It’s a nice enough game with beautiful background art and animated cutscenes, but it feels like a demo, not the first episode of a series, and it is ultimately a tad underwhelming. At first I was super hyped, but the more I played the more my enthusiasm went down. A shame, because I love horror games that acknowledge LGBT people exist.
Issue #1 I had with this game—and this isn’t a flaw of just this game, mind you—is that I wish the gender neutral/non-binary option had pronouns other than they/them. With all due respect to people who use these pronouns, I am non-binary and they/them are not my pronouns; I feel it can sometimes get unnecessarily confusing in certain contexts, too, if the narration uses they/them. Ze/hir would be a better option. Just something for developers in general to consider when they want to be inclusive to us. FYI, not every non-binary person uses neopronouns, those that use he/him and she/her are still non-binary.
Issue #2: A specific warning of animal abuse would’ve been nice, by the way. The game warns about “disturbing imagery” and “gore” but those are warnings so unspecific they could mean anything from a graphically mutilated arm to aesthetically pleasing bleeding eyes. It’s really unclear and I would’ve liked a warning before having to see the entire woods section.
Well, enough about that. The random nitpicks I have with the game are as follows: some of the dialogue choices are a bit juvenile and glib and sort of clash with the mood, to be honest.; the different traits and unlockable dialogue options don’t seem to do or add much to the game at all; most choices feel inconsequential, like padding.
All that said, I love Frou-Frou the cat and Dustin the Opossum, by the way. The Talks to Animals perk was the best, and the Gretchen dialogue options were surprisingly insightful; I was expecting just funny dialogue options. My favourite human characters were Kaneeka and her mum Sybil.