Oh Dear?
Pardon the awkward game title, but Dear me, I was… isn’t much of a game. That may sound incredibly negative, but it isn’t meant to! While it launched last Summer as a timed exclusive to the Switch 2, it has now come to other compatible formats. It’s not even really a visual novel, not using any text to tell its story. Instead, it’s a series of gorgeously rendered watercolour-style vignettes that tell the story of the life of a Japanese woman. From an early tragedy to finding first love, the steps of the human experience are all represented here. With gorgeous art by Taisuke Kanasaki (Hotel Dusk, Another Code), the story is a beauty to follow. Satoshi Okubo’s score makes for a treat for the ears, too. Yet the question remains, what does the player actually do?
The unfortunate truth is not a whole lot. You’ll randomly rub the screen to “draw” pictures, poke bits of food for the protagonist to eat and pop bubbles. Indeed, the actual interactivity here is incredibly lacklustre. It’s clear that the short length of under an hour and focus on the dreamy narrative show that the emphasis here isn’t on being a conventional game but an interactive “experience”. This makes it hard to recommend to players looking for a challenge or meaningful engagement other than occasional inputs. Nobody is asking for gunfights or boss battles here, but the incredibly limited range of interaction is really disappointing. There’s only so many times you can click on food to see it fade away!
I was… confused
As such, Dear me, I was… can only really be judged by whether it achieved its intended goal or not. As a series of snapshots of life, it’s universally emotional in all the ways you would expect. It’s as if the opening of Up had been extended into a forty-five minute film, yet it lacks the wallop of the brevity of that infamous sequence. There is a sense of wistful reflection to the story that’s quite moving, a showcase of some non-obvious life choices that many should relate to. Fundamentally, it’s unclear why this was necessarily best suited to a video game rather than a short film.
It’s good to have titles that challenge what a video game is and what it can be, but this is far too passive to revolutionise. Still, to see Arc System Works put out such an unusual game shows they can still surprise, but hopefully next time they’ll also delight.
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