Thomas Was Alone

Game Title: Thomas Was Alone
Released: Nov 12, 2012
Game Length: 4 Hours
Grade: C

Expectations: I've played quite a few minimalist games in my day and I don't see how this game could be priced at $10. Either there is a lot of stages or there better be some sort of twist the developers aren't telling you half-way through. I don't usually play these type of games unless they're thrown in some sort of humble bundle or given out at a very deep discount. The whole game is 56MB. Do you know how tiny that is?

Reality: There certainly is a lot of stages - 9 chapters with 10 levels each. However, I found the game rather boring. Although the game does have a slight amount of puzzles to solve, the majority of the time will be spent finding ways to jump across multiple platforms. So what is left to admire? The voice-over and "speech" for the rectangles was a nice addition. It definitely brought life and personality to the game. For what I thought would be a completely polished game, there were certainly a lot of technical glitches and odd-ball creative issues. Adding Chiptune behind the piano music wasn't the best of decisions. There were some hiccups where my blocks "hung" off motionless walls. The menu select screen has this weird delay between choosing your options and for some reason doesn't allow me to backtrack to the main menu by hitting the Escape button. Forcing the text to wrap around the edge of the screen was incredibly jarring. I would have forgiven the game for all these trivial problems if it wasn't for how the story unfolded, not to mention the non-existent "ending" once you finally reach the portal. I'd say play it if you have it. Otherwise I'd give this game a pass.

 

12-1-2020