VIDEOVERSE
A visual novel that captures - to a painfully nostalgic degree - the experience and feel of the earlier incarnation of the web (forums, IRC, etc...).
VIDEOVERSE is a game with a reasonably simple premise: you are a 15-year-old boy, Emmett, who owns a video game console which features a built-in social media service, the eponymous ‘Videoverse’. Gameplay revolves almost entirely around this interface simulating the experience of old web forums, complete with language and cultural references which are contemporary to the time (or analogous to contemporaries); more specifically, Videoverse is set at the end-of-life of the console (and social network) in particular, thereby evoking feelings of a dying community and the uncertainty that comes with a social platform - which you’ve used for considerable time to keep up with friends - suddenly shutting down.
These social networking aspects of the game are broken up by intermittent “real world” breaks, wherein Emmett either “logs off for the day”, goes to play Feudal Fantasy on the console instead, or is actually away on holiday in his real world. