WE SHOULD TALK
Talking up a good game
For story fans, “But I would never say that,” and “I didn’t know they were gonna say it like that,” are common refrains. Narrative design is hard, often requiring the spinning of many plates by cross-departmental hands – and sometimes that leads to discrepancies between player intent and character action. Insatiable Cycle knows the value of every word.
As a nameless protagonist with problems at home, one night at the bar could change everything. Texting back and forth with your girlfriend Sam, it’s not always what you say but how you say it that makes all the difference. The dialogue system here prioritises self-expression, allowing you to swap out words and sentence fragments to switch up the tone of what you eventually say. The devil makes work for idle thumbs and your texts can pave the way to one of nine endings, ranging from doing the work and coming out stronger together to becoming a real heartbreaker. 1
The level of control this system gives is compelling, and creatively arranging dialogue fragments is rewarding. The need to find the ‘right words’ creates an interesting tension throughout – unless you’re a people pleaser in real life, in which case this may hit a little too close to your everyday. 2 Its short length and focussed story allows for an engaging variety of dialogue options and social scenarios, but it does also feel more like a proof-of-concept in the end. But it’s less than a tenner, which feels like a reasonable price, and we’re going to enjoy seeing how Insatiable Cycle fleshes out this dialogue system in future as what we’ve overheard here presents a tantalising snippet of conversation. Jess Kinghorn