Skip to main content

Indie game storeFree gamesFun gamesHorror games
Game developmentAssetsComics
SalesBundles
Jobs
TagsGame Engines
(+1)

Interesting concept; I tried it after starting to watch Markiplier's video, and wanting to play it for myself before finishing watching how his playthroughs turned out. I have to say, however, that after putting in the time to try to find every ending and line of dialogue (because I'm a bit of an obsessive completionist), I'm disappointed with how little any of your choices in the main conversation seem to actually matter. Of course, that seems like it could be a sort of moral of a story themed around suicidal thoughts, that sometimes there just really is no right thing for you to say, nothing you can do to help someone who isn't ready to accept help (although that seems like a rather non-constructive message compared to, say, a game that might take inspiration from the conversational techniques employed by actual suicide prevention hotline attendants in terms of what does and doesn't help the caller to hang in there and seek help, and actually sort of train the players to be better prepared to help out a suicidal individual if they should ever meet one. That's what I was expecting this game to be, and my disappointment with it isn't so much because it's bad as because it seems like it could've been so much better and more important if it had been that. Maybe you could try an approach closer to that in the future, if you were interested.). But there's also the fact that your conversation path can seem to leave him in a variety of different degrees of optimism, cheerfulness, and determination to live (with several endings explicitly saying he won't hurt himself or has decided not to do anything hasty, and others leaving with him ruminating on how the world will be better off without him), yet they all lead to the same "bystander" ending if you don't start texting with him, and the exact same texting conversation if you do (save a few minor changes if you told him you loved him but wouldn't go to see him). Almost all the variation in endings was within the weird visit to his apartment which, while interesting, made absolutely no sense for the player to go through for a stranger they'd never met (and is bad advice for players trying to consider how they would deal with an actual call from someone suicidal), especially the "love" endings (unless it was a sort of Undertale-esque satire of players' tendency to do everything possible to try to get a good ending and/or see everything the game has to offer even if it leads them to extreme or unorthodox behavior; I sort of got that vibe and it was kind of interesting, but it didn't feel explored well and I'm not sure if it was intentional). It's also very conspicuous, as others have noted and especially considering the way ending 1 seems to imply you should be trying to find out his address, that after you say you'll visit and he gives you his address (the only way to learn it) you have no option to give it to the police or suicide prevention instead of just marching down there yourself. If this game were ever to be revised/expanded, I'd like to see at least a couple different endings and/or text conversations based on your phone dialogue choices. Also, it was weird how much the guy seemed like three totally different personalities by phone, by text, and in person; and he didn't sound drunk or high on the phone, so he must have downed his stuff pretty quickly as soon as he hung up to be that messed up by the time he's texting you (unless there's an implied time gap in between).


I probably sounded very critical with all that, but I hope it was constructive, and I hope I'm clear that it's only because I think there's a lot of potential to this concept that I'm wishing it was better and have spent a while thinking and writing about what critiques I have. The voice acting was great, and the apartment visit had a splendidly creepy atmosphere, yet I think Mr. Nobody remained mostly sympathetic by virtue of the fact that he never actually attacks you or forces himself upon you, no matter what you do to him or how threatening he might seem, which is tremendously valuable for maintaining the apparent tragedy of his situation. It was also interesting the way that, although you could only get a little bit of his character from a single playthrough, you could put together an interesting picture out of exploring the different dialogue branches; for instance, he implies in several routes that he's a killer, but exploration lets you infer that he's specifically killed for money in order to get out of debt.


Finally, and unrelated to comments about the game itself, I notice a number of other users commenting about issues getting the game to run; I had a lot of trouble myself with my antivirus software (Norton Security Suite) repeatedly trying to delete the game with overprotective paranoia, despite my attempts to restore and exclude it (I ultimately had to temporarily disable my whole antivirus protection while I started the game up!). Perhaps some others, even with other antivirus, are having similar issues. I think these kind of tiny indie games can trip false alarms on antivirus software easily, probably owing to being unusual files with little established history of other users using them safely, although that should diminish as the file ages and more people download it. In the meantime, it might help to make the general recommendation for users to try disabling their antivirus software while extracting the .zip file and running the .exe if they're having trouble getting the game to run.

hey very in depth, i would never be able to talk about something for that amount of time without repeating myself. :)