Video version
Text version
A premium game shortlisted for the "China Star Project"
"Long Dream of The Night" is an escape puzzle adventure game developed by the domestic team Magic Fish Studio. It is worth mentioning that this game was shortlisted for Sony's "China Star Program".
The Star of China Program (CHPJ) is a program that supports wholly Chinese-funded game developers, mainly start-ups, to china and the global market through the PlayStation platform, committed to "creating successful game works worldwide" and "nurturing and developing China's game industry". The "Shadow Torch City", "Era: Mutation", and "Suzuran Project" that we are familiar with are all shortlisted.
"Long Dreams in the Dark Night" has been researched and developed since 2018, and was officially selected as the second phase of the PlayStation China Star Program in 2019, and now it is finally time to meet with you. Thanks to domestic publisher Astrolabe Games for providing an early version of the game.
Experience a heart-wrenching past
The background of the game is the story of helping the little boy Bill overcome his nightmares. Bill originally had a warm family, but as time passed, somehow, the parents who had loved each other began to argue every day. The anger between the parents also gradually spread to Bill, and the embrace and love disappeared, replaced by blame and indifference.
The long-term repression of life caused serious damage to Bill's soul. Bill began to become autistic, irritable, and even felt that his parents quarreled because of himself, and began to constantly deny himself. But this is only the beginning of the nightmare.
The divorce of his parents, school transfers, school bullying, and the bullying of his stepmother caused Bill to become more and more resistant to the outside world, and the psychologist even diagnosed That Bill's brain voluntarily gave up control of the body, suffered from major depression, and was difficult to recover.
And Bill's heart, too, is trapped in a deep nightmare, repeatedly facing things that bring harm. In order to help him get rid of painful memories, we need to face the past with Bill, solve puzzles, and eliminate fear.
After the whole game experience, it can be said that the depiction of the story is very emotional, and the shaping of the characters in the game is also very full. Her mother was harsh and often beat Bill harshly. His father was an unsuccessful painter who held several exhibitions but no one cared, and frustration and financial pressure became the trigger for a quarrel.
After the transfer, the classmates were not friendly to this transfer student, and bullying on campus had become a common thing, and even asked the teacher to transfer him away on the grounds of Bill's poor grades. The teacher, who should have loved his students, also had prejudices against Bill, leaving Him with nowhere to live.
As the level progresses, we can collect letters, documents, and replays to immerse ourselves in Bill's inner change. This step-by-step unfolding made me feel very sad about What happened to Bill, and I was even more determined to help Bill.
And this determination has also become the motivation for me to play. It was already 1 o'clock in the evening for a few nights, and although I was already sleepy, I still insisted on finishing this chapter looking at Bill who was still trapped in the level.
It was as if I was not just playing a game, but also helping a child, and only by letting him escape from the dream could I sleep peacefully.
To my surprise, the game actually designed multiple endings. Different collection progressions will trigger different endings, and also provide feasibility for the multi-week program of the game. Through the plot tree, we can see that the production team should pay considerable attention to the design of the plot, which can be said to be comparable to some excellent AVG games.
Game core: Puzzle solving
The game uses a 2.5D God perspective, and the operation is relatively simple, moving, jumping and interacting. However, I think the God perspective will reduce the horror atmosphere, but it is more convenient to explore. The game also adds a small assistant: the Butterfly Genie. Butterfly elves can move alone away from their characters and can be used to explore the way through walls, but the distance is limited.
Elves themselves have two abilities: dreams and consciousness. Golden dream energy can detect enemy locations, and some items also require golden light to obtain. The blue consciousness energy is used to discover footprint guides and hidden channels, which is the way to obtain important collections.
The game's puzzle design can be described as diverse, from simple stepping traps, puzzles, item collection, to advanced maze arrays.
Although each level has the same type of puzzles, the puzzle solving ideas are very different. For example, in the maze of two levels of school and circus, one of the puzzle solving ideas is to choose the direction of opening the door through the flame on the desk, and the other is to observe the colored lights at the door.
