#FF00AA

Pentiment (PC) — 9/10

The writing of this game is a damn masterpiece, and the production values weren’t bad either — even if it often tried my patience. Act III is far longer than it needs to be, the handling of translated dialogue is excruciating, and even traversal was often a slog (especially before I switched to gamepad) but it was all quite worth it. An amazingly well realized world, with excellent characterization, and something to say — so many things to say. Almost certainly one of the best-written games I’ve ever played.

P.S. I hate the way dialogue checks are displayed. I wouldn’t mind so much if they just happened in the background with the exact same parameters, but the way they’re presented encourages a perfect second playthrough, which is particularly cruel from a game that also implements time pressure to prevent you from going through every scene you want to in one go.