Red Tape

Thumbs-up, with VERY big reservations. I had fun with, well, most of it. As far as gameplay goes, there's barely any; this is about as rudimentary as a walk-around-and-fetch game can be. Personally, though, sometimes what I really want is a dead simple game, with enough input needed to engage my attention without demanding much higher thought. On that basis Red, Tape is just what I needed. The story is also simple but fun, with a collection of oddball characters and amusing dialogue -- but then, I'm a sucker for anything with angels and demons, for some reason. The aesthetic is goofy and unique, and the corporate Hell is a cool idea (I had fun trying to guess what sin each of the departments would represent), although it does feel like the premise and setting could have been explored some more. And then at the end it full-on faceplants. Abruptly, a slideshow with narrative text quickly summarizes what [i]should[/i] have been the second act. It doesn't feel organic, it's not satisfying, and it reeks of devs hastily slapping something together with the assets they had at the last minute. Watching this little movie play I was dismayed that it appeared to be the end of the game. Unfortunately, it isn't. There's more, and it SUCKS. Suddenly the nice, mellow, comical game swerves into a frustrating, ludicrously difficult platforming challenge, in which you have to grab an item and carry it to a high platform, then do that again, then do that again, then do that again, then... you get the picture. All while being chased around by a giant fly too fast to allow for any real control of your floaty and hard-to judge jumps. We all know how delightful first-person platforming is, right? Even more so when you have no time at all to turn and see how close that literally damned fly is. And oh yeah, just to add to the joy, your progress is reset if the fly hits you. Which it ******* WILL. The amusement value of the game isn't high enough to be worth the effort to get through this ridiculous out-of-the-blue chore for whatever little bit more comes after it. So... recommended for the fun part, but the ending leaves a very bad aftertaste. I picked it up on sale, and I think it was a fair amount of diversion for two bucks. It's not worth six.