Lake

I waffled, but in the end decided to give Lake a thumbs down. I actually did enjoy it quite a bit but, all things considered, it doesn't quite reach its destination.

There's something very beautiful and charming about it. This small Oregon town is so lovingly crafted and rendered, with cars parked in the driveways, swings and barbecues in the backyards, wheelbarrows propped against porches, etc. And the core gameplay loop—delivering mail—is very satisfying. The driving controls are just what you expect them to be, and there's no gaminess or unnecessary systems grafted on top. Just be a postal worker. Live the life.

But the environment is also too sparse, feeling unfinished. The town ends up being mostly window dressing that allows almost no interaction with its charms. There are invisible walls everywhere, including a hiking path down to the dam—which even has a sign—that is blocked by nothingness.

The charm ends up being skin-deep, too. There's just not much depth to the characters and the story. The earnestness and hokeyness of small-town America is dialed up to absurd levels, such that no character feels real anymore. And there's just so little to the story, which you can pretty much figure out entirely in the first few minutes of the game. I really appreciated how gay-friendly it is, but even the potential same-sex relationship felt disappointingly shallow. It's as if in a frantic desire to appear locally authentic the game lost the ability to be authentically human. I found it hard to care about any of these people. Also, it's weird that everyone in this town can follow their dream and not worry about how to make a living. All the houses are perfect.

The game feels unfinished in its production polish, too. There are various audio bugs as certain sounds come in and out at random. And animation bugs: once I delivered mail into thin air, and then a pedestrian disappeared while walking. Also, there's just not enough content: you'll hear the same three songs on the radio throughout the whole game. It gets tiresome and also breaks immersion, because that's not how radio works. Luckily the game isn't too long, but towards the end it does feel like you're delivering mail to the same places again and again. Which, I guess is the point, but the game wants you to love your route while doing nothing to endear it to you.

What tipped my thumb down was the endgame. You're allowed to save your state freely throughout much of the game, but then the dev decided that you can't save during the last 20 minutes. The consequence is that if you want to see all the endings you will need to repeat those 20 minutes multiple times. Oh, and did I mention? You cannot skip any cut-scene or dialog. This felt like a very petty and annoying design choice and it left me with a bad taste.

Maybe what disappointed me isn't such a big deal for you. There's definitely a lot to love about Lake and I'm looking forward to more narrative-driven games from the dev.