Mato Anomalies Review (Swevenfox)
This one is an absolute gem and I wish it would have more recognition.
Sure there are some raw edges here and there - but this be a smaller team they make up perfectly with writing, story, characters, atmosphere and mood setting. The love poured into their world building and to share it with the player is felt all the way down.
Merits
- Great characters, they all are unique and different from each other from different areas with different background yet they manage to work together perfectly without feel any of them would be forced in the team.
- Absolutely great background music, sound designs and voices. They all help a lot to upkeep the gloomy post apocalyptic Noir feeling the game was aiming for.
- Great writing! It is entertaining and the characters all react on one another and comment on each other strength and weaknesses. Also I think this was the first game where a new term surfaced us the player didn't encounter it before but our main character due of his background would be aware of it already. Instead of taking the main character a fool and re-explain the term it was explained to another character who had no idea about it and by no means he could know that either. Small detail but I absolutely loved that.
- Complex and very interesting story to explore and uncover it's secrets.
- The art style is great, it is an interesting mixture between styles but carefully crafted together into a whole. It might be not everyone's cup of tea though.
- Visible love of the developers for their world and building it up you can feel all that care they placed into it.
Flaws
- For the English VA the lip sync often wrong and it can be annoying in cutscenes.
- The story and the game flow slow building takes a bit of time to pick it up but if you bypass the first chapter it becomes more intense after.
- Lack of Intermissions. The story lead doesn't wrap up in a shiny paper it's content so sometimes some path or new characters joining the crew is raw. The story is very straight forward and heavily focusing the actual plot and investigation aspect without introducing arcs and smoother the flow a bit.
- Illusion of a semi open world. It is not and gives no any room for exploring it is clear where you have to go to progress with the story. No on world treasures to find, all loot comes from merchants or dungeons/quest rewards only.
- The card battle aspect might not be everyone's favourite element but the game offers skipping it so you won't stuck on it which is nice.
- The lairs and enemies can feel a bit repetitive and 'boring' they only change with chapters. Though the dungeon's atmosphere with each chapter is amazing in return!
Now my review not fully covering the whole game as I not yet finished it. But I am not disappoint and to me well worth the price and waiting for the actual release. I played the demo I loved the idea and was impatiently waiting for the launch.
This so far absolutely my favourite Indie game of the year.