This is the best story game I've ever played. hands down. There is nothing I know that can compare to Signalis. I'll explain why.
TL;DR, Signalis is a story-first survival horror game that toys with memory and pursuit. It shows you a world that feels foreign until you remember that it's not, and it gives you bits and pieces of the truth that are intriguing to digest until theres a whole cake at the end of the breadcrumb trail
First off, and the weaker of the game, the gameplay. The world is immersive and interactive. Almost everything has flavour text, regardless of if its actually interactable or not. There is so much to look at and so much to take in that it creates something absolutely beautiful. The rules of the game make it feel strict, to the point where you'll be conflicting yourself on every turn about what you need to bring around with you, and I've been told the game feels exactly like how a really old resident evil game feels (if youre into that). Admittedly, the game is a bit of a tedious key hunt without interesting puzzles for more than a third of the game, which is where the game is its absolute weakest. The real puzzles are unfortunately sparse (although not terribly). You'll encounter a puzzle for every maybe 40 minutes of gameplay, outside of the second gameplay area Sierpinski, where its around every hour. They make up for it by being extremely interesting and thought-provoking, though. You're forced to remember (or screenshot) images, and emergently reference collected notes in order to solve puzzles. You're made to interact in ways youve probably never done before in a game, sometimes using real-world logic. There's unfortunately a mechanic that seemed to have got forgotten early in development, but its not a terribly big deal, although it wouldve increased the immersiveness by a large margin.
Next, the music. Short section, cuz its 3am. The OST for this game was created by 1000 Eyes and Cicada Sirens. These two really understand the themes of the game, to the point where you will feel immersed and connected to the game through the soundtrack, absolutely beautifully. There are intense themes, battle themes, lore themes, remorseful themes, introspective themes, every kind of theme that makes you feel exactly what youre supposed to feel in exactly the way youre supposed to feel it. I plan to learn one of the themes on piano, honestly.
Next, and the absolute smoking gun of it all, is the story. This game is INTENSE on its subversion. You are going to be confused. You will be confused for a while. As a matter of fact, the game is designed around your confusion and your memory. You will not understand the full scale of the story until youve consumed every bit of lore, every piece of gameplay, every stray document, and every piece of relevant flavour text, and you'll find that its the most beautifully tragic, bittersweet media that you can currently play. You'll scramble at every new discovery and cutscene, noticing things that fit together as well as things that dont. The jigsaw puzzle that is this game's story is so strange to take in, that it feels so amazing to finally fit every bit in place. The storytelling of this game is so pronounced and interesting, that it makes the actual story feel all that much better. The immediate thing to pick up on is that it's queer-inclusive. very obviously lmao. Disregarding that, this is a complicated and loving story that hasnt been told before (there's exactly two huge similarities to any trope I can think of, and this is a game with a huuuuge range of concepts). The story was formatted with utmost care, the precision of timed story elements and the hints at the bigger picture are so well-placed that they feel like theyre exactly where they belong, even with the intended subtlety (or lack-thereof) of a photo or a huge pit, and even with the length of the game. Without getting into spoilers, Signalis shoves you into it's world without a semblance of knowledge and feeds you that knowledge through emergent details like posters and papers, strange-looking walls and puzzles. Keys that shout nothing at you and radios that whisper juuusssst what you needed to you. Safe to say that this is not your average love story lol
Extra notes: Theres a really interesting dynamic between you and your playable character when it comes to memory, shifting as the game plays through. You are not the only one in the dark, but eventually you will be, and you wont even know it when it happens. On top of that, theres an added layer of cosmic horror (spoilers for emergent storytelling) [spoiler]that you think isnt really present until the latter half of the game, until you brighten the game before the Nowhere section and see that you are ALWAYS under the gaze of something you dont understand... yet[/spoiler].
Signalis is truly a masterclass of storytelling, even when the game is a tad rough around the edges (which it rarely is). I cannot recommend it any more, and as a matter of fact ive recommended it to 3 friends and out of the 2 who've played it so far, they've all loved it! Everyone knows anecdotal evidence is the best so like... yeah. good stuff. play Signalis!!!!!!!
