2435: Memories: Read

I finished Read Only Memories earlier. I liked it a lot! I posted a review on Steam, but I thought I'd post it here too because I'm feeling lazy.

Read Only Memories is an adventure game in the '90s mould, seeming to draw specific inspiration from titles like Snatcher and Rise of the Dragon, and set in the same world as the (later, and wonderful) VA-11 HALL-A.

On the whole, it's a great experience. The pixel art aesthetic really works for the game and has clearly been designed by people who know what good pixel art looks like. Everything about the interface, including the font, is well-designed to look like a retro adventure game, and the FM-synthesis soundtrack complements it nicely.

Puzzles are relatively thin on the ground but in a couple of cases are more interesting than "use the thing on the thing", which is worthy of note, though the final puzzle in the game seems to play by some inconsistent rules that can lead to failure seemingly by no fault of your own.

The story is well-written and filled with interesting characters, plus deserves note for having a number of possible solutions to various situations, though not all will lead to the "best" ending. The game encourages you to consider the consequences of your actions and the things that you choose to say, even though those consequences may not become apparent until much later. I very much liked that your behaviour over the course of the whole game affected some later events rather than choices having an immediate impact on what was going on.

The overall plot is one of tolerance and understanding, and strikes a good balance between casting the player (whom you can name and gender as you desire, since you never see them) as an "everyman" sort of character prone to putting their foot in their mouth when confronted by groups they don't quite understand, and presenting a solid message about acceptance, learning to trust one another and personal growth.

The only real criticism I'd level at the game is that its handling of gay and transgender characters feels a little ham-fisted, with their presence and the "reveals" of their identity seemingly being calculated to go "SURPRISE!" rather than simply blending them into the setting. Big burly, manly bartender dude? SURPRISE! Next time you meet him, he has another big hairy dude all over him calling him "hon" at every opportunity (though that said, I couldn't help but like Gus). Meet an eccentric, long-haired, bearded TV producer? SURPRISE! They're a lady! That and the presence of a non gender-specific character demonstrates just how awkward using singular "they" as a pronoun is in dialogue.

Ultimately it doesn't hurt the overall plot at all, but these instances stick out like sore thumbs when they happen as they just don't quite feel like they're in keeping with the tone: the implication elsewhere in the plot is that society has moved beyond discrimination by gender and sexuality, and instead onto discrimination against those who are "augmented" in some way, either through cybernetics or genetic hybridisation. To specifically draw attention to gay and transgender characters in this way as the game does feels counter to this implication, which is otherwise well handled.

This game's spiritual successor VA-11 HALL-A handles gay characters much more elegantly by them simply… just being there, no big deal, no big fuss about who they are, no sense that the game is holding you down and urging you to admire how progressive its views are.

I played this game before the big update that adds voice acting, and if you're interested in this game, I'd encourage you to do the same. The few parts of the game that do already have voice acting (just the intro and epilogue at present) are immensely jarring with the rest of the game's presentation, and the delightful beepityboopityboop noise that dialogue makes throughout the rest of the game is a much more powerful stimulus to the imagination than a voice actor whose interpretation of the character may not match the one you have in your head after reading the text.

Overall, Read Only Memories is a game I give a solid thumbs up. The issues I mentioned above are minor in the grand scheme of things, but hopefully the team will learn from them — and from the things VA-11 HALL-A did better, despite being produced by a different team — and produce even greater works in the future.