And the game's tips are also just right. Some important information is perfectly integrated into the current environment.
Take the circus lantern above, I walked around the maze for almost ten minutes, and when I looked back and saw the hint of the lantern, I suddenly realized that this lamp was the key point.
This clever design can avoid the game puzzle being too difficult and annoying the player, and at the same time, it is not too obvious to make the puzzle boring. Here is a revolving door maze, where you can leave a solution in the comments section.
Although it is a flat view of God, the design of the map is three-dimensional. Many of the game's scenes have basements and climbable ventilation ducts, adding explorable areas to the game and solving puzzles.
In order to fit the concept of dreams, the game also has a scene change mechanism, such as when you trigger a trap, the scene behind you will become a different scene.
Less scary horror game
In fact, after I played the first chapter, I began to get used to the horrible sound effects, and there was no wave in my heart in the later stages. Because those musical effects are short and repetitive materials, listening habits are naturally immune.
In addition to auditory reasons, the visual monotony also leads to less terrifying gameplay. The only thing that changes after encountering an enemy is that the picture turns red, and then the picture is accompanied by an eerie distortion. There is no jump scare, and after being caught, there is no scene full of impact.
The image of the monster is also very simple, and the sense of terror is only reflected in the distribution of the cape. And the big-eyed monster without hair makes people feel like a camera, not a ghost.
And the mechanics of the monsters in the game that can't run the character feel a bit wrong. Even if we are discovered, we only need to run with all our strength, and we cannot be caught. According to the common sense of such games, once discovered, it should be impossible to escape except to hide in a hidden place. This also led to the game's design of the hiding closet, completely useless, detour sneak play, but also become a marathon.
However, the age rating of the game is 12+, and the production team may have made concessions in terms of horror in order to allow more younger players to experience it.
Satisfy your collecting fetish
The game has a growth system that allows players to level up by going to an altar hidden in a corner. You can upgrade the duration and flight distance of the sprites. You can also increase your stamina by capturing elven deer.
There are also props for unlocking off-site facilities, such as lighthouse shards, thousand paper cranes, puppet parts, and more. Of course, these can only be regarded as small fights, and the game's collection system is directly related to the direction of the plot, which is the above mentioned multi-ending.
The level is littered with plot-related document items, and although it is said that not looking for them is not an obstacle to the level, players can learn about Bill's past from those items, and can personally experience the true source of Bill's inner fear. The heart-wrenching plot enhances the game's play lifespan.
Some painless and itchy spit
Some game levels are designed to run for too long distances, obviously a road without any events and items, but it takes a long time to run, which affects the continuous experience of the game.
Cutscenes can't be skipped and fast-forwarded, and every time death comes back, you need to watch it again, which is a bit helpless.
When squatting, there is no interaction, and the angle of interaction is relatively small. For games with a large amount of interaction, the player's actions should be automatically optimized. For example, standing next to the mechanism, even if the angle is wrong, it should be able to automatically adjust the position, rather than asking the player to tediously adjust the position.
It's full of sincerity and worth a try
Although the game has some minor drawbacks, and the graphics are not beautifully built, I don't think these are the most critical places. The production team mainly focuses on the plot and puzzle solving, which is indeed a wise choice, and having excellent playable content is the core direction of game production.
The intention of the game also allows players to be more exposed to the topic of adolescent depression, which has attracted the attention of society.
According to the research data of the mainland's 2020 Mental Health Blue Book "China National Mental Health Development Report (2019-2020)", 24.6% of adolescents are depressed, of which the proportion of severe depression is 7.4%. That is, one in 5 teenagers may have depression.
Nowadays, teenagers are under greater academic pressure, and today's society does not pay enough attention to mental health, and there are certainly many people who still experience Bill's nightmares in reality.
Only deep experience can feel the pain, and "Long Dream in the Dark Night" gives us a very good way.
This article is written by StarGame Connoisseur Summer