REVIEW : The Signifier (PC)
The Signifier is the first, ambitious title of the Chilean studio Playmestudios, a young and independent group of modellers, programmers, game designers and writers who have joined their forces to create a project that is certainly not easy to be the first work.
The player plays the role of Frederick Russel, a scholar and scientist of psychology and artificial intelligence at the head of the Dreamwalker project; in fact, man has managed to create an experimental system for scanning the human brain, capable of reproducing the subject’s memories, memories and emotions more or less faithfully.
Despite being a potentially invaluable tool for solving many investigations, the ethical, political and economic implications of the Dreamwalker are equally high and, for this reason, Russell will find himself collaborating with the TSB (Technology Safeguard Bureau) to prove the goodness of his work and discover the reasons behind the alleged suicide of Johanna Kast, vice president of the powerful technology multinational Go-At.
With the fruit of his life of research under scrutiny, the protagonist will have to choose whether to go to the bottom of the case, push the bureaucratic limits to the limit and unearth uncomfortable truths, or minimize any repercussions on himself and his project. ; whatever the player’s choice, this will lead to consequences and a different ending to the adventure.
The Signifer offers a first experience lasting about 6 hours, which tends to be reduced during subsequent games; the environmental puzzles are quite simple and/or intuitive, fortunately never banal.
Frederick Russel will use his experimental AI Evee for the reconstruction and exploration of Johanna’s mind, whose brain was scanned and digitized shortly after her death, precisely to preserve any information on the causes of her suspected death from an overdose of antidepressants.
Unfortunately, Dreamwalker is a project still under development, the time offered by TSB is pressing and the mind of the deceased is anything but stable. The player will therefore explore both “real” settings, as well as the reproductions of Johanna’s places and memories, many of which are also quite disturbing and obscure, sometimes even inaccessible; it will therefore be necessary to understand the necessary steps to avoid emotional blocks and rejections, until reaching both the mysterious past of the woman and the last moments of her ambitious, but sad life.
The Signifier requires the exploration of memories composed of a double level: the objective one, linked to the information of the brain, and the subjective one, built on the interpretation that Johanna’s psyche made of that information. By crossing the data of the two layers of the simulation, it is possible to unlock new key elements to research, scan and then visit, until the truth is reached.
Russel can pass more or less freely from the subjective to the objective condition to identify what he needs; other indispensable activities are the “manual” interpretation of some raw data, too unstable for the AI and which require a more human interpretation, the overcoming of some emotional blocks through the control of avatars present in the memories, or observation Timewarps, temporal sequences important to the subject and which contain valuable information, but often unclear.
Due to its dreamlike and particular gameplay, it is really difficult to accurately explain all the mechanics present in The Signifier: what is certain is that the title offers a good narrative rhythm and an intuitive progression system even for the less accustomed to adventures with investigative elements.
However, in addition to the pure game system, it is precisely the overall aesthetics that make The Signifier a title worthy of attention. Despite the human models not exactly detailed and the uncertain animations, photography, music and game environments have been created with great care and showing off imagination and inspiration not just.
PREVIEW : NONGUNZ: DOPPELGANGER EDITION BETA (PC)
