Reflections

Last update on August 2, 2016, 7 months ago. Not acceptable for an Early Access game. Edit July 4, 2017: I know that they announced an update in May, but according to SteamDB, they still haven't published a new update. Even if they did, it's been about 9 months without any activity at all. Edit 04.04.2020: Well, still no update. Abandonware, do not buy.

This is not meant to be one of those (un)funny unhelpful reviews, but I literally put some things in a box, moved some files around an office... and then the game was over?! Apparently I died as an old man with regrets about my life choices...? There appears to be VERY little content right now. It looks like there could be a couple branching "paths", but with ONLY 1-2 months(!) of Early Access planned there's NO way it's possible to come up with enough content to make this interesting. Sorry, I wanted to like the game. It doesn't come close to delivering on its promises. The first level is visually polished enough, the second office level not so much - with all the coworkers, male and female, sharing the same character model. And then suddenly it was "lunch" and they were all standing with a ball behind their back...? By this point its feeling more and more like this was someone's school project made from Unity assets. The dialogue scrolls past way too quickly without waiting for you to press a button to confirm you've read it. Not that you're missing much, the dialog is very generic and uninteresting. Between levels it does wait for you to confirm the dialogue, however with the current amount of content, the transitions are extremely jarring and just awful. For this to be successful it needs a story, like it promises. There is currently really no story. All that "Storyteller engine" stuff is a load of BS at this point. *SPOILERS* The only possible "choices" I made: * click everything to make it turn colors (drawers, lamps) * Try agonizingly to get a basketball through a hoop one time * Play horseshoes * Play darts * Listen (stand next to) girlfriend while ~3 lines of trivial dialogue rolls by, rather than walk away * Answer the phone * Put records on a record player and listen to the music (will children/teens even know what this is?) * Put 3 items in a binder * Put the stuff in the box * Move papers from one place to another These are NOT choices! Fun stuff: * Throw a football in girlfriends face * Throw darts in girlfriends face * Put a box on girlfriends head

Reflections seems to be a choose your own adventure type of game. When you interact with objects (sometimes just by clicking, other times you have to throw them), they "unlock" and turn into color. Changing objects or entire rooms from grayscale to color is the basis of this game - when they're unlocked, they are counted as decisions and influence your life later on. So far, the puzzles seem easy enough, even for a puzzle-challenged person like myself. When you're near some objects, there's even a clue on what to do with it. For example, while standing near an empty binder, a caption says that I need to find some paperwork. And when you are holding the missing piece nearby, it automatically moves to fill in, leaving the guesswork out of it. I'm enjoying this game so far. I have a hard time with throwing things though (so far I've encountered darts, a horseshoe pit, a basketball court and a football). Most of these things won't "unlock" and colorize with just one throw, but honestly if you have better hand-eye coordination than me, you'll have no trouble. It's not a deal breaker, it's just a small difficulty I have to overcome. Not the game's fault. The grayscale is a soothing color scheme, and it's fun to explore the setting (your childhood home). However, when you unlock the colors, it gets a little bright and loud. Yellows, oranges, greens...quite the opposite of black, white and gray. It makes a dramatic difference to the game. The effect of colorizing is cool as well. Things don't just suddenly turn yellow - pixels move across the object and gradually fill it with color. It makes it a bit more subtle, which seems to fit in with the overall atmosphere of the game. If you're looking for a relaxing, easy-puzzle game with a calm color scheme (until the color sets in, then it's crazy!), then look no further. Here is my gameplay of the first level: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VCmIrZaY38E

