This game really surprised me. I was expecting something kinda typical of horror-themed walking simulators and came out of it really stimulated and thought-provoked. It accomplishes a lot with some choice and punchy dialogue and environmental design, such that its message is conveyed successfully with brief flashes of insight rather than weighty exposition. It invites exploration of its story rather than a fixed, narrow perspective, which shows that the developer is very adept at storytelling in spite of how brief the game is.
I’m still not sure what to make of the endings. Perhaps that’s the point. Looking back on the story as a whole I struggle to determine whether it’s optimistic in tone or pessimistic, but I think that’s deliberate, since the characters have very clearly different perspectives on what’s going on.
The one moment I definitely didn’t like was the section with the fish stuck in the door. Maybe I didn’t understand how that fits into the overall message, but it seemed like an unnecessarily cruel scene for the sake of having a scene of cruelty. If I had written this I would have left that out, but again maybe I’m missing something there.
I really applaud this game and I heartily recommend it to anyone who’s even remotely interested in interactive storytelling.