Reviews - Lemm314

I'm glad I got to play this. I had a brief PM exchange with C-Zom five years ago, which ended to the tune of "it's best to not play it until you replace your PC with something that can do more than 25fps on low-med". I'll be surprised if he even remembers that, but he was nice enough to share that exchange with me and answer my questions + concerns. And now here I am on a much newer PC revisiting unfinished business from an earlier stage in my life. Though I think I would have appreciated this more back then, as I've since subscribed to "walking simulator fatigue", like many others.

Right at the start the first thing that struck me was the spooky ambient sounds. And as I continued, the bleak colour scheme, striking use of sun/moon light and stillness in the landscape really did create a powerful and haunting atmosphere. I enjoyed simply letting that embrace me and basking in it, seeing the sights. That felt great.

However the way the story is told and presented is wrong in so many ways for me. The four primary characters being Darien, Jeramiah and Samael from what I can tell. But to me they lack personality and presence, and I found it hard to keep track of who was who. I think the lack of presence is down to the fact a lot of what goes on is in notes or spoken dialogue. Characters rarely have an NPC representing them, and the words "show, don't tell" literally crossed my mind near the end, because I was literally being told about something happening while simply walking forwards.

It also felt wrong to me that, with the kind of atmosphere the environment captured, I should be spending that time looking down at notes. And at other times, looking down from my screen at my phone while I look up the meaning of obscure words. (Seriously, who talks like that? Those notes don't feel like they've been written by real people at all!)

It was an unfulfilling experience in the end when I felt like the actual events were happening somewhere far away from my actions, and like I wasn't actually achieving anything by being here. Still though, I had a pleasant enough experience simply soaking in the atmosphere in the environment for a while. And it's quite telling IMO of what's really important in games when a mod for a ten year old game can do that effectively.

Although somewhat unremarkable and unsurprising, it is quite fun.

The gameplay doesn't bring about anything we haven't seen before. It mostly capitalizes on Half-Life 2's formula, although there's nothing wrong with that.

Level design at the beginning is absolutely fantastic. The ruined walls and lighthouse are architecturally quite rich compared to what we often see, although this standard isn't retained all the way through. Later levels had quite dense vegetation, which brought my humble PC to it's knees.

It meets you with an odd sense of humor towards the end, however. The wheelchair-bound fellow felt comical, and I can't decide in my own mind whether it was insensitive or not. He got a few smirks out of me though, so I might be going to hell!

I'd say it's worth playing, even if only because you like Half-Life 2. This won't surprise you, but it will still prove fun. :)

I'm not even sure what I just played. I have no idea what just happened.

This has proven to be unsubstantial to me. The term 'puzzles' would be used generously here, as there's nothing particularly puzzling in it.

The story is also quite awkwardly presented. You can't assume the player has read the synopsis on here, because they don't in all cases, as strange as that may seem. That was the case for me, as I went on the rating alone. The way it opens right now, it may as well be a drunken dare among kids as far as I could tell.

Overall, I'd say this is a shining example of Crysis modding. It's not the most original idea ever, nor is it executed extremely well. But I like it for what it is, and I do recommend it!

It progresses extremely slowly, yeah. The slow movement controls aren't really an issue though, and I rarely found myself getting bored wandering around. Although, having said that, I did do it with my shift key pressed from beginning to end. Being stuck in place while it reads books out loud was quite annoying though, as was the slow first person cutscenes.

The story... Well... I personally couldn't follow it at all. Even having finished it, I can't make any sense of it. So my own reflection on it can only be the journey from beginning to end, which I do rate positively. TWON does a great job of setting the mood, and invoking a sense of paranoia with the suggestion that you're being stalked every step of the way.

I'll certainly be recommending this one to friends! :)

I used to regard Crysis as being quite a disappointing platform for mods. It's incredibly powerful, and the skies are the limit, but so much winds up just being pseudo-tactical FPS action in expansive tropical environments. You know, basically what vanilla Crysis is. And so I'd give Call of the Fireflies points right off the bat for not resembling Crysis in a single way.

The mod calls back to point and click adventure games, as a lot of the gameplay consists of manipulating the world in little ways to make a way forwards. Operating mechanical devices to extend a bridge and the like. It's all quite clever, and doesn't resort to any bizarre adventure game logic either. It all makes sense.

It sets a fantastic atmosphere aswell, as you spend a long time feeling lost and alone in a world where you really don't belong. There's a great sense of loneliness all the way through, really bringing home the message that you're on your own to deal with the hazards you're faced with.

It's a fantastic mod, and despite being quite mellow, does pull all the right strings in my heart. This is easily one of my all time favorite mods for Crysis. Despite a few bugs, I loved every second. Bravo!

Your means of travelling is pretty poor. One of the main things you'll use is the suit's strength mode, which functions the same as it does in vanilla Crysis, except jumping much, MUCH higher. It feels powerful at first, but it's a nightmare to work with. And even when it does work, it does so with absolutely no sense of flow.

Wedged uncomfortably into the poor gameplay is an incoherent plot. There's plenty of dialogue, but it's mostly provided as subtitles and only subtitles. Often during cutscenes with action going on.

It all falls together to become quite a clumsy chore to play.

A great puzzle game built around a very simple mechanic which opens up limitless possibilities for puzzles. The campaign may be short, but it's certainly not unsubstantial. The ending is satisfying, and there's many interesting puzzles along the way. After that, there's some other challenges for you on the side (finish a challenge as fast as possible, etc.) including some 'advanced' levels to really test your skills and your mind.

Great game, deffinately not one you'll want to miss if you enjoy a good puzzle.