The Nameless City

The Nameless City is a very well designed lovecraftian game that I enjoyed playing and despite it being short it still impressed me. Overall I would recommend if you are looking for a good game to play https://youtu.be/Vgc7IQ1hK-Q

It's a bit of a tech demo that doesn't really mechanically come into itself, but it's a neat bite-sized chunk of lovecraftian walking sim. The idea of using the AI neural reading thingy for eldritch visions was great, though it will probably feel gratuitous even to people who understand what it's supposed to mean. However, I enjoyed it well enough.

Lovecraft would be proud. It's a short game, about an hour or so, but the price seems fair for this short romp into Lovecraft's first Cthulhu myths story. The PSX effects add a dream-like detail to the game, which is good since what's narrated is a nightmare. Some of the effects were impressive like the infinity room or the gargantuan monster that rises from the sea. If I had any complaints I'd wish it was longer. The mechanics in the game need to be explored in greater detail. Maybe for the sequel?

The first half is well-paced, but the second half is a very small amount of interesting writing placed piecemeal among blocks of circling repeatedly through the same corridors. I'm also not convinced that AI generation was the right choice for [spoiler]the frescoes.[/spoiler]

Like the story it is adapted from, this game feels like something in between a dream and adventure. Game play is mostly exploration with some relatively easy puzzles. The Nameless City can be completed in a little over an hour, but I revisited it for a couple of further play-throughs. The mood, the music and the narration are all worth re-experiencing.

What an intriguing and well-made little game. A playable story, perhaps. Lovecraftian in the truest sense, wherein there's no corporeal entity save yourself, pondering, questioning, the things of antiquity. Things never meant for man to know. This can be finished in less than an hour, as the store page itself says, but that time is filled with cosmic dread beyond anything I've experienced in a game, and a curiousity that stirs and embeds itself in your mind. I feel changed, almost, by playing - experiencing, rather - this game. It's opened my eyes to the works of H.P. Lovecraft and given me a desire for more. I also love the use of AI generated art for the vision scenes. It's the perfect use for it - grotesque, unhuman, with neither shape nor form save that which we attribute to it. Though I can't help but ponder the unwholesome familiarity of the Nameless City, as if I had seen it before, in ages past, or in a dream perhaps. I awoke this morning with the Nameless City upon my mind, and the words of the mad poet on my lips. EDIT POST AI-REMOVAL UPDATE: The new frescoes and vision scenes are equally immaculate as before, if not more as now the game is free from AI use. Even though the AI-generated imagery worked fine in the game (not saying I condone the use of AI, but its earlier dreamlike imagery had its uses), the new art takes it up a notch, and makes the frescoes easier to understand. Also even though I was pretty thorough my first time through, I still found some new things the second time, and was still deeply immersed and distraught, in a great way. So despite being a simple linear playable story, there's replay value! In much the same way as rereading some of H.P. Lovecraft's works, like this very story. I also thoroughly like the heavy purple artstyle to the game - it feels offputting, but the mind gets used to it, and sees or creates colours through the purple. The first time through, I took screenshots of a scene with blues and grays, and bright accents and deep darks, and was baffled the next day on finding that the only colour in the screenshot [i]was[/i] purple. [i]"Wait, it's all purple?" "Always has been"[/i].

A rather enjoyable experience. A little confusing at times where to go, but I liked the art and sound direction. Would have preferred there be no AI art. I get that it's trying to invoke uncanny imagery but I'm pretty sure I saw a zombie chicken at one point, and that just took me out