The Grandfather

I knew this game was more art than game play, but even on that level it's not very good in my opinion.
They never fully explain the story, just say the Grandmother never loved him and treats him coldly. Then the Grandfather wakes up as a floating head and needs to find his body. After finding it all he kills himself and is now "free."
This is a TERRIBLE message. He shouldn't blame others for his own misery when, at least in the given situation, he could just leave them. And then the story makes it seem like suicide is good choice here? Suicide is never a good choice, but especially when the misery could simply be avoided, why advocate for such a terrible thing in the ending?

Don't waste your time with this game. If you want a good game that deals with suicide and facing misery, play "Cry Of Fear." It's has fun game play that should last more than half an hour and cost just as much. (Meaning it's also free)

You get to play as a naked old man bunny-hopping through a birth canal (or possibly an umbilical cord) in search of his own body parts.

At least it's something different.

The Grandfather is a game which is hard to review, because of how weird it is.

Story:

You play as an Old Man. You live with your wife, who is a cold and bitter person, that never loved you and the story follows on her coldness towards her husband.

That is the basic gist of the story and it basically follows on the Old Mans feelings and how he deals with the situation. It's definitely some messed up stuff and honestly it was pretty depressing to play, but overall the story was pretty interesting and definitely was worth going through all of it.

Graphics:

Most of the game is hand drawn and I liked the art style, even though it's very rough. Some of it seven gross to look at, especially the main characters. I liked the hand drawn art style a lot, but I felt it suffered in places, especially the environments, which weren't that good, they look much lower quality than the characters.

Audio:

The audio design is flat out the worst part of the game. The voice actor that narrates everything, her acting is decent, but the mixing makes it sound super quiet, where most of the time you can barely understand what she is saying, not to mention everything else is incredibly loud.

The music is not very good and the sound effects mix into are just an awful experience. There's a lot of echoing whenever something happens and it's just attack on the ears.

Gameplay:

The gameplay is going to be really hard to explain. Basically you control the head of the old man and you fly around in a room of the house and you basically try to mess around with the items in those rooms to progress into another room.

The gameplay is not very good, for multiple reasons, first of all it's really cryptic on what you have to do. I had plenty of times where I had no idea what I was doing, all I did was flying around, interacting with items and just hoping I was going to progress.

Controlling the head is also not easy, as it feels incredibly slippery. It just sort of slides out of place and it becomes annoying when you're trying to interact with something specific.

Verdict:

The Grandfather used to be a paid game and if this was still the case, I would have given this a negative review, however since it's free, I think it's worth it for horror fans, since it only takes roughly 20 minutes to finish, only worth it if you're a horror fan.

Final Rating:
6/10

Pros:
+ Decent plot
+ Art style is pretty decent

Cons:
- The audio design is terrible
- Goals of each level are pretty cryptic
- Controls are way too slippery

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I couldn't hear anything because the music was too loud compared to the narrating voice, and the game doesn't give you the option to adjust it. I got stuck on a level, and when I tried to restart, I couldn't skip the scenes I had already seen. I don't know if the storytelling is great because I didn't even finish it. I know the game is cheap, but I can't recommend something that can't handle these small issues.

This game is a beautiful device for story-telling and has some really interesting, albeit simple, puzzles that use the mechanics very well. The game is a very short play but has a rather satisfying climax in the story. The visuals are very aesthetically pleasing and feel like a storybook or comic. The game is rather dry and short and leaves something left to be wanted.

As someone who played the other game made by this developer (The Lady) i can say that this is a huge stepup from then. I like this game, the art, the story. It's gripping and emotional. In one word, beutiful.
I think there has been a huge improvment in the way the story is beeing told from The Lady. There is narrative but the story isen't force fed down your throat. It gives you enough to comprehend the overarching story but leavs enough room for thought.

However this is far from perfect, i felt like wen i was figuring out the puzzles it kinda happend by random. I force kicked my way through most of them, the only once i figured out were tv room and kitchen. In short i wanted more "game" from it, abit clearer on what the goal of the puzzle is as there is more enjoyment in figuring it out then. (Atleast for me).
The length of the game is also quite short, I finished it in about 20 minutes.

It also misses some key components which i hope will be adressed in future games, like a propper options menu with sound levels for the background sounds and the narrator. Some subtitles would also be nice.

All in all for the price, id say this game is worth your time if your a fan of deeper story. But if your here strictly for the puzzles, id pass.

