Animal Well

I almost gave this 2. That out of the way, let's get into it.

This game has 0 story, and provides absolutely 0 instruction about what you're supposed to do. Just figure it out on your own. I'm sure some people like that; I'm not one of them. This means that any sort of review for this game is going to necessarily have spoilers, in that I will talk at a general level about what it _seems_ the game wants you to do. I'll get back to that _seems_ in a minute. And once again curse the lack of markdown support in reviews. :P

Last chance to bail before spoilers.

OK, you were warned.

As you start the game, with a minimum effort of blind exploration you should come across the map. On the map, you can see 4 flames are marked, probably should do something with those. If you set out generally in the direction of each flame, you'll get an item. Unlike a lot of games this might remind you of, there's no specific order you need to do these in. Collect those 4 items, and then set back out to the 4 corners to try to reach the flames, only possible with the combined power of your items. Each corner has a boss of some sort, though this is first and foremost a puzzle game; you're not really meant to fight the bosses with your non-existent super missiles and power bombs.

All the while, you should be on the lookout for hidden nooks and crannies with collectible eggs, each of which has a unique name and may make you chuckle. If you head back to the center of the map, you'll find a room where you can get rewards for your eggs, so they're not completely pointless, and may even be an important part of the game's objectives.

What do I mean may? Well, in the broader video game media outside of c3 (heresy, I know), there's a lot of talk about this game being excellent and amazing and it's going to be GOTY and it has mysteries upon mysteries, people comparing it to ... what do you mean I can't even TAG another game in here? What kind of .... sigh. The Outer Wilds. Which i really should go back and play someday... stupid rocket controls.... crash every time.... anyway.

OK. So you get the flames dealt with and you light the beacons, Gondor calls for aid... wait, wrong franchise. You go down an actual well. I mean, OK, sure, seems like there should in fact be a well (the bosses covered the animal part). You solve more puzzles, collect another item. Take new item reach new area where final boss? awaits. Solve more puzzles while boss tries to kill you; you can't kill it -- just gotta be smart and rely on something that can stun the boss. Get through the large puzzle without getting killed and you can reach something that actually **will** kill the boss [markdown count: 4]. And then you roll credits.

And this is where I was disappointed. The hype I heard was "oh the game gets really interesting after you roll credits." (OK, second time I was disappointed; first was when I found it wasn't a metroidvania.) I can keep playing and I can see there are more mysteries to solve... but it's just more of the same? Where's the magical extra layer? Am I still in layer 1?

I don't know. I don't care anymore. It's not a _bad_ game. It's not going to be my GOTY (Metaphor Refantizo better not fail me either) and it's a good lesson in hype... maybe this is your cup of tea more than it's mine. It feels worth saying you should at least check it out if you have an hour or two; it's free with PS+ Extra right now, which is how I played... 11.5 hours? Eh, let's round that down to 10, I have a bad habit of leaving games idle.

I don't plan to go back but if somebody can actually convince me that there is something more here... honestly I probably won't believe them anyway.