![]() Without spoiling it, I’ll say it involves pulling levers in a specific order, trial-and-erroring until you get the correct combination. Mo also has very slow animations when she interacts with certain objects, which was one of my main gripes with that aforementioned heinous puzzle. Running is an option, but I wish it was a toggle because I never let go of that dang button. ![]() For one, Mo walks at a snail’s pace by default. Where it doesn’t work as well is in the gameplay. The game’s pacing is deliberately slow at points, particularly when Mo is approaching or departing a dock, but these moments elegantly fit with the game’s tone. If there’s one thing about the game I wasn’t hot on, it’s its speed. Minute of Islands tackles some heavy subject matter, but in a way that feels nuanced, respectful, and – maybe I’m just speaking for myself here – utterly relatable. There were parts I found confronting, stressful, and completely heartbreaking, but after playing it all the way through, I’m so glad I did. I think this warning is absolutely appropriate. However, I want to point out that the game starts with a content warning for trauma, anxiety, and destructive behaviour. I’m hesitant to say any more about the story because I think it’s something that should be experienced with as little prior knowledge as possible. At several points, I kept playing not to find out what happens next, but to see what Mo does next. Playing as her was always engaging, even when I didn’t fully agree with her. There were parts of Minute of Islands that reminded me of Night in the Woods, in that, in the midst of such a heightened, fantastical world, the protagonist is often the most interesting thing on screen. “It’s like Adventure Time meets Junji Ito.” Each character is read in a distinct cadence, and Gay’s performance perfectly underlines Mo’s emotional turmoil. Instead of dialogue, everything is described by the narrator, voiced by Megan Gay, who does stellar work. I was engrossed by each of her relationships with the other residents. This means that you’re not just exploring this world as a player, you’re learning about Mo’s past, and learning about the island’s residents by the stuff they leave lying around (I love the concept of outdoor cabinets and I can’t explain why). Having lived on the islands her whole life, Mo knows all of them intimately. You quickly learn that the islands are not as populated as they once were, and everyone left behind is connected to Mo in some way. It’s like Adventure Time meets Junji Ito. Some sights in this game are downright horrific (mainly the many, many animal corpses you will come across, in various states of decay due to the poison) but otherwise the game comes off cartoonish and family-friendly. Every environment is vibrant, detailed, and full of little animations, and manages to strike a great balance. I can’t stress how beautiful Minute of Islands’ art style is. Button remapping is not possible for keyboard or controller, at least in the version of the game we received for review. I found this a bit awkward, but thankfully controllers map these commands to the triggers, which is much more convenient. The Omni Switch can be pulled out at any time to point you towards your next objective, and it’s otherwise used to interact with various machines, which involves holding down some combination of the S, D, and F keys (on keyboard). The game consists of travelling to and exploring each island, which takes the form of jumping between platforms, pulling levers, and pushing various objects around so you can jump off them onto more platforms. It’s not just her job, she was chosen to do this. There is a deadly poison in the air, for some reason all the air purifiers have stopped working, and Mo is the only one who can start them up again. She is the wielder of the Omni Switch, a kind of sci-fi magic wand that lets her interact with the machines scattered around the islands where she lives. The story follows Mo (pronounced like “more”), a young woman who lives alone in an underground network of tubes and tunnels.
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