The Highlights of LudoNarraCon 2020

This year’s LudoNarraCon event – a showcase celebrating narrative games – was jam packed with indie games of all stripes. It’s a remarkable time for games that I’ve previously written about, like Neo Cab and Mutazione, to shine. It’s also a great excuse for indie developers to showcase their upcoming projects via demos, which will hopefully lead to more exposure, wishlisting, and sales. Of the dozen or so games I ended up trying during this year’s LudoNarraCon, there were a few standout games that amplified my excitement far more than I would have expected from a quick hands-on demo. 

Welcome to Elk

Let’s start off with a few honorable mentions that didn’t fully click with me but that I had fun with. Welcome to Elk is a whacky game that features a world that looks like a blank coloring book, but has vibrantly colored characters with mismatching clothing. It has some of the jankiest looking 2D animations I’ve ever seen for characters, and I was forced into one of the weirdest drinking games I’ve played in a video game, but the characters were written in a way that made me interested to see more about this bizarre little island of misfits. Beware if you’re sensitive to watching others projectile vomit, however, because that happens quite a bit towards the end of the demo.

Solace State

Another honorable mention was Solace State, a futuristic visual novel about a surveillance state. The reason this game didn’t work for me is because the demo throws you into Act 1, Scene 3 of the story. As a result of being dropped into the story, everything felt like an info dump of needlessly complex and obscure jargon. The aesthetic of this game, however, holds this entire experience together, for I have never seen such an interesting presentation to a visual novel before. The story takes place with 2D art in 3D environments, radically moving the camera every time a new line of narration takes place. By using the environments themselves as the background for text, I found myself really enjoying the game world in a way that very few visual novels have ever allowed me to.

She and the Light Bearer

The final honorable mention from this year’s LudoNarraCon is She and the Light Bearer. The story of this game didn’t grab me, but the art certainly did. Every single character I was introduced to felt distinct, both in terms of their design and personality. The game’s environments are simple to explore but gorgeous to look at. I didn’t get much mechanical depth out of the game, as it functions largely as a point and click adventure when it isn’t leaning into visual novel storytelling. This feels like the perfect mobile game, but perhaps not something I’d want to sink my teeth into for longer gaming sessions. 

Genesis Noir

Genesis Noir is the first game from LudoNarraCon that completely blew me away. Billed as a comic book style presentation to a noir mystery that occurs before, during, and after the big bang, this game is borderline incomprehensible with its psychedelic overtones. The art style is gripping and expressive from the outset, with a monochromatic presentation of what often looks like hand-animated line work. Everything about Genesis Noir pumps with moody jazz that perfectly compliments your simple interactions on the screen. The demo features some musical duets and Simon-style sequences that kept things interesting, even if the game is unrelenting with its strangeness. Admittedly, I was far too enraptured in the art style to garner much narrative depth, but I have every intention of picking up Genesis Noir as soon as I can dive back into its universe. 

Coffee Talk

I did not expect to like Coffee Talk, but I found myself tabbing out of the demo to wishlist it – it clicked that quickly for me. Anyone who has played VA-11 Hall-A will find the premise familiar: you are a barista that serves up various drinks to customers. As these customers visit your cafe, you will learn about their lives, their personalities, and other intimate details. Coffee Talk places you in Seattle as the only cafe that stays open at night. The story takes place after a great race war between monsters and creatures of all sorts. In my brief time with the demo, I served a couple that were facing relationship troubles from their families who were against the idea of an elf marrying a succubus. I also served a writer who was dealing with all sorts of imposter syndrome side effects, holing up in my cafe to generate some inspiration. In short, Coffee Talk is a relaxing place to spend my time, and I found myself caring about these beautifully crafted and well-animated pixel characters. But as someone who doesn’t drink coffee, maybe I’ll brew up a cup of green tea when I play the full game. 

Lost Words: Beyond the Page

I have been eagerly awaiting Lost Words: Beyond the Page since it was announced. It’s a blend of storybook adventure and childhood imagination, wrapped in a hopeful narrative that uses word puzzles to help advance its story. The game starts off by introducing its main character, whose thoughts are expressed in a journal. You control a tiny 2D version of this character, running and jumping along the words on the page like a platformer. These words have specific functions and interact with the page in creative, surprisingly logical ways. The game opens up from the page itself into this young girl’s imagination – a fantasy land of magic and wonder, where she can use a magical book to transform the world around her. From little details like choosing how I wanted my character’s focus to be intelligence (as opposed to something like kindness, for example) or that I wanted her dress to be purple were little snippets of choice that didn’t need to be there, but added to the experience. I found myself utterly delighted at this game for the entire duration of the demo, repeating variations of “I love this.” The platforming is snappy and perfectly responsive to my inputs, the graphics are charmingly rendered and well-animated, and the story immediately got its hooks deep into me. More than any of the games I spent my time with during this year’s LudoNarraCon, Lost Words had me distraught when I realized the demo was over. 

LudoNarraCon is exactly the kind of event that I want to see more of, especially as game conferences and conventions move online in a time of social distancing. Anyone familiar with my work at Epilogue will have an understanding of why LudoNarraCon appeals to me specifically, given its focus on story based games, particularly from smaller developers with smaller budgets. It’s awesome to get hands-on time with these games, but my favorite part of this event was watching these games live streamed by the developers themselves, offering insightful commentary about the creation process behind the scenes. Though many game events fail to capture a sense of intimacy and authenticity between developer and audience, I truly felt in this case that LudoNarraCon was bringing us all together.

Thank you for reading. Your Patreon support keeps our community entirely Ad free.