Another Space Odyssey

Stories Untold was the first release by developer "No Code" and while it oozed style, overall, I was very critical of the game.  The ending, in particular, rubbed me the wrong way.  Sadly, their next outing (a game entitled Observation) has largely the same strengths and weaknesses.

Let me dive in with a bit of positivity by saying this game has top-notch presentation.  Everything from the lighting and environments to the UI puzzles and microgravity physics are fantastic.  The sounds effects are spot-on and the music, most noticeably during the intro credit sequence, is great as well.  Where Observation fumbles though is in the storytelling department.

The basic premise of the game is fine.  In fact it had the potential to be an interesting role reversal.  Unlike most of these kinds of sci-fi experiences wherein the protagonist is a human dealing with an artificial intelligence gone mad, Observation flips things by having the AI be the main character while the humans are the ones losing it.  In this game, players take the role of SAM, a "Service, Administration, and Maintenance" AI severely damaged after an accident aboard it assigned space station.  The human crew are also in a bad way, and need the help of SAM to weather the crisis.  Now, here's the first stumbling block.  Rather than having a branching story path of benevolence, malevolence or somewhere inbetween, the player is essentially railroaded by the plot.  Worse still, said narrative has an awful lot in common with the games Event[0] and SOMA in addition to the film "2001: A Space Odyssey."  While it's possible that the two games are getting a homage treatment, the movie references feel a bit too egregious to be shout-outs.  Here's a list of some similarities:

• Gas Giant (Jupiter/Saturn)
• Mysterious Monolith (Hexagon/Sphere/Rectangle)
• HAL/SAM AI Construct
• Star Child / Merged Hybrid
• Gainax Ending

That last bullet point is the real kicker in that despite everything negative I've mentioned thus far, sticking the landing could have been this game's saving grace.  Unfortunately, it's way too ambiguous with far too many questions being left unanswered.  There's also too little information for players to come to their own conclusions.  In my case, I can't really comment on the ending except to say something non-committal like "Uh...okay then."  I think there was some message about global warming and government/corporate obstification, but it was so vague not much (if any) meaning can be extracted from it.  Despite all this, I hope No Code keeps making games.  They obviously have a lot of talent...they just need to work on some of those weak points...