No Longer Home

No Longer Home is an casual indie adventure game designed by two former University students that focuses strongly on their experiences during the final months of their course. Follow Ao and Bo, the semi-autobiographical avatars of the developers, as they muddle their way through the woes of leaving a place that was once their home and finding their new place in a greater world. Get ready to get into a full existential crisis and let’s jump in.

Story

You know a game is going to hit you in the feels one way or another when it gets awards before it even gets released. The story is semi-autobiographical, meaning it loosely follows the experiences of the developers. The reason it’s not full biographical is likely to leave a large space for artistic expression.

It’s through this lens that things will be shown to or experienced by the player that do not fully conform to natural reality, feelings shown as strange beasts, time and space losing meaning, a slipping grasp on reality in general. All methods of conveying an idea in a more interesting way than just being told about it. It displays a similar atmosphere to Night in the Woods, with its use of suggestive metaphysical concepts and such.

With the gameplay, which is primarily just point and click, the player is asked to traverse the apartments or houses they occupy to discover more about the world state or the characters state of mind. A significant amount of reading is required, that much is clear.

Art Direction

The art Direction has a unique blend of minimalist and detailed. The characters have no real countenance but the world itself seems to be quite detailed. The way the characters move reminds me of The Gardens Between, where everything is smooth and rubbery but it all still has an interesting and clear weight to it.

Seemingly focusing on a blue/darker colour palette, the art style evokes feelings of sadness, melancholy or loneliness, themes discussed by the developers. It’s likely that the game will focus on these feelings for its majority, perhaps with a lighter ending or perhaps with something darker.

It appears as though the different sections of the game maps are presented to the player as though they are sets of a play. It will be interesting to see

Sound Direction

The developers have admitted that “sound is half the game” and thus reluctant quite heavily on the sound, or lack thereof, to convey ideas, concepts and emotions.

The music can be quiet and ambient in one scene to vacant and silent in the other. The sound will clearly play a huge part in conveying the ideas of loneliness and fear that the game appears to capitalise on.

Pros:

• Charming and evocative visuals
• Relatable story

Cons:

• Has potential to be very boring and slow