Game Info |
PlatformWin, Mac, Xbox One |
PublisherNight School Studio |
DeveloperNight School Studio |
Release DateJan 15, 2015 |
There are few games in recent memory that I've wanted to like as badly as Oxenfree.
Night School Studios' first game hits all of my sweet spots: teen protagonists and branching dialogue options, all wrapped up in a beautiful, painterly art style. Yet despite my appreciation for these individual components, I finished Oxenfree with my mouth agape, feeling wholly unsatisfied.
Oxenfree is a game created and developed by Night School Studio.The game was released for Microsoft Windows, OS X, and Xbox One on January 15, 2016, with a PlayStation 4 version released on May 31st, 2016, along with an extension to the game, known as 'New Game Plus'. Oxenfree Quotes. There are no approved quotes yet for this movie. Movie & TV guides. Best Horror Movies. Top 200 of all time 'Rotten Tomatoes Is Wrong' Our new podcast Worst Superhero Movies.
teen protagonists and branching dialogue options are wrapped up in a beautiful, painterly art style
The beginning of Oxenfree is promising enough. It follows a group of Pacific Northwestern teenagers who are forced to face their greatest fears (and unresolved grief) during a weekend getaway that takes a turn for the worst. You play as blue-haired, unassumingly cool Alex, who's trying to reconcile her feelings about the death of her beloved brother, Michael. At the same time, she's trying to get to know her new stepbrother, Jonas.
Accompanying Alex and Jonas are her best friend Ren (an affable stoner), Ren's crush Nona (quintessential ditz) and Clarissa, Michael's ex-girlfriend with whom Alex frequently butts heads. The group's plans to drink and chill out on the beach are quickly dashed when they happen across some supernatural weirdness that exposes their vulnerabilities — oh, and their bodies to ghastly possession. Throw in some annoying temporal anomalies, and there's a whole mess of issues to sort out.
It's Alex's, and by extension the player's, relationships with each of these characters that really drives Oxenfree, more than the narrative's creepy undercurrent. That's in large part thanks to an enormous number of dialogue trees. Night School boasts some former Telltale Games designers in its cohort, and its first release wears the influence of that story-driven studio unapologetically.
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It feels great to be given the sheer level of control over the protagonist that Oxenfree offers. Yet many of Alex's dialogue choices seem to have an incremental influence on the overarching story. For every decision you make that has an impact on the narrative, there's a choice between how, precisely, you want to say 'no' to someone.
Regardless of whether those conversations lead somewhere, Oxenfree subjects you to a lot of talking. Though it stars a group of teens, Oxenfree doesn't fall back on lazy, cliched 'young person' speech. The characters are more earnest than the typical video game teenager, and the bulk of their conversations aren't boring or painful to sit through. For a game as chatty as this one, it's a definite plus that Alex, Jonas and the group tend to have interesting, revealing discussions instead of groan-inducing ones, even if the voice acting isn't exceptional.
The most common conversation topic: what, exactly, is going on. The way Oxenfree subjects the characters and player to these mysterious happenings is inventive. To solve puzzles, Alex uses her pocket radio to access certain signals that eke out information, unlock doors and help her investigate the mystical powers at play.
This sound-driven method is an interesting conceit, but one that boasts style over substance. The dial is severely limited for the first half of the game, and while it eventually expands, the game always nudges you in the right direction so that you'll never be stuck.The radio mechanic might be a bit of a dud, as is the manner in which repetitive time loops are manually rewound and reset.
The best part of the puzzles is honestly just seeing how the graphics adapt and distort under duress. Oxenfree features subtly cartoon-like characters atop backdrops which only grow more stylized when manipulated by the disembodied villains inhabiting the island. When Alex and her friends are knocked back in time a few moments, the screen fuzzes out like an old VHS tape to exaggerate the time skip.
These glitches, which also send things topsy-turvy or completely blur out the field of vision, intensify during creepier situations, like possessions. The scariest moments come at the expense of the player — I won't spoil them here, but there are instances that recognize your own involvement with the game in some surprising, bizarre ways.
Ishowu instant advanced 1 3 14. Civilization: beyond earth 1 1 4. Employing the game's strongest quality, its look, to create these effects is perhaps Oxenfree's most important asset. Its accompanying storyline, just doesn't quite match up. You can breeze through it at an almost astonishing pace; on my second time through, I was able to reach an ending in just under three hours. That doesn't afford much time for the story to properly unfold or to really get to know the characters.
I say 'an ending' because there are several conclusions you can land upon. Despite the leeway given to shape Alex's responses, the repetitive plot points and short runtime robbed my ending of some of its effect. I tried my hardest to choose different paths the second time around, and my adventure ended up similar, with just a few notable differences.
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Dialogue balloons suggest three deviating plotlines based on their color, and Alex's friends will sometimes react to something you or another person says with a thought bubble bearing someone's face on it. The meaning of those thought bubbles is never made overtly apparent. Did they like how Alex answered? Did it upset them? Because the story follows the same general beats, it sometimes feels like these labored decisions are ultimately irrelevant.
