cultist, or if he's the hand of the ultimate big bad stringing you along, keeping an eye on you. There was just a little more to be desired there. Liz–her affinity is (in my experience) crazy difficult to obtain–it feels like no matter what you select dialogue wise you end up in the same place, she says the same thing to most of your dialogue choices and it doesn't change her affinity. I've been meticulous in my playthroughs trying to see what different dialogue options and game choices get you, and all roads lead to the same (seemingly) enemy relationship you have with her even if you find and give her all of her mementoes. Those also feel like they should play more of a role–you should be able to remind her from time to time, especially when she develops her powers, of who she was before. Especially at the end. There's a funky place in the finale dialogue where you're speaking with her when you go to save her, just after you tell her she had a life before this, all of the dialogue options say "Placeholder". I'm hoping that's a glitch, or a bridge to a future where that dialogue box contains her different memories. Act III is just a little sparse. According to the achievements I've done all the major missions but there's still blank spots in the 'main mission completed' cabinet. I'm hopeful that that means there's more to come, and that act III will be expounded on! I love everything that's here–I love the plot, I love the gameplay, I love the characters, I adore Murkle. I would love to see more, but it's okay if there isn't–as it stands right now the game is perfectly playable, has so much to offer, and I really truly adore everything that's already there (even you, Shelly, my beloathed). Wishlist: More Act III missions please! For your actions to subtly make their way into the news broadcast. I don't mind that I have the different days of the week fully memorized to the point I can recite the Infinite Breads commercial on command, but it would be interesting if week to week there were subtle changes. It would be nice to see the newscasters sanity chipped at in ways like he starts delivering the same news story he's delivered for weeks now and suddenly oh wait, uh. I guess it's this way now? When did that happen–that must just be how it is! It would be interesting if things started changing like something you do prompts the Infinite breads commercial to be them begging for a different employee because maybe someone you pushed in their direction through the post office did make the curse that much worse, or the limit they can make is increased but it's now an overwhelming goal they have to meet and they would like that reversed. Idk, I know it's a lot of work to execute, if you never added another thing that would be so totally fine, it's just if this is something in the cards, if the game is going to have any sort of major update in the future, these are things that would be kind of cool to see. Let sending books to the Library do something–I don't care what, honestly, but there's a continual call for books to be returned to the library, we have a full collection of the classics in the post office, and at least once a week I send those books to the library for extra money. It would be nice if there was some plot point regarding that or an achievement or something. It was one of the places I thought I was going to be met at, story-wise, and wasn't. The notebook/journal to feature a completed objective page. What the notebook provides and the trophy case in your room don't quite hit the level of 'I have the memory of a goldfish, I canne remember what I dang did' mission tracking I need. I love turning the radio on in the morning, it's the routine, but it would be nice if it didn't turn off every time I have to go upstairs to chuck something in the toilet or under a pillow (or throw my mistake-laced mail in the closet where it belongs to think about what it's done when I'm on a perfectionist playthrough). More phone options–I would 1) love an easier way to dial, I'll live (or not) with the present way, but it would be nice to be able to like, engage the phone and dial with your keypad 2) I would love random encounters over the phone from dialing random numbers, or for citizens to call in with mail requests/odd ball things. Dialog tags–it's hard to tell just in written words the tone you're using in the game, I can never tell if I'm picking the cheerful option or a sarcastic one, and Liz's reactions to them also don't always tell me what I've picked. I love that lower-sanity options are squiggly, you can tell that's what you're picking, it would be a little helpful if there was a way to denote (Cheerful) (Determined) (Sarcastic) (Complaining). I wish I could organize mail by district, if there's any expansion on the powers/sorting mechanics, I would happily grind out 5k of Yog's finest dollars to have the ability to autosort your stamped stack so I could just rapidly fling envelopes into their slot because I'm chucking straight Wistvales until I run out and hit my Doloth Hills envelopes. Lastly I would love an option to tenderly kiss every single person involved with the making of this game on the forehead. Just a little 'mwah' to thank you for developing such a fun game!

