Tessa's Ark: Chapter 1

[got_quiet]

Name: Tessa's Ark: Chapter 1
Status: Complete ????
Site: https://neutron-dust.itch.io/tessas-ark-early-access
Pairing: Gen
Description: An annoying math game



It is primarily a puzzle game in which you need to take a set of given numbers and use them to create an equation that provides the desired result. The game's sale page says that there are multiple endings, but from the wording, and from what I've played of the game, I get the feeling that these endings are decided by a single binary choice sometime at the end, and I don't know if that choice even gets to be made in a game that is titled "Chapter 1." The reason that I am speculating is because I didn't end up finishing this game. 

 

The criteria I gave myself when starting this little venture was that when the game is not really based on VN mechanics and goes for something else I have the right to jump ship. But when I started I was hopeful. I like puzzle games, and I'm not super against math games, but what I don't really like are memory games, and this sort of unintentionally became a memory game, albeit a very easy one for most other people and one that I probably could have overcome had I been willing to do so at 11PM at night (I wasn't).

Backing up, the premise of this game is that you are a person, or a digital memory of a person, you don't really know, and you're being prompted to execute certain actions within a computer system. There is a lot of language about what exactly you are doing that may have been coherent to others but read to me something like "You need to encroach the mainframe with the appropriate oscillation algorithm in tandem with your pass code to gain entry to the mainframe's second level security pathways!" OK, I thought, I will try doing that! In order to do that, you need to solve number puzzles. You're given a starting number, and ending number, and a cluster of integers. By manipulating the integers to add, subtract, multiply, and divide your starting number you can get to the target. I've played similar puzzles on paper, where you're given a row of numbers and just insert the operators, but this thing over complicates things.

In order to know what buttons do what, you need to memorize the colors that indicate the math operations. But then, on top of that, there are tri-part light objects that you can rotate to create new colors that create different operations. So you need to remember what color does what, what colors combine to make which other colors which do which other things, and then you need to determine which numbers to activate in which way.

The first part I could kind of get but once color mixing raised its head I was like... I don't wanna. In addition to this, you can't just mess around with the puzzle to try to brute force anything, as there is an overly complicated health system in which certain actions cost health which can be rejuvenated somehow... and... this is a lot of complexity for what is ultimately a simple puzzle.

But even then, I probably would have tried a little harder to keep going with this game, except it's also buggy!

The very first tutorial segment, you are given an example puzzle and told that your starting value is 5, when on the screen I was clearly looking at an 8. There were a few moments when I hit a number expecting one result and got another, and honestly couldn't tell if I had lost the ability to add, if the button did something other than what I thought it did, or if the puzzle itself was just fucked. At one point, I had gotten the demanded final value, and the puzzle wasn't unlocked, and simply by turning one element of and on again suddenly the puzzle was unlocked, even though it was in the exact same state it had been before. This, plus a weird interface and other small technical issues are the reason I decided the game wasn't worth playing.


 

Notwithstanding the technical problems, the design of the game is kind of funky. The art is instantly recognizable as traced women, possibly from some sort of uh, sexy source, that have been heavily painted over and sort of abstracted with neon. There's something retro and comfortingly familiar about this approach, but I would not call it good. The story, such that I could get, was also familiar, in a matrix-like what is reality sort of way, and also felt like it came out of the early 2000s, which is not really a condemnation.

 

Given the nature of the gameplay, I think my difficulties with execution was a serious problem. I'm sorry about that too, because from the previews I thought this might be a fun and slightly more challenging game. I can't recommend Tessa's Ark on the basis of the bugginess, mostly, but I feel like maybe if you really like math puzzles, and you are very confident in your calculating, you'll be able to work around them if you really, really want to.

---

It seems that someone else is doing a similar project to me, and reviewing all of the BLM Bundle games (rather than just the VNs) Their series is called Scratching that Itch and here is their review for this game. It also notes that a big hurdle is just remembering what color does what, so I feel somewhat vindicated in my frustration.