Well, this was certainly interesting. Like the best wander games it tells a lot in a very short time, while leaving it up to the reader to infer its world from the details. In this case, building a dystopia through lovely bitter satire.
A lot of it is sold with lovely art assets. A disturbingly red sky. The extravagant misch masch of influences in the lounge. A guard posing next to a Banksy painting. But it’s also sold through a fantastic original soundtrack, about as long as the game itself.
After playing I noticed that this was a predecessor to The Norwood Suite, which I had heard of previously but never played. I’ll simply have to give it a go!
This is a very late post but I’ve finally come back to post it. I had hoped to also play episode 1 of Tales from Off-Peak city because my thoughts feel half finished, but it’s better to say now and hope I still revisit it.
My favourite part of this game was how it captured the space of a terminal/train station. A huge open space with many people crossing through, hidden spaces and secret passages. I have a fascination with the hidden back rooms of shopping centres and airports that I’ll never see, and this game activated that in a tiny way.
This and the writing made a solid atmosphere while I explored. But the part that left me a little more cold and confused was the rest of the writing. The factional elements made sense to me in the abstract. There was a controlling figure on top that exerts authority on an oppressed under class. But I really couldn’t grasp any specificity of what it was saying beyond those broad strokes.
Like I said, I had hoped to play episode 1 and see if there’s more of a coherent throughline being created. I don’t think it’s necessarily required for this game, but it certainly felt like it was an unfinished thought. I’ll still try to get to episode 1 and return with hopefully more developed ideas.
I’d definitely still recommend loading this up and walking through the train station to drink in the vibe.
