As an artist myself I'm kind of sick of people assuming that THIS is what an art game is supposed to be. We act like it's an excuse to give a game that isn't that great amazing ratings just because it has some simple elements of storyline and such. Which doesn't make sense! Listen, this game had a lot of potential, I'm cool with blocky pixels, I'm cool with the simple style but there are so many things that went wrong with this. The first one is that take into consideration that some people aren't able to see ONE PIXEL on the screen and that it'a be kind of frustrating. The berries? Could barely see them. The controls? Not explained, Japanese symbols didn't help me despite it being simple enough to figure on your own. The Music? Good but never in the right place. The pace? Awful. This game could of gotten a lot better reviews if you just had sped things up even a tiny bit for the Guardian, we get that hes slow but you managed to make it the most irritating longest annoying thing ever. The storyline was "Okay" It really wasn't that great. You should of added a lot more emotion to it which could of worked if you had added a bit more music or even added NEW scenes instead of recycling the same pixels. If you really wanted this game to be good consider all these simple things you could of done. Add, colour, Or shading, add sounds when you're in the forest. Add more wild life then a few birds. A good example of a game with not the best graphics but still extremely beautiful and stylish is Sword and Sorcery give it a look and you'll see what I mean.
Now I'm going to comment on the high rating comments this game is getting. Listen, art games can be beautiful but the reason they are called games is because they have REAL elements of gameplay. They aren't always an interactive story and if an art game works like that then it should still have more interactive aspects. Remember most normal games have storylines, effort, artistic skills and beauty. Take a look at some great art games like Coma, Limbo, Don't look back ect these a good because someone put a LOT of effort into them. Does this look like it was a lot of work? Art games shouldn't be getting a break just because it's an "Art" game. ALL good games should have some beautiful qualities even if they're just plain addictive games.