Monochroma
Developer: Nowhere Studios
Price: $20
Platform: PC
A PC code for Monochroma was supplied to us
After a mildly successful Kickstarter campaign Monochroma is finally out and while it tries to evoke memories of games like Little Inferno, Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons, and Limbo it unfortunately fails to capture the essence of those games.
Monochroma opens up drearily enough with your brother hurting his leg in a fall and you both being chased by a large man who wants to take you for reasons. The game’s story is told through its environment and while it doesn’t quite make much sense (why would you carry your brother TO the danger instead of backtracking back home or something?), there is a slight sense of dread as you go through these levels that should be populated with people but are mysteriously empty. There’s also an evil corporation vibe the game tries to convey with these charming illustrations but I really wish the game went further with it. And while the game is visually appealing with its monochrome (GET IT?) palette punctuated with deep reds and dystopian look, it’s nothing you haven’t seen before and definitely done better by other games. The music is superb though with these fantastic pieces that unfortunately don’t fit the action that’s happening on screen at times.
Being a puzzle platformer you’d expect Monochroma to perform well in both regards but it’s the puzzles that are unfortunately the only thing it does right. There are some really clever puzzles in this game but the controls kill any sort of attempt at enjoying the puzzles. Instead of satisfaction after finishing a particularly challenging puzzle I feel relief at hitting the checkpoint so as to not have to redo it. Moving around is super clunky and your jumps have a floaty imprecise feel to them. I never felt confident when making my jumps and failure usually resulted in death which meant having to restart the puzzle. The game’s sluggish controls become even more evident during its various chase sequences that require precise jumps and quick movements that the controls don’t deliver on. It doesn’t help that the loading screen when reloading a checkpoint hits that sweet spot of being just long enough to annoy you.
Now the entire gimmick of the game is that your brother hurt his leg and cannot walk which means you to have to carry him everywhere. Carrying your brother makes you move slower, heavier, and have shorter jumps which all plays into the 3-4 hours worth of puzzles the game has to offer. He’s also scared of the dark and can only be put down anywhere there’s a spotlight which seems odd considering he was playing in the dark perfectly fine in the intro sequence.
The game has a solid mix of puzzles you can take your time with and others that feel more hectic due to the fact that they put your brother in danger. The issue with the puzzles is that your brother is a complete nuisance who makes these puzzles even more of a pain than normal. Having to go through an unnecessary amount of work just to get a box so you can get to the previously unreachable two extra inches needed to get to a ledge isn’t fun either. It gets worse when you have to clumsily race through an area to get to your brother who’s about to get killed by some slow moving object. Monochroma is clearly trying to give players the same feeling of companionship puzzle escort games like Ico or Brothers gave but it fails in every possible way at establishing a relationship with the two silent characters. Neither of them exhibits anything close to a personality and there’s a sort of stern silence throughout the game because of it.
It was such a huge relief when you’re separated from your brother for almost an entire chapter and instead given a slew of disposable robots to help during puzzles. I gave more of a shit when the robot that just helped me solve a puzzle got crushed under a pillar than the entirety of the time spent with the younger brother. The game offers absolutely no reason why you should care about the two brothers and comes off as a cheap knock-off of a much better game.
The Final Word
Monochroma could have been something really interesting but its wonky controls and weak gimmick leave it in the pool of other mediocre indie platformers.
– MonsterVine Rating: 2.5 out of 5 – Mediocre