This game has so much potential. The premise and overall vibe of the game are fantastic. But I cannot in good conscience recommend the game in its current state. It is beyond buggy, to the point of that after 17 hours in this game nothing makes sense. I now apparently have three different "plot" threads occurring at once which shouldn't be running at the same time according to what I should have unlocked. I also have several packages and letters that simply cannot be delivered due to the game breaking bugs, meaning that I cannot progress the game to its end state. If the extensive bugs are fixed I would change my review to positive.

everytime i think i've gotten close to seeing all the game has, i realize i'm still at the tip of the iceberg. A very clean gameplay loop with enough ongoing mysteries and interesting characters to keep me entirely hooked

It pains me to leave a negative review for this game. I don't have any problem with the story, gameplay, design, any of that. But it's just broken. It's marked as "playable" on steam deck, but in the less than 2 hours I played it crashed about 5 times, even causing the deck to restart. Lots of the menu buttons simply don't work at times, like the button to exit the truck-loading screen. Other times I randomly get a neverending black screen and have to manually exit the game. I can see others have had the same issues, which is a real shame. The devs are obviously working on a fix. But it's been out for over 6 weeks now, after a beta period, so it's clearly not going to be a quick and simple fix. Therefore I wouldn't recommend this game right now unless you want to gamble on being one of the lucky ones who can actually play! If these issues get fixed down the line then I'll try to revisit this game and change my review.

Okay, So I am going to revise my previous review and wish there was a way remain neutral so know my recommendation is "No... FOR NOW." The Devs have fixed several game breaking bugs since my last review, including the one that soft locked me (Amon, dude, I know you are forgetful but please remember to come by the post office and see me.) as well as fixed a few other things that were game breaking. The issue is that there is still some minor save soft locking problems. Now, these are not ignored and in both discussions and discord they are working on them but they want to put out larger fixes instead of a bunch of smaller ones, which I suppose I can understand for time and ease on their part. Either way, the game is good and the devs are trying to fix things so hold this in your follow and check back. It seems that Kharnym is simply a bit fussy about who it's letting have the new postmaster position.

A true postal worker needs both persistence and Patience. Outstanding game. I ran into the issues of those who didn't recommend the game. Black loading screens and other various bugs. At time of writing this review, they are gone, Shredded even FlatNine Developer are super active to the Letter, fixing issues promptly. Game development is obviously never an easy thing but this certainly gets my Stamp of approval, especially these sorts of games with so many aspects to them. They are always there to answer any questions (...via hints), talks to and praises those who provides guides and what not (which are very good in of themselves). Listens to the community through forums to evolve the game. Such as, if any gameplay element appear to be a bit confused, like the order of a task to unlock secrets or reveal parts of the story or even move the story along. Acknowledges them and states to strive to sort them out and actually do. The game is so good (as you can probably see from my play time, which this review is cutting into my playtime to be honest so I will be getting back to it, post-haste) and is right up my Pneumatic tube. Liv - the antagonist or is she the a protagonist(.. hmm!) is fab, voiced very well, I usually listen to one of her ramblings during Stamp duty, easy listening. Plus I'm on a personal mission with the game, stretch it to it's limits, it'll take Time and perhaps a little Loopy. Try everything, look at everything, check everything, even if it's 'nailed down' (Are the posters watching?) Check all pieces of Paper, and take no shortCuts. All round very enjoyable and suits my Palate. By golly, if Liv reads this, she is going to be make treble deductions on my pay with (I wonder if the Devs noticed this) 10/10 (good luck, talk soon)

Huge fan of this game. I think the gameplay loop is really fun and they did a great job breaking up the possible repetitiveness that a game like this could have fallen into. I think the writting is good and the story is really engaging, and the voice acting that is present is really good at making the world feel alive. I'm also a huge fan of the art, both 2D and 3D. The office space is beautifuly done and all of the characters are beautifully drawn and well designed. You can tell how much love went into the game.

Running the post office in Nightvale