This is not a game but more of an interactive stoy that you are following. It's bizzare sort of puzzle are as simple as they are creepy. While I wouldn't recommend this game to a lot of friends there are those few that would enjoy it as much as I did. The dark story is really what is the draw, it's hard to explain it without giving something away from the plot but for the price I would suggest picking it up. It's only $.99 not on sale, and good bit less than an hour install to completion.
Pretty sure I'll be having nightmares about this tonight.

I enjoy simple games like this that are more art than game. So for me it's worth it. However, due to its incredibly short length (about 30minutes to finish) it's only worth it because the asking price is also very low. If you get it on sale, bonus.

Often cheap games like this are all bugged up but I didn't experience any bugs at all. It worked fine, so there's that.

If $1 is a lot of money to you, don't buy it. If $1 is no big deal to you, it's worth having a nice little half hour experience.

I bought this game because of The Music Machine and Moon Sliver, which had sparse narration but still managed to pull off complex characters and a chilling, interesting world that outshone the lower-end graphics.

The Grandfather is the opposite, a beautiful game with gorgeous, gross illustration, but the story and characters are shallow, and the game portions do not support or develop the story. Grandfather is sad because his wife is mean. Feel sad because you are told to. Plug up the toilet and flood the room with blood because... we're sad? Yes, I can see the symbolism that is attempted, but there's no player buy-in. It feels like a missed opportunity for so much more.

With that said, this game isn't expensive, so play for yourself if you're unsure.

I understand the mixed reviews on this particular game but I must pass it on with a positive review. Yes, the gameplay can be frustrating and confusing without instruction but once you finish the first puzzle it is easy to understand how the rest works. My positive endorsement however is due to the amazing cinematography and story of the game. If you view this as more of a film or story than a puzzle game it becomes a fascinating story illustrated in a unique form and art style. I recommend this to anyone who wishes to spend about a half hour watching this comic come to life.

A story with interactive elements, but there isn't much game to be had here. The point-and-click sections are rather abstract and don't make a lot of sense. There's another part where you just walk forward down a bland tunnel and the rest is story told by a bored-sounding narrator.

All this in less than 20 minutes. It's a bizzare adventure, but one that was confusing and short-lived.

Not really a game but more of a narrative, interactive story whose mains selling point is the art and overall creepiness. I'm not sure what I was expecting when I bought this but the creepy art was enough to make me curious about it. It's a very short experience, you'll be spending 20 minutes at most, probably less, since the game's main gameplay element is a series of simple puzzles which you simply need to click on various thing to figure out. There is no context and no explanation to help you with these puzzles, but they're easy enough to figure out, it's pretty much impossible to put a puzzle in an unwinnable state.

The story is rather creepy, which is really the game's best quality. The art, the mood, the plot, all this has been put together in a bag of gore and darkness to make the player slightly uneasy with eerie sounds and dark, dirty-looking rooms inside a big, creepy house where a sad man suffers from his cold wife's constant torments. The plot, well, it's nothing much, it's a very short story, the Grandfather's sadness is explained as you progress through the puzzles, there's not much development but it's surreal and dark.

Of course, with an artsy 2$ game there is bound to be some flaws, for one, its length. This is a 20-minute experience at most, the puzzles are pretty easy to figure out and don't require much thinking, only some clicking and dragging random objects until the screen goes dark and the narration continues. The narration, not bad in itself, is unfortunately muffled and hard to hear and there are no subtitles, you'll have to really pay attention to understand what is going on. The gameplay is very simple but before each puzzle there is a boring, unnecessary walking segment that only serves to pad the game between puzzles and narrative sequences. The Grandfather also have zero replay value, unless you want to show it to a friend, there's absolutely no change in the story, it's the same experience over and over again.

Now, would I recommend The Grandfather? This is a time I wish there was a "Maybe" option on Steam, because I don't fully recommend it but I also don't think it should be completely be dismissed as a low-budget, low-ambition indie game with next to no appeal. The art is good, the narrative is interestingly creepy and it's a pretty casual puzzle game which doesn't require much effort to play through but it's also short and has low replayability. On the plus side, it's cheap and really, if you have two bucks just hanging in your wallet, then give this a try. Just without too much expectations.

I bought the game because I thought the art style looked very interesting. But over all, the game was not very good. The transitions where odd, and the puzzles more frustrating than intriguing. The story was nice, though I thought the game could have been more.

Sadly, I am pretty disappointed with the game. I felt there was no real clear indication what I was supposed to be doing, and a game kind of stops being fun when it's all abstract with no clear goal defined. Or at least that's what I think. So I stopped playing after about 20 minutes.

