Developer: Oh, a Rock! Studios
Publisher: Oh, a Rock! Studios
Platform: PC, Mac
Tested on: PC
Internet Court – Review
Oh! Here we are again with another review for indie video game studio Oh, a Rock! Studios. The developers specialize in funny, weird, and sincere adventure games, visual novels, and live-action FMV games. They proved this to be true with their older games (that we previously reviewed), such as Cat President 2: Purrlitical Revolution and The Beard in the Mirror. Quite the reviews, right? Let’s see if the studio could stay on the same level with their newest game Internet Court.
Story
In the 21st century, crime can still happen anywhere – even in cyberspace. When someone gets pulled over on the Information Superhighway, they get a one-way ticket to… the Internet Court, where the courtroom is virtual, and trials are live-streamed for the whole world to watch.
You get to play through four internet-themed cases named “Two old friends who unfriended each other”, “Terrible fanfiction”, “A deceptive online advertisement”, and “A troll who posts mean reviews”. We’re not going to spoil what the trials are about, but looking at the titles, it won’t be too hard for you to guess what each case entails.
The story for each case is entertaining in itself, but what actually puts the cherry on top here is the continuing storyline of the recurring main characters. This includes ‘Super Lawyer 64’, an enthusiastic new prosecutor with no idea what he’s doing, but at least he’s got a cool t-shirt; ‘Don’t Stop Defending’, a former prosecutor with a sordid past who is now forced to be on the defense side, and ‘Judge Doodles’, who hates his job, but loves working from home in his comfy bathrobe. Throughout the cases, we get to learn who these three peculiar characters are and how they got to this point in their lives.
Graphics
To keep the cyberspace theme in the foreground, the game is presented as an online meeting program with an old-school-looking interface from around 2005. It’s actually so well done, we honestly forgot that it’s 2021 – TAKE ME BACK TO THE GOOD OLD DAYS!
The game is mostly in FMV. Meaning that the game has a full-motion video narration technique that relies upon pre-recorded video files (rather than sprites, vectors, or 3D models) to display action in the game (ref.). From experience, these pre-recorded videos never have been very high quality in any video game. Fortunately, since the game looks like it’s still on Windows 98, the slightly bad quality of the videos fits just right into the whole experience. We love us some good immersion!
Having amateur actors playing the characters was also a great choice. The acting was at some points stiff and very on the nose. Luckily, this makes it all much more silly, funnier, and authentic. Fun fact: the all-star cast includes the developers themselves, the developers’ moms, Victoria Budkey, an actual actress, and a baby.
Sound
Objection! Is it really an immersive experience without good sound accompanying the graphics? Well… objection sustained. It’s true, you can’t get fully immersed if you don’t have great sound. The sound design is not good, but also not bad here in Internet Court. It’s functional. There are matching sound effects, and there’s some subtle background music so the game never falls into complete silence. The audio for de pre-recorded videos, however, could be a little clearer. Then again, it fits with the theme. Other than that, there’s nothing worth mentioning.
Gameplay
Internet Court is a live-action comedic courtroom thriller, where YOU can be the prosecution, the defense, and the judge, depending on which case you are working on. For gameplay, all you have to do is follow up on each case, listen and watch attentively, solve some puzzles on occasion, and make the right decisions when asked. There is nothing more to it. So basically, it’s a point-and-click game, but you don’t have to move anywhere.
There are four trials to go through and they take up 2 – 3 hours of gameplay altogether. Each case has its own story, puzzles, and actions. The story is presented as pre-recorded videos and some images which are mostly evidence. If you pay enough attention, the puzzles shouldn’t be very hard to solve. Often, you just need to use common sense.
The overall puzzles in this game consist of you finding specific evidence, like contradicting statements, such as lies or grammar errors, and choosing the right option when prompted. You’re free to go in any direction you want. Your choices don’t really change the narrative much, and choosing the “wrong” answer just gets you a quirky reaction but the story moves on. Beware though, you can get strikes in court, and three strikes and YOU’RE OUT!
Conclusion
The final verdict: Internet Court is humoristic, light-hearted, and fun! The old-school Windows 98 aesthetic was a very nice touch for the graphics. The game itself is quite short, and it feels a lot shorter because you want more. The game could definitely use more trials to fill up the gameplay. The story for the cases and the underlying subplot that continues throughout the whole game are actually quite interesting. It keeps your head in the game instead of mindlessly following an FMV and occasionally clicking the screen. The sense that you actually are solving a case also helps. Overall, Internet Court was a joy to experience, especially if you don’t take it too seriously.
Internet Court – Review,
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