Goodbye Deponia | a Review
originally published on 08/08/2020;
Hello everyone, I am the malding G.E.M.Simov, a beastly game man who finds himself sick of talking about this franchise, but must talk about Goodbye Deponia on this day.
Simple review details - I rank games on an out of 10 basis, granting up to 3 points in 3 categories, as well as a last, single point from my own self, depending on my experience with it.
Also, I am a gameplay designer and a writer so I got the credentials to talk shit.
Most of the content in this review is copy pasted from the previous Deponia reviews as nothing changed.
GAMEPLAY
Goodbye Deponia's gameplay is the exact same as Deponia and Chaos on Deponia’s gameplay - as in, it is a point-and-click game, which means that it requires only a mouse and its Left Button to be played. It provides the Player with a Player Character (PC) who walks to whichever spot the Player clicks or to whichever object the Player clicks and interacts with it (if the object is one that can be interacted with). Clicking objects with the Right Mouse Button (RMB) makes the PC comment about the object (or Character).
In addition to that, the Player has the option to pick some items up, putting them in the PC's inventory, which can be accessed by scrolling up, or down, with the Mouse Wheel (Mouse Button 3). It features a large number of slots that get filled up with the items the PC picks up. An item, when hovered over in the inventory, can either be used (by the PC, on itself) or it can be used on an object in the game world, with the alternative being to have it be used on or given to a Character in the game world.
Lastly, whenever clicking on a Character to interact with them, the PC will either attempt to or successfully being a conversation with them. That will bring up a menu with a number of options that can be selected, as a result of which the PC will say whatever the option reads, and then the other Character will react to it. These Dialogues can be very important, and some options can only be selected once, so the Player should be careful with their approach.
In theory, this game is very simple, and it plays very well thanks to the simplicity of its controls. However, as a consequence of the fact that it is a point-and-click adventure game, it also has to feature puzzles as a means of challenging the Player in some way, so as to avoid simply being a visual novel. However, these puzzles - solved by interacting with objects in the game world or using items from the inventory to do that interaction with game world objects - fall into the trappings of the classic point-and-click game's puzzles.
What does that mean? Well, a puzzle can be two things - simple or hard. It is hard whenever the one solving it does not have access to the information needed to solve it, or whenever it is not intuitive (does not stick to some sort of logic). The classic adventure (point-and-click) game's blunder is that it happens to make its puzzles lack that intuitive element, it makes them thoroughly illogical, and that makes them hard, but not in a good way - one that requires that the Player gathers information so as to solve them - but in a bad way. The only way to solve that kind of illogical puzzle is to keep attempting solutions until, randomly, the Player gets lucky. That's bad design.
So, overall, what is the verdict? The game has a very simple, and smooth, vibe to its gameplay. That makes it pleasant for the Player to just play, to interact with things and do stuff in the game world - which is good. Some of the puzzles abide by some sort of logic, which makes things very nice for the Player, and provides an enjoy-ability to the experience. However, the presence of the illogical puzzles sours things thoroughly.
2/3
PRESENTATION
The game looks very nice. Due to the fact that its appearance is as stylized as some of the unmentionable sources of entertainment, originating in Japan, I am left pleased by the cartoony appearance of the characters. It is interesting how the characters seem to POP from the background, due to the fact that the lines outlining them are much thicker than those of the scenery, but that is excusable and makes it easier to spot important people.
The sound effects are passable, the music is decent enough, but it becomes boring very quickly. The voice acting is good, but the animations are really, really distracting. There are songs intertwined with the beginning of every act, but they really ripped me out of the experience and completely broke my immersion. The singing was not that good either, nor was the text interesting, as a norm. There were outliers.
The art is the one thing I can not really complain about, so kudos to whoever worked on it. Daedalic, stick to illustrations and world building! 2/3
STORY
The story of Goodbye Deponia is, actually, the best out of the three games in the series, not counting Deponia Doomsday as I’ve yet to review it. The characters are unlikable, but I’d developed the habit of just going on fumes of anger and my hand absentmindedly clicked so that I would go on. The issue is, probably worse in the next installment, due to the fact that this game seems to actually allow the characters to develop - namely Rufus.
The main character is Rufus, an entitled, rude, unwashed, selfish and egotistical prick, the exact same idiot from the last two games… But in this one he’s actually more interesting. The story takes place an nondescript amount of time after the events described in Chaos on Deponia, or at least so it seems - although it's muddied up because who cares about consistency, am I right OR AM I RIGHT?
The story this time has Rufus being horrible, as usual. He steers the vehicle him and the rest of the team are using onto an Organon Cruiser route, and they need to do something about it, pronto! So Rufus and Goal get to it, while Bozo… Sleeps quietly like a little baby? In any case, things get going from there, and the absurdity does not stop.
This is the one Deponia installment that had a moment within it that had me intrigued. And by intrigued, I really do mean that I was truly unable to contain my excitement and wonder at what could happen next and what was happening. Sadly, however, that moment faded away and was replaced with another incredible plot contrivance that made me want to stop playing.
As usual, there are still plenty of unanswered questions, but there was such a strong moment that I just can’t give this anything but something. 1/3
LEGENDARY POINT
Does this game, that is really just a clicking simulator with a disgusting story, get the Legendary Point? Normally, heck no. You might recall the spiel - I’d rather give the point to a bad, explicit game, because it’d net be the sight of tits. Overall, I still would.
HOWEVER! However, Ladies and Gentlemen, as I mentioned there was such a strong act in this game, such a wonderful, sublime moment, I just feel as if I HAVE to say yes and give this game the point - if only for how amazing the moment itself was in comparison to the whole franchise. 1/1
CONCLUSION
6/10. It's just an average game, if only because of how great a small portion of it is. Alas, it is a game I would not recommend. Do watch a play-through of it on some website, preferably YouTube and my channel, because the story actually has a semblance of development.
In the bag of mediocrity it goes, to get covered in dust forever. It may be a shame, but it possesses one radiant spark of wonder.