Developer: Mojiken Studio
Publisher: Toge Productions
Platform: PC
Tested on: PC
She and the Light Bearer – Review
Once all the chores are finished, you want to kick your feet up and enjoy a nice interactive adventure or a pleasant music album. There is a defining charm to be found in She and the Light Bearer you might not expect. This game offers a narrative experience to be enjoyed by young and old as it touches many sentiments and offers a certain wisdom of life as you progress through the game while enjoying a canvas of colors in a truly beautiful art style.
Story
The narrative begins with a group of children of defining personalities preparing themselves for a great festival which would mark their adulthood. As we all know and love chores, a decent amount of complaining and annoyance gains the attention of Grandma White who sees no other solution than to gather the children around a fire and tell them the story behind the festival. As she begins to tell the tale of the firefly, you will embody the protagonist of this story, a firefly titled the Light Bearer who will guide you through the trials to find The Mother who is a divine creator of the forests and its many inhabitants, each with their own personalities and responses to how they communicate with our firefly.
It becomes clear as the story progresses that the forest is not doing well. You will hear stories of dark creatures known as The Devourers who are slowly but surely coming deeper into the woods. The Light Bearer works hard to bring back light to the forest. In order to do so, she travels deeper and deeper while solving trials and puzzles given to her by the creatures and beings she meets on her quest.
Graphics
Mojiken Studio’s She and the Light Bearer is a very colorful 2D point-and-click adventure game which is very pleasing to look at. The environments and characters appear to be hand-painted and the blend of colors are beautiful and clean. You will find the art to be inspired from crayon and watercolor styles which are in turn animated to give the game a great visual experience inspired from fairy tale story books.
The characters are quite varied and their personalities reflect in their expressions and style, which is really impressive considering they all are part of the forest’s flora and fauna. There is a special mention for the work put into the environments and the variety of background and surroundings. Despite the game taking place in one and the same forest, you will see a series of groves, a pond, a large tree, each having their unique look and feel. A big thumbs up to the graphical design of this game.
Sound
While there is no impressive voice acting other than a few onomatopoeia in different voices to distinguish characters, the real beauty lies in the music. Mainly compromising of strings and drums, you will hear the occasional wind instrument. Through the whole game the music is soothing and calming, regardless of how dark the story gets. This is another reason to believe this game is truly suitable for younger audiences.
Gameplay
She and the Light Bearer is a point-and-click adventure and puzzle game. While this game is fully driven by storytelling, most of the playtime is quite dragged out due to extended and drawn out dialogue. The game in itself is quite short and does not provide any real challenge as all your objectives get highlighted and the characters tell you quite specifically what they need you to do and where you will find them. Most of the puzzles drive the player to go to a specific location, find a specific item or click around said zone’s highlighted parts until it is completed before returning to the character who gave you the trial and either dragging the object over his physical location or by completing a dialogue.
This being said, there is a level of satisfaction to be found in the completion of the puzzles as it brings you further through the story.
Because there is no challenge in the game nor an increase in difficulty, it makes this title an ideal game for younger audiences to either be played with their parents and provides an entertaining learning experience about deeper topics such as emotions, humility and responsibilities and the different styles of communication with different personalities.
Conclusion
Everything being said and done, Mojiken Studios gives us a short game with too much unnecessary dialogues. The artful graphics, the soothing music, the vibrant animations, the dynamic mood and atmosphere and the ease of progression makes this title a very interesting game for younger players. If parents will choose to share this experience with their children it can become a really educative one and a nice way to stimulate emotional growth and learn how to handle situations of different styles.
She and the Light Bearer - Review,
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