Oxenfree Review (PC)

  Oh, boy... another one of “those” games... The kind where you know the protagonist has gone through some emotional trauma because she dyed her hair blue. The kind where, despite seeing your friends possessed and committing suicide a scant few minutes ago, there's always time to stop and take a group selfie and banter about mundane teenage problems. If this is the new age of video game entertainment, where we fully embrace the self-imposed inferiority complex when stacked against other mediums that are better suited to telling nuanced long form narratives, why does the writing feel like it was cobbled together from the Dawson's Creek trash bin? Is the lateral move from a fourteen year old male demographic to a fourteen year old female demographic (who aren't capable of playing traditional games) really a sign of progress? Why do these teenagers talk like they're thirty, but don't understand simple concepts like what constitutes a stepbrother? Why do they start the game as stereotypical Diablo Cody characters, survive what would be a life-changing night for anyone... and end the game as stereotypical Diablo Cody rejects? Sigh...

  To be fully honest: I'm not the intended audience for Oxenfree. I heard a few rumblings about a new horror game where it was best to go in as fresh as possible to get the most out of it, so I took the bait and bought it on blind faith. That was a bad move. Immediately I began to have PTSD episodes of Gone Home, where it became clear this game was made for entry level, angsty preteens and creepy, middle aged academic critics who questionably identify with them. To be clear: I'm not against “casual” games, or narrative focused games, or even coming of age stories, nor do I want to take anything away from anyone who enjoys them... but if that's your thing... demand more than what Oxenfree has to offer.

  You play as Alex, a high school girl full of spunk and 'tude, always with a dry quip at the ready. Starting the game on a ship headed to a remote island, you're accompanied by your step brother. Here you can learn the simple controls for moving around and interacting with the environment, as well as how to use the simple but utterly broken dialogue system. When you engage in conversation you'll be given three options to choose from (not unlike a Telltale game), or you can choose not to say anything at all most of the time (also not unlike a Telltale game). The twist here is you don't have much time at all to choose, and your interjections abruptly cut off other characters. I can see what they were going for here: more naturally flowing conversation where lines can be talked over and halted, but the execution fails hard. The cuts are janky and jumbled, and while you're given more freedom to walk around and explore while exposition is happening the dialogue is so long winded you often end up standing around waiting for people to just shut the fuck up anyway. Or you move on and cut them off. I had scenarios where two characters were projecting over a loud speaker, I was tuning into a radio station, another on-screen character was trying to have a conversation with me, and I was cutting him off with my chosen dialogue all at the same time. The voice acting is quite good, but the corny writing and broken mechanics completely undercut the performances. It's a mess and it sucks.

  Once you arrive at the island you meet up with your friends: The Geek, The Bitch, and maybe a couple others I've already forgotten about. You go into a cave and are introduced to another core mini-game: fiddling with a radio to find a frequency to attune some sky triangles. Because there's ghosts on the island. And these ghosts will attempt to possess your friends unless you fight back with your radio or solve simple trivia and navigation puzzles. And that's pretty much the game: walk around the island, use your radio, have flashbacks about your dead brother... credits. Some of the visual effects caused by the poltergeists are kind of effective as they distort the screen and cause time loops, but they feel like they're pulled from another, better game. It doesn't matter what these kids go through, they'll always fall back on the mundane “who likes who” conversation that at least seems to be the focus of the story. There's some hint at incestuous intent between Alex and her stepbrother, but she has time that night to play matchmaker between The Geek and the other girl...

  I quite liked the hand painted backgrounds of Oxenfree. They stand in sharp contrast to the PS2-looking, low polygon character models that frequently clip through each other. There can be a problem with scale and navigation caused by the art, as some paths aren't clear and you can often outrun the camera. The game probably wouldn't be pushing any limits on a phone, but overall it's pleasant to look at. You will be referring to your map quite often, however, and that suffers from the same problems with scale and determining pathways. Scattered around the island are some collectibles in the form of small piles of rocks, and these can be unnecessarily difficult to spot: they're tiny and often almost indistinguishable from the background, or they're off-camera...

  The clashing art style is exemplary of the game itself. Oxenfree feels like a handful of disparate ideas thrown against a wall, and they don't mesh particularly well together. Some of the horror elements are kind of cool, but they're completely destroyed by the pacing necessary to tell a poor teenage melodrama. The relationships of the characters could have been interesting to explore, but the supernatural elements (and their lack of concern about them) along with generally poor development and payoff make the script seem secondary. The exploration of the island could have been satisfying, but it's bogged down with the clunky dialogue... Nothing ever really gels, and none of Oxenfree's parts are very strong on their own merits. I also ran into a couple notable bugs. Once the AI just up and broke on me, leaving my character stuck at a door while her much needed friend just stared at her, causing me to reload a save from ten minutes prior and relive a scene I didn't care about the first time all over again. Another time a female companion's dialogue was replaced with an off-screen male character's voice for a lengthy line. That was actually pretty funny and unfortunately the most entertainment I got out of Oxenfree.