"Solomon's Link" looks like an adventure game, but it's more of a visual novel tech demo expressing a simple concept for a game. And that concept is a Choose Your Own Adventure based around that old TV trope where two characters on the show get handcuffed together. We've all seen that episode. This is the same thing but shorter, looks more like a mobile app or a browser game than a PC game, and offers very little to gamers as a serious gaming experience (which is what we're here for).
The graphics in this game are passable, but could be better. And while it's vital for any game to have impressive visuals (gaming is a visual medium, after all), there's more to a game than just the graphics. To be worth a gamers time, the game must match top tier visuals with top tier gameplay, and that's not happening here.
Not every "free" game really is. There's often MTX, or content locked behind DLC, or donations being requested, or any other number of things that could mislead gamers, but in this case I'm glad to say this really does appear to be a fully free game.
Nothing demonstrates a developers belief in themselves and their work than giving it away without any remuneration. This is a service to themselves, and the gaming industry, and should be applauded. Of course, just because something is free, doesn't necessarily mean it's valuable.
Even though this is "free", it failed to appeal to the 120 million+ gamers on Steam. SteamDB showed the game peaked at only 8 concurrent players... this is a dismal public reception. This was so bad they couldn't even give it away.
Bearing in mind that free games don't add +1 to your game collector count, should you bother adding this to your library and downloading it?
This is a "maybe" experience... if you have a lot of free time on your hands and nothing else to do, why not? But for the purposes of a review, this isn't something I can say everyone must try. It's not quite there. Valve doesn't give us a "maybe" option in reviews, but if they did, that's what I'd choose for this.
Also, some kudos to the developer for also making the source code free. That's a noble gesture that shows great dedication and service to the gaming industry. While this game isn't quite up to the standards PC gamers have come to expect, I hope to see more from this developer, perhaps as part of a professional game dev team who can make full use of their talents.