THIS IS AN EARLY ACCESS REVIEW - September 07, 2015 It's not at all worth a purchase in it's current state, but I write this review to help ensure that it is when it's done. [table] [tr] [th]Feature[/th] [th]Y/N/Rating[/th] [/tr] [tr] [td]SLI[/td] [td]No[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Aspect Ratios[/td] [td]16:9, no info on others[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Framerate Cap[/td] [td]120-144+[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]FOV[/td] [td]Yes, 90 Max[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Key Rebinding[/td] [td]None[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Controller Support/Rebinding[/td] [td]Yes, No[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Options[/td] [td]Extensive, but Broken[/td] [/tr] [tr] [td]Performance[/td] [td]Horrible[/td] [/tr] [/table] [h1]PC Port Quality[/h1] The options are very extensive, shockingly so when I first opened the game, but there are two key problems. 1. None of the options stick properly, not even mouse sensitivity or FOV. If you crouch/run/zoom/throw/climb or view any cutscene, FOV reverts to the extremely low minimum. You're extremely limited in what you can do without going back to the options menu every 3 seconds. The slider should modify the base value, and the different cameras should adjust that and revert to the base when finished, but instead it seems they revert to a set value. 2. The performance is abysmal for the visuals on display, though it's mainly very specific settings and the way the game streams textures. Some settings can completely change the visuals in a really non-intuitive way to little performance impact. Depth of field looks nice in some scenarios, but it seems to just be a near and far blur that doesn't change, rather than focusing on the cursor. If you push up against a wall, it's pure blur. There are dozens of bugs regarding the settings to what I'd say is a pretty unimpressive result fidelity-wise. Tons of pop-in, both seemingly intentional and unintentional. More on that below. Finally, it desperately needs a dedicated full-screen option as it can lose focus behind the taskbar somehow, and lose mouse bounding while using the menus. [h1]Gameplay[/h1] I enjoy exploring 3D environments, especially when there are fun physics things to play with. This game is just hinting at that. The grabbing mechanics feel satisfying and are largely fine outside of the FOV reverting issue and that come objects shoot straight into the character and snap back and fourth when grabbed. There are tons of drawers and containers to open, but rarely anything of interest. The basketball outside was a lot of fun to play with, and I'd say the game could benefit massively from more things like it. There are tons of medium/small objects that are static in the environment, and it's a shame not being allowed to mess with them. Also higher texture quality on objects with text, and the ability to rotate objects while zooming (right click) and say holding shift, would be fantastic. Once you leave the first level with the home, the amount of things to interact and play with jumps straight off a cliff. The house already felt a little bare, but in later levels there's almost nothing at all except a few pebbles by the lake shores. There needs to be puzzles, things to interact with, really anything of interest! Mouse acceleration is a touch too strong, and while movement in general okay, it could be improved significantly. I feel sprinting speed should be increased, and the player should be allowed to jump and fall off small ledges like the second story in the cabin at the start of the forest area. Snapping to the ladder awkwardly to go up or down, on top of the FOV resetting, was beyond clumsy. Finally, you should be able to sprint while carrying objects, and be able to strafe while sprinting as well. Being locked into only forward movement while running endlessly through the forest level felt really restricting. [h1]Presentation[/h1] Assuming various fidelity issues are addressed, the game actually can look pretty nice. However, it's key problem is also it's main gimmick. Filling in color as you progress through the environment. It works okay in the first house environment, where it's triggered by fully exploring the contents of the room. The black and white interiors are unappealing, and while the colored versions are an improvement, they aren't great either. Outside however, in the forest area of the game (the second "level"), the filled in colored versions are bright and vibrant. Certain scenes are screenshot-worthy. That said, that's AFTER you fill in the area with color, which entails walking around intentionally off of paths to fill in as much as you can with an invisible circle surrounding your character. You want to fill in the environments fully to see them finished, but not only is that a waste of time and a distraction from anything else the game might be trying to say, tons of obstructions stop that from being possible. On top of all that, the constant coloring in seems to be done via texture replacement, and oh boy does it stutter endlessly because of it. I get it, you saw other games pull off this painting gimmick well, and you want to emulate it... But at this point it is very clear that attempt has failed. I say drop the gimmick entirely, and let the player focus on more interesting mechanical and story elements. It seems early enough that implementing such changes would be a relatively minimal amount of effort, with the only challenging being finding a basic way to explain goals to the player. Sound wise, the game is currently like walking through a void, with some footstep sound effects. The sound effects that are there are okay at best (though I did find the basketball's to be satisfying), and some are too loud/abrasive. The best moment was when I put a record on in the livingroom and walked around searching for more hidden things. The game desperately needs more sound environments the ensure a sense of place, and if you can pull off basic reverb and 3D sound sources, even better. Finally, a mixture of sound and visuals. The dialog is pointless in it's current state. The game absolutely NEEDS voice acting to tell a story or cement this as a believable world. I thought it was cute when I dialed 911 and they got angry with me, but it lacked a ton that even lackluster voice-acting could have provided. To add to this problem, the subtitles of all speech including some from the player character (side note, if you spam certain objects like the kitchen faucet, the dialog text will show up again for every time it was pressed as you walk away), use a gross red text on a gradient transparent box covering most of the bottom of the screen. Small white text with a black stroke, and nothing else, is more than enough for subtitles. Similarly, the white text that pops up saying what objects do is pointless in 95% of the cases it's used, so it could be omitted along with a toning down of the border around intractable objects on hover. I feel no border, and a dynamic crosshair would serve that purpose far better. [h1]TLDR - Summary[/h1] [b]~IN PROGRESS~[/b] The game needs a lot of reworking, bug fixes, and well, actual content. If it never changes from it's current state I could never recommend it, but that doesn't mean it can't eventually be a nice little game, and I hope this feedback helps work towards that. I'd hate to see all this effort so far go to waste.

