Burly Men at Sea

The Credits Rolled Before I Could Even Understand What the Game Was About

I don’t mind short games or ones with limited interactivity, but this particular game takes that formula a bit too far. The act of interacting with it felt almost meaningless, and I couldn’t help but feel disconnected from what was happening.

While I do appreciate the simplicity of the art style, some scenes—like the one with the island and the giant—are so convoluted that it's hard to discern what's going on. The game also features three characters, but it doesn’t really matter because they’re essentially just one asset. There’s nothing about them that stands out, and none of them have enough depth to justify their presence in the game. Why bother creating three characters if none of them are developed enough to make a difference?

The only redeeming quality I can give the game is that some of its sound effects are actually funny, but that’s where the positives end. Ultimately, I’d advise you to avoid this game. It’s a waste of time, and I’m sure you can find something far more creative and enjoyable to do with just 30 minutes of your life.

Such a pretty game, but also very boring. I'm not a fan of repeating things multiple times, and this game started to feel grindy even though it is a very short game. The idea is there and I liked the characters the burly men met. I just wish there had been less branching and more story for each branch. Now it was 3 clearly different main branches which then each branched to a 2 different sub-branches, and then these sub-branches branched again to two different endings. So there were a total of 12 different endings. The further you got, the less new content (changes in scenes, different dialogue) there was.

I feel a bit mixed about this game, because there wasn't anything major wrong with it. No issues, looks nice, nice idea and the story is there, albeit it is very very very short and keeps repeating way too much. If I'm being honest, I wouldn't recommend this game for a full price. If you enjoy a nice looking game and maybe play each ending with a week between each playthrough so you have time to forget the (super short) story and how repetitive the game actually is, I guess it's worth a try.

Is it a bad game? Nooooo?
Does this game make way more sense when you find out it was originally a mobile game? Yes.

A nice little game telling 12 small stories of adventurous journeys, taking path between three routes, each of which will make you choose between two choices, leading to another pair of last choices until you loop back to the beginning, ready to take on another of those 12 stories. :P

The stories are short and the actions simple, but sometimes you'll have to wait a bit as the characters transition from a scene to the next one, but it's not a problem unless you wanted to hurry through the game in a speedrun mindset. XD These stories are clearly meant to be experienced in a more chill way anyways. :3

Graphics are minimalistic, with a clean simple artstyle and it works for this game. There are also cool smooth animations as the stories unfold and we are being taken from one scene to another.

The soundtrack is simple and calm too, comprising mostly of ukulele music with some electronic sounds here and there, and often accompanied with non-verbal singing of voices too. Many sound effects in this game are made a cappella style too, which makes for fun sounds as you interact with your environment! :D

This game has a strong core idea and certain well-executed parts. You can tell where work and heart went into it - the music, for example, has this kind of a capella, homemade sound that makes me think it took time and passion to create. As a game, though, it's lacking in some ways that turned me off from it.

The controls for PC are irritating. They don't break the game or anything, but at no point do they feel good, and at times for me they didn't work without trying a couple of times. The little stories that are told in each route are cute, but they're made of compartmentalized parts, meaning you'll have to replay the exact same first three parts you've already played just to see a fourth part that's different. There's no way to make that process easier, like skipping dialogue or anything, so you'll have to just sit through the same 3/4 of each story a few times. They're really not interesting enough to warrant that. There's an achievement tied to each unique route ending.

The final achievement in this game (get all other achievements) didn't pop for me. They did a weird thing where achievements don't pop at all until you close the game - I saw the dev say somewhere that the choice was made so the achievements wouldn't interrupt the art of the game or something like that, which I thought was kind of pretentious. It makes achievement hunting a frustrating process because you need to keep closing your game to make sure they're actually triggering. Some of them took a few tries to pop for me, despite doing the routes correctly. Several other people have had the same problem with the final achievement not triggering and have posted on the discussion board about it with no response. I still haven't figured out how to make it pop, and that's a huge con for me in a game.

If you're really interested in this game, buy it on mobile. It's cheaper there by 50%, despite being the exact same game.