Ever played a video game where you're part taking into some huge war in a city and buildings get destroyed? Civilians getting killed. Like, you're actually looking at this building collapsing and thinking to yourself, "man I hope all those people got out okay?" Or maybe you're watching a bomb go off downtown and thinking, "man I hope those people got out okay?" Ever watch a terrorist attack take out a small village and thought to yourself, "man... I REALLY hope those people got out okay?" Well, apparently the developers of Black Flag Studios did just that. Someone at that studio had this thought and decided to build a game around it. This game is called Orphan Age and well, I'm all for it.
Now before I get into my initial thoughts about this game. Let me get out the negative stuff first. I want to throw this out there first because these are general things that bothered me about this alpha that affected my "gameplay experience" but not my actual THOUGHTS of the game. The first thing that bothered me was that the tutorial, though detailed, would at times bombard you with menus on the top of menus that would clutter up what I was reading and what I was doing. This at times would cause menus to overlap and cause the mouseovers to be super sensitive. And super sensitive they were. The mouseovers for certain things were a lot bigger than I think they should have been. It was hard trying to click on menus because then another mouseover would cause it to disappear. I spent quite a bit of time trying to click on getting Trace to eat, but the menus kept disappearing. Was frustrating to say the lease. Making the hitboxes on the mouseovers a little smaller might fix this, I'm not sure. There were times when certain actions didn't register and froze up on me, like trying to cook the food and trying to feed Trace. This had me restart the game a couple of times. Also when placing down a bed. When I tried to put the bed in the room Trace was in, my character kept walking up the little stairs leading to the rubbish bed instead of the new bed I placed to be built. This, again, caused some frustration and required me to restart and put the bed down in a different spot. Overall, these weren't game-breaking bad. It's an alpha. I've said this so many times, games that developers on G.Round allow us to play shouldn't be stigmatized for things like this. They are still in the beginning phases. I appreciate that they mentioned this at the start of the game. These are things that they want to know and have fixed so that they can reach their desired deadlines. It's our jobs are testers, reviewers, and content creators to help out these guys to bring forth the best product they can.
So with that being said, let's talk about what I loved about the game, which honestly, is everything. I enjoyed the aesthetic of the game. The feeling of being an orphaned child and trying to survive. They call this an RPG, Strategy, Simulation, Survival game, and honestly, they nailed it on the head. When you play the game, it gives you the feel of being children who have to survive. Everything from the cosmetics, the graphics, the menu designs, and the game functions shows that the developers took time to make it seem like you just lost your parents and now you need to grow up a lot faster than you should. The way that they input children's moods, hunger, health, was nicely introduced and implemented. The controls of the game were wonderful, despite the bugs and mouseover box problem I talked about. I had to envision how it would be and feel if those weren't the issue, and I saw it looking clean in the final product. I think one of my favorite parts, is the way the developers used emojis when the kids talked to each other. They really did help with the game and the feel. Not using voiceovers, and using emojis to figure out what they were saying to each other was pretty cute. This game definitely had that feeling of, "if the Sims decided to make a post-apocalyptic expansion..." Wait... did the Sims make that? Can someone inform me if the Sims actually made that or not? I feel like they did?
So then it comes down to the music and sound effects. And they were spot on. The music made you feel depressed and solemn, the feeling you should have after your family was killed and you're only around with you and your sister. I applaud the sound team for conveying the feelings through sound along with the graphics team for having the game's looks, lighting, and more just fit together perfectly. It was a great listen. Something as simple as the menu sounds, even though to others seem like just a simple bleep or bloop, can ruin it for a person like me who is very audio sensitive. I really did like the soundtrack that I heard in this game so far.
I also wanted to touch on some of the other game mechanics. Like having to search through piles of trash for materials, breaking down cabinets and things to get supplies for crafting. Looking for food through old vending machines. Tearing through couch cushions and chairs to use for parts. This was pretty spot on. Things I never would have thought about. Making a LOT of the world interactive so that you can sustain this orphanage of kids and help them survive through quests and a narrative, was pretty well done. Though I couldn't get through because of the menus frustrating me, I did manage to just navigate around the area and realized just how many things you could interact with. The mechanics showed depth and it showed that the game wouldn't be a simple game. I liked that thought a lot.
So in the end, I would definitely look into Orphan Age. I feel like it's a game worth investing my time and energy into once it launches. Even a game I would stream on my twitch channel on Saturdays and Sundays at the link here. (Self-plug because I can). Black Flag Studios has a gem here in my opinion. They clean up the game and keep going in the direction they are going, I do feel like they will definitely make a product that can go the mile. I also wonder if they plan on doing expansions and additions to the game once this product is out. Much like how Sims has... well.. Sims everything, I wonder if this is a direction that Black Flag Studios is going. If so, I wouldn't mind see it personally. But once the game launches, I will definitely probably be purchasing it and giving it its rounds on my machine.
You can find out more information on Orphan Age at the links provided in this article. They have a Kickstarter that you can show some love to that gives you a chance to join the Private Alpha of the game.
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