Review - THE LONG REACH - A John Carpenter-inspired horror point and click game!
"Stan, why are you eating your own face?"
"The foggy voices asked me to do so. Now do it too so that we can ascend!"
A new family-friendly game coming to you by Painted Black Games!
| Store | Platform | OVERALL RATING: 67% |
| Buy it on GOG Buy it on Steam |
PC |
+ THE POSITIVE
+ Creepy atmosphere!+ Great haunting sound design! + Nice pixel art! + Intuitive and simple UI!
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THE NEGATIVE
- Extremely confusing storyline - Kinda boring linear narrative experience - Average dialogues - Too short |
| Buy it on Amazon | PS4 | |
| Buy it on Nintendo.com |
Switch |
WHAT IS THIS GAME ABOUT? YOU TELL ME. 🤔
Drawing its inspiration from 2D side-scrolling horror games like Lone Survivor or Claire, the Long Reach is a feel-bad horror adventure game taking place in New Hampshire, in a fictional snowy town called Baervox.(did they spell that right?)
It starts like a love story, continues like a horror one (which is often the case in real life), and ends up in a complete madness which would make John Carpenter himself shivers. (which also happens in real life...)
You'll play several characters(at least, that's what YOU think...) throughout the game, each offering you a different perspective on the story.
Everybody: "alright, alright, but WHAT story? What is it about?".
I... Don't... Know.
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| "Sorry, I don't get anything of what you're talking about". Tell me about it. |
The story is IMMENSELY confusing and even after completing it and getting one of the two endings, you'll be left with no serious explanations whatsoever, which will leave you with a bad taste of unaccomplishment - and blood - in the mouth.
The developer tried too hard to make the game weird and confusing, but weird doesn't necessarily always equals creepy... It's mainly awkward and misleading.
Anyway, all we can tell you is that you'll play a dark character and meet even darker characters, explore a dark laboratory in which some crazy dark scientists do dark experiments on themselves, which lead eventually to some very, very dark events, which are all orchestrated by a very dark conspiracy. Enjoy. 😀
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| Please don't tell me it's going to be a spinoff remake of "two guys, one cup"?🤢 |
This is a highly suggestive game in which most events seem very open to personal interpretation. You'll understand when you play.
Even the developer says it himself: "The Long Reach is a horror-thriller hell bent on screwing with your perception of things."
The funny thing is that EVEN characters themselves refuse to explain what's happening.
Instead, they prefer to talk about personal drama or argue about pseudo-metaphysical issues.
Oh yeah, and sometimes you'll encounter ugly women who say regretting the good old days of communism. Oh wow, this too is like in real life! The game is basically a documentary.
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| Roger: "Oh, I've got one. A Mexican, a Jew, and a colored guy go into a bar. The bartender looks up and says, "Get the fuck out of here." " |
A minor detail, but many characters curse like sailors.
Without the wit and funny puns though.(if you want real sailor talk, go check the old Monkey Island games!)
At f****** Good Morning Gamers, we don't have anything against f****** offensive language, ****!
But this feels forced, exaggerated and unnecessary, and makes the characters look very uneducated.
GAMEPLAY - MODERN-OLD-SCHOOL ADVENTURE 🧐
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| The wildfires in California are getting pretty serious. They're now starting to burn marijuana farms. The fire is being put out by 200 firefighters, and 8000 "volunteers".(Team COCO) |
You'll spend most of your time exploring and trying to interact with every object you can find. The game doesn't hold your hand and you'll have to experiment a lot, which is when you'll realize that many puzzles make no sense at all.
The first puzzle in the game, in which you have to use a broken rubber bone on an elevator button, is a good example of what kind of puzzles you're going to encounter in The Long Reach...
Following the "modern" tradition of horror games, your character is a wimp and can't fight at all, so your only option when you encounter enemies is to run and hide.
The stealth part is relatively minor though, and it usually consists in hiding in some dark and tight areas, which are very few and scattered around the laboratory.
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| *encounters a crazy zombie waving a bloody knife in a dark corridor* You've got two options. #1: go back. #2: go back FAST. |
| TIP ! | |
|---|---|
| If you want to get past an enemy, just lure him somewhere then hide before he sees you. After he walked past your hiding area, just run the opposite way! |
The Long Reach is also a narrative experience, with little freedom left to the player, and you'll have to read long walls of text sometimes.
You can choose different dialogue choices every 5 lines or so, but it doesn't seem to change anything 99% of the time.
The way the text is displayed is quite annoying to say the least, as it's reversed - from the bottom up - and feels unnatural, compared to what we usually get in similar games.
It's surely intentional to make the game looks even more disturbing...AND confusing because it makes the conversations even more difficult to follow.
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| Ooooh I finally get it! It's a game about scientology! No wait... Or is it Raëlism? |
Finally, it's way too short: you'll finish it in 3 hours...
1 hour if you already know it.
GRAPHICS - MEATY PIXELS🥩
Actually quite good, and our favorite part of the game.
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| Worst family vacation ever... |
It's pure pixel art, with some nice effects like fog and some very nicely done atmospheric lighting which contributes to create a constant dark and creepy ambience, despite the apparent simplistic art aesthetic.
Everybody loves glowing lights! 😍
The Long Reach is pretty gory at part, but the pixels make such scenes more "acceptable".
On the other hand, it makes your imagination go wild and you might end up being even more grossed out. This is the "magic" of pixel art!
Have fun captioning that picture below!😄
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| The latest trend in Baervox: redecorating your store with your own entrails. The shop owner:"hey I think it gives a meaty flavor, don't you think?" |
MUSIC & SOUNDS - I NEED SOME NEW PANTS 😱
Quality-wise, it's similar to what you could hear in a good hair-raising horror movie.
Nothing memorable, but it sure works well.
You can hear a sample of the OST in the trailer. =>
If you like it, you can get the OST on GOG.😊
There aren't lots of different tracks, but the game is short, and it might also be a design choice from the developer to make most areas silent and rely on creepy ambient sounds instead.
And the sound design is VERY good.
The feeling of uneasiness reaches its climax when you try to solve a puzzle, while hearing some weird evil voices lurking in the shadows, waiting there as if it was about to attack you. Too bad it doesn't happen often enough.
A few parts even reminded us of the incredibly scary voices in Doom 3. =>
RATING BOX
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VERSION TESTED: v1.0
Publisher:
Developer:
Release Date:
14 March, 2018
1 PLAYER
Difficulty: Easy
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|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| GRAPHICS: 83% | |||||||||
| Professional pixel art with very nice lighting effects, in a deliciously dark world. | |||||||||
| MUSIC: 75% | |||||||||
| As gripping as the scary visuals, it'll shred your nerves every time you hear it. Too bad it's too discreet throughout the game though. |
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| SOUNDS: 90% | |||||||||
| Manages to convey an uneasy feeling and will creep you out more than once! | |||||||||
| GAMEPLAY: 60% | |||||||||
| Suffering of simplistic gameplay mixed with a somewhat linear narrative experience, further marred by a few confusing puzzles. | |||||||||
| GAME LENGTH: 39% | |||||||||
| 3 hours in the best case, and just 1 once you already know the game. | |||||||||
| OVERALL RATING: 67% | |||||||||
| Despite some very good art, The Long Reach is disappointing and never manages to catch our attention, thanks to an extremely confusing storyline, and subpar dialogues. | |||||||||
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