Coming back to this game years later because it popped back into my mind. God, this really is as good as I remember. Lovely.
Reviews for "no-one has to die."
Love the stressful feel and the storyline.
ok this is pretty good
I logged back into my old NG account just to leave this comment, because a decade after I played this game in a single evening, it still sticks with me. Over the years I've played dozens of puzzle games, and I can't think of any with the same style of puzzle -- for such a simple game, it's surprisingly unique. I've also played many games with branching stories, but there's something special about the way this game made me feel the weight of each decision despite the expectation to play each one. We don't just learn new information information from each path, the lens through which the story is told changes. While hope is a common theme across all kinds of media, the way this game delivered its message resonated with me. Perhaps what's different here is how the ideal outcomes depends on failures in other realities: rather than advocating for blind optimism, this game embraces a grim reality as *part* of its hope. Hope doesn't come from luck or some unseen power of determination, it's a logical step of learning from our mistakes. Maybe I want to believe it's not idealistic to suggest there's a world in which no-one has to die.
cant open the game...