★ — 3/10 - Could've been a neat little game if they would've finished it. When I first saw this game a couple of years ago, I was looking forward to giving it a try. It took a while to finally get to it but the experience has been rather disappointing. I really wanted to like this game but unfortunately, in the unfinished state it's in, I can't recommend it. The description says that every action you take has a meaningful consequence that radically shapes the experience but honestly, to me, it didn't feel like anything I did in the game had any consequence let alone a meaningful one. It also didn't radically shape the experience, because the only thing that really changes is that the world turns from black and white to color. To me, it didn't feel like that had any kind of impact on the game though because the only "story" (if you want to call that) is told in between stages. In general, you simply just walk around and mindlessly click on and interact with anything and everything you come across in order to give the rooms and things color then you eventually finish a stage and move on to the next just to do the exact same thing again. So yeah, this could've been a neat little game but sadly, it's far from it. I also wouldn't consider this as an adventure game, more like a walking sim as there is not much adventure to it. [code][h1]Panda Reviews[/h1] Was this review helpful? Feel free to follow [url=http://store.steampowered.com/curator/31777711/]my curator page[/url] for more reviews.[/code]

I recommend you check back on this game when it's released. If you like exploration-driven adventure games, this one has potential. At the moment it feels like it's a bit low on content, but at the current rate it will likely be quite an interesting game when it's finally released. You start off as a teenager packing their things and saying goodbye to their family house, about to leave for college. Depending on what you do and what you pack determines where your life takes you (you end up on one of several different "maps" for the second round of exploration). Where you explore and what you interact with determines how the rest of your character's life pans out. It's less than an hour long per playthrough, but it's fun going back and trying different things to take your character through a different path in life. In the game's current Early Access state (15 July 2015), it seems like all of the different life paths are implemented but it's still lacking enough detail to make some of the exploration parts interesting. I enjoyed my first two playthroughs of it, but there were some boring bits that I hope will be fixed.

No update in years. There is no point anymore. there not working on it.

Dont recomend this game unless you get it for free. The reason is simple it's "dead". Nothing have been done in close to two years.

I dont know why your game has been listed for vr support. I bought this game for my oculus rift. but the vr support ingame is terrible. It;s almost inpossible if you want to use the menu in vr and when you are ingame it looks horrible. When you turn your head in vr everything moves and makes you dizzy. THIS IS NOT A VR GAME. (i know it;s early access but still)

OK firstly, I understand how this is still EA but I don't get how this game can have actions that have 'meaningful consequences'. You wander around a black and white house opening drawers and cabinets until the colour comes back, then you come back for round two and paint the whole house. The screenshots here do not represent the game well - that girl you see in the shots - not in the game at all. The park with the autumn trees? Not in the game. So...I really have no reason to recommend this game.