Maybe... there is love in me?

I'm a bit late to this, but I still wanted to make a review because I make one for every game that I love. And I love this game.

I'll admit. I did not complete all the puzzles by myself. I tried until that spreadsheet puzzle where I just gave up and read the solutions in the txt file. And to be honest? I don't regret it. Games are meant to be fun, and banging my head around a puzzle where I don't have any clue on what to do isn't fun. I'm sure the Author agrees, or else they wouldn't have added the txt file to begin with.

First time around I skipped around most of the story file just because I just wanted to get on with the puzzles as quickly as possible. I didn't understand anything and was left kind of empty at then end. Then I decided "eh, why not. let's just go back and read the story one by one." And so I did that. Pull out all the chapters and read them one by one in one sitting.

Let's just say that I was sobbing by the final chapter.

Anyway, I don't think I'm qualified to review the story because I still don't understand quite a lot of it and I'm not a good writer. What I do want to say though is that I LOVE the world building in this game. There are so many curious little details that only reveal itself when you really take your time to analyse the story itself. And this actually brings me to my final point on why I love this game so much:

This game is both an SCP and an ARG.

I actually thought of this around the first half of the game. This game has many elements reminiscent of the super complex and story rich skips, mainly the experiment logs being the main medium used to tell the narrative, and the omission of information in an in-universe way. Alongside with literally being an Alternate Reality Game where you need to use outsider knowledge in order to beat it. Both of these are things that I'm fond of, and finally seeing someone blend them together into a masterpiece of an experience makes me very, very happy.

I don't think I'll ever get to experience anything like this ever again.

FINAL VERDICT:

539 freaky plushie goon sesh / 13 bullshit puzzles that made me want to kill nepenthe

Thank you very much for your message. I appreciate you leaving one, because I know how hard it can be to say nice things about what you enjoy.

It was one of my priorities to integrate gameplay and story in a novel way, which came naturally due to the game’s homages to the adventure game genre. I thought it created the dual motivations of doing puzzles for the story, and reading the story for the puzzle. You can enjoy either aspect, and I wanted the world to feel fleshed out in both. Of course, if you want to know more, I did write about the game on my blog. https://disposablearts.neocities.org/

I think that you will experience good things again. It’s hard for me to feel novel feelings as well. When you give up hope, you settle for less. I like my own works a lot. They’re my blorbos. But lots of other things give me that feeling. That’s how I get inspiration to put stuff into the work.

I think if I continue the TILIM lore, you will enjoy it very much :)