Mierenneuker has a new favorite as of 13:59 on Jun 18, 2020

• The game has the "precursor race" trope only instead of being esoteric dead people we get a picture of genuine warmth. They joke and flirt and cheer with one another. They work towards a common goal with an understandable motive. Some have reservations about how they achieve their ends, and they try not to deprive future generations of resources.
  
  
• The story isn't incomprehensible. It's not a vague metaphorical indie-game. Everything makes sense. There's a linear cause-and-effect narrative broken up into a hundred non-linear parts. Think less 2001, more Arrival. Every big dumb object serves a purpose.
  
  
• Progression is like a pseudo open-world/metroidvania. Your only progress is intel found and your own knowledge of how the rules work. You don't get a double-jump to scale the high ledge but you do learn the secret-handshake.
  
  
• Unlike Subanutica it does a more grounded version of fast-travel that is mostly optional and doesn't exist for the player's convenience, and makes sense given the story told.
  
  
• Instead of having a checklist of chores you get a board full of rumors connected by string as if you're a conspiracy theorist.
  
  
• It's loving scary but it's not a horror game. All the scary stuff happens as a byproduct. Nothing has a personal vendetta against, there are no villains, but the universe does not play favorites. You can cast adrift from your ship and spiral hopelessly into space, you can get crushed by the sands that fill the dark tunnel you're exploring, you can make a noise in Dark Bramble and face the consequences.
  
  
• Despite the terror there is also warmth. The characters are good-natured salt-of-the-planet explorers who pack their instruments on their space trip. The OST of the game hammers home the sense of adventure, fear, mystery, and melancholy there is on offer.
  

Inspector Gesicht has a new favorite as of 22:55 on Jun 19, 2020