Curiosity is a powerful drug. And with a name like this showing up one day in the Humble Bundle, how could I not be curious about it? Still it could not outshine what I was playing at the time, so it went into the backlog for a couple years. But among my online groups it turns out I was not the only one curious about this title... so let's see what the hell is going on.
MAL really did not want to abort the mission. And I mean really did not want to. When the order came down the line, the AI argued, demanding a reason, then explaining everything was ok, so it wanted to proceed. When none of that got it permission to continue, it finally claimed it was losing connection as it drove through a tunnel... a rather weird excuse considering it was running a space station, but the point was clear. This AI was rejecting orders and now someone had to go find out why. Get on your ship and go!
Upon arriving it becomes clear that the tunnel was not the only lie MAL told on call. His crew is also very dead. Your mission is to find out if this and the call were due to malfunction, and if so, shut down MAL. You will explore the small station in first person, collecting evidence and talking to the AI about it to find out what really happened there.
But the game does this in a really clever way, as you are not currently on the station. In fact, your review, decision, and following actions have already happened and you are back home. Rather this story is told while reviewing your performance with the local authorities. Your view during this will alternate between a 1st person view of the investigation and the office you are currently in while your interviewer discusses your actions with you. The latter view won't take you completely out, however, as you continue to be able to move about the station as the camera that recorded your actions plays behind the man interviewing you. In addition, there are two other screens behind him which blends the instructions of how to play right into the game itself as part of this office.
Not that you need much. The game uses very standard keyboard and mouse controls to move around (WASD setup with shift and space working for your vertical control in zero-g) with each mouse button having a specific job... one takes pictures to collect evidence while the other interacts with object through most of the ship. Once in the AI's room, however, the buttons become how you talk to the AI... one to start a logic path between the pictures you've taken while the other lets you select pieces of evidence to use as arguments against the AI to force it to tell you the truth.
There is a little bit of humor as you play through, but it is an exceedingly short game, so don't expect a lot of time for it. There is also very little in the way of a satisfying ending, unfortunately. If anything, I found that to be the real downfall of this title... I'm not sure if the author felt the need to put a lesson here or not, as it falls utterly flat, contradictory, sudden, and then it's over and rolling credits.
Bugs: This game ran just about flawless for me. I say just about because after the credits, it seemed to want to begin again before forcing itself to quit. More messy then actually working wrong, but worth noting.
Overall: 2000 to 1 feels exactly like it is: an experimental game with a lot of good ideas, but an incredibly simple story and premise to play with them in. It is definitely something to play with between your bigger games and for about an hour of your time and at most a tip of your choosing to the developer, you could do far worse. But it also won't leave you fulfilled or thinking this was something exceptional.
Score:
6/10
System Requirements:
- Unfortunately I can not give requirements for this game as I can not find them listed. But I can not imagine this game requiring much to run based on the graphics in-game.
- Ryzen 7 (2700) 3.2 Ghz
- 16 GB RAM
- Nvidia Geforce 1660 (6GB VRAM)
- Windows 10 (64 Bit)
No comments:
Post a Comment