izigame.me

After roughly 12 hours, I've finished the game, and I did enjoy my time in the clearing of Wanderstop.
Although, I have to admit, it was a very puzzling experience. The main reason I say this is because early on, I was introduced to characters which my 30+ years playing games made me identify as having problems for me to resolve as the player, on my way to solve the problems of the character i'm playing (Alta). My assumption was that by solving their problems, Alta would solve her problems. I went in expecting something somewhat akin to Psychonauts.
So I'm introduced to someone bearing a curse and who seems to have a strange relationship with his kid. Another character who seems to be a demon hunter with no demon to hunt. Not gonna spoil every character, but with the majority of characters, the game seemed to tell me "it's time to move on" without giving me the option to see a satisfying conclusion to those story-threads. I never got to see the cursed guy get uncursed, for example.
At one point, the game even presented me a character with quite a unique design, and I never actually was allowed to talk with that character.
There was specifically one character I really liked, that I really wanted to see more of, and that I was SURE I would see more of... and ultimately I didn't.
Several characters like that had this lack of closure which reminds me SO MUCH of how the story of Coda ended in The Beginner's Guide.
The game gave me again and again and again and again a frustrating feeling of lacking closure. I don't think the game was trying to be fully enjoyable. Some of it was, but a big part of it, I think, was engineered to be a slap to the face.
In a way, I suppose it's a realistic commentary on life. If you meet someone who's broken, you may be able to influence them, but when you part ways with them, you might never get to see them again, to see what they become, if they solve their problems, if you've helped them, if they get better or worse. They just... leave your life as much as you leave theirs. I *think* that's a part of what the game was trying to tell me, at least in regards to the other characters.
I suspect that mostly because of my experience with The Beginner's Guide, which was also written by Davey Wreden, also threw me for a loop and gave me those same uneasy feelings.
Similarly, the game is built around the idea of impermanence, where you're meant to get used to lose things. You will find/earn mugs with unique designs and trinkets (like plushies), and the next chapter, poof, they're gone. You quickly understand that you're not doing it for the game, you're only doing it for yourself, for the satisfaction of doing it, knowing it won't stay. So I did it once and then never again.
As far as games go, I think it could've easily been far more enjoyable, by allowing you to accumulate mugs and trinkets over time, keeping the plants you planted throughout the game (at least inside the tea shop).
And then it would've been perfect if you could've seen characters come back from one chapter to the next.
But again, I don't think the game was going for that.
The game had a story to tell, it told it and didn't overstay its welcome. I can respect that.
But that story was so strangely told (by having so many unresolved threads) that hours later, I'm still debating with myself to figure out if I liked it or not!
I think the game needs an endless mode with a trashbin to throw away items you want to delete.
I think the game could've used a 6th chapter where you would've found again some characters from the start of the game which could've used a resolution.
Then a couple UI/gameplay improvements here and there, and less deletion of the things you took time planting/placing/coloring/collecting. THEN, at least to me, the game would've been perfect.