One of the major complaints among the gaming community is a lack of variety and creativity and design. Companies that are now well established have learned the formula for selling specific genres of games. Shooters are the most often accused of these, as Call of Duty is often used as the prime example of cash grabbing and lazy game making. The fact is that every genre is guilty of this and every genre has been guilty of this since gaming began. The fact is people remember the good ones and forget the mountains of poor quality they encounter. Monster Loves You is a text based adventure game recently released for Steam, IOS, and Android, and will provide many gamers with a truly memorable and creative experience. The reason this game cannot be called an imitator is that there hasn’t really been anything like it in recent memory.
Monster Loves You is most like a pen and paper role playing game or an old text based role playing game. The players starts off as a morsel, an infant monster, in a spawning vat located in Village of Omens. The Monsters dwell within a forest called Waelmist, the only haven monsters have from their age old enemies, the humans. The player’s job is to make choices for the monster as it grows from a morsel to an elder of the monster community. The early choices present a very simple introduction to the game’s mechanics, the choices get far more complex as the monster ages so it does take a significant amount of thought in later parts of the story. There are five attributes that the monster can gain: Kindness, Ferocity, Cleverness, Honesty, and Bravery; there is also a respect meter that will determine if you are fit to lead your brethren to a decent future.
It is difficult to go into the intricacies without revealing parts of the story which would ruin the experience, but the game does have a few surprises to throw at you because it is hard to be sure that even performing actions with good intent won’t make things worse. What truly separates this game from other games that implement such choices is that there is no universally accepted method among the characters, being kind can actually have serious repercussions in certain situations. The game also has an excellent amount of content for how small and simple it is. There are fourteen different endings ranging from heartwarming to apocalyptic with some utter ridiculousness here and there as well. The real challenge that this game faces is what it asks of the player, that is, to play pretend. This game requires using one’s imagination which can be a tough sell for some players given the lean toward increasingly powerful graphics; it can be very hard to compete with such sensory stimulation, so it won’t be for every type of gamer.
Anyone who likes visual novels, text based adventures, and old school pen and paper games will undoubtedly get a kick out of this game. As for players who aren’t into such things, its simple design is a great introduction into this style, so this might just be the game to convert them. Monster Loves You is available on IOS and Android for $2.99 and Steam for 9.99. This may seem like a little much given that it is all text based, but there are movies and books with less content that are even more expensive. This game is worth every penny as the it is apparent that the developers put everything they had into creating a fun adventure. If this still seems like too much to spend, Steam has sales all the time and it would be a great idea to pick it up then. This isn’t the game that will infuse creativity back into the gaming world, but it is a fine effort and a truly memorable experience.
looks fun!
looks cool, not at that price though.