I'll start by saying that ninety-nine cents is not a great deal less than this game is worth to a player. It was incredibly short, and the content was dubious (which I will get to in a moment.) enough to give me pause. However at just under a dollar, the fact that it has a beginning, middle and end with gameplay in between makes it at least worth the price of admission.

I appreciate what the developer of this game was trying to do, and I appreciate oblique, surreal or mysterious storytelling. A peice of work just needs to have a solid sense of itself, and steady direction to not have it be an unrelatable mess. This game does not have a solid sense of itself. It wears it's Lynchian influences embarrassingly on it's sleeve without realizing that what makes his movies so good is that the symbolism, while impenetrable, is consistent and resonant. It never got around to developing it's own set of symbols for the player to relate to (The umbilical cord was a literal umbilical cord, for goodness sake.). The story is a straight line from start to finish, with no conflict to speak of. Even the antagonist is revealed to be such through a series of flashbacks which do not relate to the surreal gameplay, which one can assume is the "present" in the narrative timeline.

The gameplay is shitty puzzles. They're meant to be non-logical puzzles, I realize, but that makes them shitty puzzles.

That's all the smack I'll talk about this game. Those are my personal opinions on the game's story, but I'd still say it's worth the dollar I paid for it. I think new and weird things should be supported, even if they suck, because hopefully they get better through that support.

Short and sweet. Play at night iwth headphones on. Brilliant artwork and stroy. If you are looking for something grotesque and unconfortable you should definitely play this game. It is a short game, but still gives you creeps.

Its a different and unique game that takes some serious thought for an idiot like me to fully comprehend.
It obviously took a lot of effort to create a game with such an intriguing concept as this with such an interesting art style that I don't see very often.
The Puzzles are relatively simple if you have experience with puzzle games but for those who don't have that it experience it is much more of a challenge.
It may be annoying to proceed in some aspects of the game but overall it is an interesting game that I would recommend to anyone that is interested in purchasing the game or anything remotely similar to it.

I enjoyed my time with this game.
It can be short but it´s a powerful experience with great art design and a haunting story.
The puzzles were not any problem in my case, they have certain logic to them.
It´s for players who enjoy bizarre Horror and an abstract story instead of challenging gameplay.
I recommend it without a doubt.

I was really excited for the game after playing the beta, but it didn't really go anywhere. It has a really nice art style, but as others have mentioned, the narration is very quiet. The puzzles are fun, but they don't seem to progress. I would have liked to see more overall in this game in terms of story development and difficulty.

The Grandfather is a short puzzle game that will most likely last you 30-45 minutes.

First of all, the narrators voice is way to low, she is almost barely audible the first time you hear her. I suggest getting this fixed. Let it be known that this was the only issue in the game, I did not encounter any other bugs or issues so it's definetly a stable and well made game.

The Grandfather is a wonderfully illustrated horror game that tells you about a sad miserable grandfather who has never been loved by anyone, including his wife who enjoys torturing him emotionally by giving him the scariest version of the stink eye ever.

One night after going to sleep in his bed, separated from his wife's (wow that woman is a total bitch), he wakes up, none of his body parts present OR attatched to his body! Only his head, which also can float, he begins his venture to find his body parts, what he ends up with though, is better than what a paint brush could ever do.

The puzzles in The Grandfather were, honestly, not very difficult. Maybe I got stuck two times trough the whole game, the puzzles felt sort of meaningless as I just clicked at things, but they were fun to figure out when figuring out was needed.

The game was made in Unity 5 (which I highly suggest to any devs who are starting out, for real, get it, it's free) which most people enjoy shitting at, however thanks to games like Firewatch, The Forest and the development hell beaut' Raindrop it's slowly getting a better reputation after it got slaughtered by the billions of Slender clones.

The Grandfather though, it's weird, it has this ugly yet pretty, cool looking style that gets accompanied by some nicely done lighting. It also has these short segments that are first person where you walk forward, these are also very nice. The illustrations of The Grandfather are done by the talented SaintYak, the art is very well done and characters have a nice artstyle going on, objects in puzzles look sort of sketch'y like if they were drawn quickly, really adds to the creepy atmosphere of the game.

There isn't really any music in The Grandfather, if there is then it's some sort of saw being played on, it's very weird and sounds kind of creepy... Or funny. Other than that there is omnious ambient noise going off most of the time, which works and fits the rooms you solve puzzles in. Whatever is there of soundwork is interesting and adds to The Grandfather's already creepy atmosphere.

All in all, I pretty much enjoyed The Grandfather, it was way cheaper than I expected it to be and it totally came out of nowhere as I forgot it's release date, I hope it does well and that more people will try out this little enjoyable, creepy game.

I give The Grandfather a 8/10