Though the events leading up to them don't change too much, the endings offered do vary to a fair degree. It's just that when you land upon them, they're wrapped up fairly quickly. Even scoring a 'good' ending didn't feel satisfying. For a game that seems to want to give the player so much agency, I regularly felt powerless, unable to alter my own course.
Wrap Up:
Oxenfree doesn't live up to its potential, but has a story worth telling
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Oxenfree exhibits a lot of potential that it doesn't always live up to. Its length is disappointing, and it seems to favor quantity over quality when it comes to the all-important speech bubbles. And that art style and character design is held at a distance; the camera is so zoomed out that the (very limited) overworld never quite feels like home.
But somehow, I'm still fascinated by all of the possibilities afforded by the swath of talking points and conclusions to uncover, however minute the changes are. As is, this coming-of-age tale is one worth telling. It just doesn't quite match the heights of its influences.
Oxenfree was reviewed using a pre-release Steam key provided by Night School Studio. You can find additional information about Polygon's ethics policy here.
About Polygon's Reviews7.0 Win
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A gripping and genuinely scary ghost story wrapped up in an indie styled shell, while at the same time marking an impressive debut for Night School Entertainment. It’s Oxenfree.
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A supernatural thriller of a puzzle game set on an abandoned military island where Alex and her friends, along with new stepbrother Jonas, plan to hold an overnight party while she also attempts to deal with the fallout from her brother’s death. Things however soon take a turn for the worst when the friends accidentally open a portal to the spirit world as the group soon find themselves forced to confront ghosts from the islands past while trying to make it through the night.
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The game meanwhile sees you guiding Alex around the island as she attempt solve the mystery of the ghostly apparitions which continue to plague her and her friends, this is very much a dialogue and puzzle driven game which is more about building tension and a sense of creeping dread than it is about big action sequences. Players are able to control Alex’s dialogue options by selecting one of the colour coded speech bubbles which appear above her head. At the same time she also carries with her a radio which can not only be tuned into nearby spirits but also be used to pick up old radio broadcasts and even snippits of information relating to the buildings and locations on the island as well as providing clues to secrets hidden in the varies locations which Alex discovers on her journey across the island.
Developed and published by Night School Entertainment, a studio made up of former “Disney” and “Telltale Games” alumni with Oxenfree being scripted by Adam Hines who previously worked as the head writer for “Tales From The Borderland” its unsurprising that this game very much has the same feel as the “Telltale Games” especially with your choices once more effecting the outcome of the game as well as more keyly the relationship which Alex has with the various group members.The link to Telltale can also be found in the fantastic voice cast which includes Erin Yvette (The Wolf Amongst Us / Tales From The Borderlands) and Gavin Hamnon (The Walking Dead / Wolf Amongst Us) which will no doubt be greeted with much delight by the established fan base much like Britanni Johnson who previously voiced Angel in Borderlands 1 + 2.
Using a distinctive artistic styling alongside original art by Heather Gross it makes the game reminiscent of “Scott Pilgrim Versus the World” something only further added to by the sharp dialogue throughout the game which regardless of the path you choose to take it. However when it comes to the dialogue while the speech bubble options are a nice touch over the traditional bottom bar of dialogue options the timing of the dialogue can at times feel that your speaking over characters lines rather than adding to the conversation leaving it coming off more awkward that it should.Interestingly the game can also be played with Alex not saying anything throughout the game as the other characters talk between themselves. Perhaps not the most engaging gaming experience if you choose to go this route but it will however earn you an achievement point / trophy.
However, when it comes to the dialogue nothing is hinted at for the player, with many of the puzzles throughout the game requiring players to remember pieces of information they have gathered from each area. At the same time it’s a game which avoids going for an info dump ending instead slowly revealing the truth behind the island though snippets of information making it all the more important for the player to be constantly mindful of what any of the characters are saying as is especially true during some of the flashback scenes which enable Alex to potentially change her future depending on the player manipulating the conversation to avoid future events happening.
Still despite the pastel colour scheme and cartoonish character design under the surface this game certainly hides a much darker side, with Adam Hines crafting here a truly effective ghost story, with the game constantly able to create a creeping sense of dread and some genuinely unnerving moments throughout its runtime bringing back nostalgic memories of the early “Silent Hill” and “Resident Evil” games and all without spilling a single drop of pixilated blood. Amongst these standout moments are the scenes in which Alex is required to play games such as hangman to free one of her possessed friends while a game of hide and seek is possibly one of the more tense gaming moments of late.
While the game gives the indication of having multiple endings there really are only two and even then its more outcomes for characters than any real major difference between the two, though that being said the game does end on a rather delightful twist which for a change doesn’t feel like a crutch for the plot, like so many games / films of late. Unquestionably one of the more original titles both in terms ofand an exciting debut for “Night School Entertainment” who truly mark themselves out as a studio to watch with this title which is well worth checking out.