Wireframe 2019

wfmag.cc \ 63

Review

Rated

Review

Does Professor Layton dream of electric rats?

t was after I’d been trapped in two

rooms of a flat for an hour, unable to

go anywhere else until I’d found the

one or two remaining clues at the

murder scene, that Tales of the Neon

Sea revealed to me how much of an arse it was

being. The vast majority of clues and interactive

elements in the game are highlighted as such

when you walk past them. I was used to this, so

was looking for an interaction prompt I might

have missed. Naturally, the clue I was looking

for wasn’t highlighted, so

it was blind chance (and

button mashing) that helped

me progress, not superstar

cybernetic detective abilities.

Tales of the Neon Sea looks

superb, and sounds even better, but after a short

amount of time, this not-quite point-and-click

detective/adventure game has shown you all

it has. There’s traipsing around (lovely-looking)

areas, with a lot of ferrying back and forth. There’s

a lot of interacting with clearly highlighted things,

and a small amount of trying to find the stuff

that isn’t highlighted. And there are puzzles, for

some reason. Puzzles that make no sense in the

game world, even when there’s an accompanying

explanation as to why they’re there, and puzzles

that – while sometimes fun – do little more than

act as roadblocks to your inevitable progress.

Some roadblocks are bigger than others,

thanks to a combination of the puzzles

themselves being occasionally challenging

and saddled with explanations that have been

poorly translated. I won’t nitpick the translation

elsewhere – Neon Sea is a game made by a small

Chinese team, you’d be daft to expect perfection

• but when the instructions to a minigame, one
  you have to complete in order to progress, are
  muddled at best, it does impact things negatively.
  Having to wrestle with the actual point of a
  puzzle before even starting to try and solve it in
  earnest is not what you’d call fun.
  And, on reflection, I think that feeling carries
  throughout Neon Sea. It’s not a lot of fun.
  It’s busywork, a lot of back and forth to grab item
  A and take it to place B, before
  solving a lockpick/Pipe Dream/
  line-drawing puzzle, then
  taking item C to place D and
  so on and so forth for about
  ten hours. Or 20 if you get
  stuck on a puzzle’s instructions and the lack of
  highlighted interactive elements. It’s a muddled
  experience, not quite being an adventure game
  in the point-and-click sense, nowhere near
  simple enough to be a casual visual novel-alike


• it just comes across as unfocused, not really
  knowing its own identity.
  Tales of the Neon Sea, as you can tell, is
  gorgeous. Its soundtrack is fantastic. The
  cyberpunk-lite setting is generally well thought-
  out and coherent. There’s a lot you’ll want to love
  about the game, especially the cheeky sense of
  humour and sections where you take control of
  a feline sidekick and see the secret world of the
  cats in all its glory. But looking at the package
  as a whole, it’s just a bit of an ill-defined, vague
  experience. It’ll stick with you in some ways, but
  otherwise, this is sadly a forgettable one.

Tales of the Neon Sea

I

VERDICT

Gorgeous and atmospheric

it might be, but Neon Sea

flounders where it counts.

53 %

GENRE

Detective/cat

simulator

FORMAT

PC (tested) /

Consoles later

in 2019

DEVELOPER

Palm Pioneer

PUBLISHER

Zodiac Interactive

PRICE

£13.49

RELEASE

Out now

Info

Review

Rated

REVIEWED BY

Ian Dransfield

“It’s not a lot of fun.

It’s busywork, a lot of

back and forth”

HIGHLIGHT

Neon Sea’s musical score is

fantastic, though its loops

are a bit on the short side

and can become an irritation

when you’re stuck on a puzzle.

Nonetheless, the lo-fi, synth-

laden soundtrack is a fabulous

accompaniment to your time

in the game, and easily one of

its strongest elements.

 It’s gorgeous both in motion and

when static, with moody neon

lighting littering most of the game.