Mortal Advocate

I loved this game from start to finish, the story-telling and world building are top-notch and I truly didn't expect to become THIS attached to the characters. Legitimately kept putting off this review because I kept getting distracting thinking "aw man I love Zegg" and forgetting to write anything else. But also: man, I love Zegg and I think you will too. I'd definitely recommend this to folks who like dystopias and the horror that comes with them, detailed magic systems, character-driven stories, or if you just really like zombies (u kno who u are). There were a few technical issues I ran into, but pretty minimal considering this was a 1-person effort. - Most significantly, if I hit escape to leave the window during a cut scene the game would skip the cut scene entirely. Unsure if this is still the case! - Handful of typos, nothing super important that I can remember though. - There's an easter egg involving super glue that I couldn't get because the game wouldn't load an important item (the glu) ((Speaking of easter eggs, I have it on good authority this game is packed with secrets ;) ))

Mortal Advocate is an ambitious first project from FungalWorks. An interactive visual novel with a fascinating world and characters and a striking aesthetic style. The gameplay is simple first person 3D exploration that let's the story take center stage. While progress is very direct, taking time to explore each scene expands on the world and story in interesting ways. This is all helped by a striking artistic style that creates a haunting atmosphere that can be oppressive in one scene and quite lovely in another as the story unfolds. The game is not without a few glitches and bugs, some than can require you to reload a save a couple of times, however I feel that the story is strong enough to be worth pushing through to see how it all comes together. I would absolutely recommend playing Mortal Advocate.

I really enjoyed this game! Very much an indie game with a pretty strong sense of aesthetics, but where this game shines is definitely the writing. The narrative is linear and your main choices are if you decide to poke around to get all the fun commentary from the characters when you click on things. It's a bit buggy on Linux but that's not shocking and it didn't stop me from enjoying the story at all. Some of the animation is a bit awkward at times but if you aren't put off by that then you're in for a treat with all the dark humor and forced introspection of the main characters. If you enjoy things like "The Murderbot Diaries", this is very much along that same vein in terms of mixing the horror with dry humor and combatting total hopelessness.

I very much recommend this game to anyone interested in dystopian sci-fi, interesting magic systems, ominous religious themes, and finding love in adversity (both platonic and romantic)! I had a really fabulous time with Mortal Advocate! You can tell that so much love was poured into each and every second. I loved the worldbuilding and the characters. Zegg will have a special place in my heart for a while, I can feel it. He has a really fun tendency towards wry humor and he has something to say about almost everything in the world. I love the character designs. Everyone felt really distinct to me in both design and characterization. I will be thrilled to play the next game whenever it comes out! There are admittedly a couple of minor flaws, all of which can be chalked up to the fact that this was a labor of love made by a single developer and game production is HARD. None of the negatives strongly impacted my enjoyment of the game, but I will list them here to be impartial: [*] I had some issues with the UI. Partway through the game, I stopped being able to leave the settings menu without using tab to bring up the objectives menu and then clicking outside of it. There had previously been a back button, but that got replaced with a 'Graphics Settings' button which wasn't present for me at the beginning of the game. [*] There were a few typos, mostly in optional flavor text. Considering how much Zegg and Tybalt have to say throughout the game, it really wasn't a large number at all. [*] One particular section near the end of the game gets very dark in a way that makes it pretty difficult to navigate if you haven't already memorized the layout of the room. [*] Sometimes the models move in odd ways, usually when interacting with other models or the environment.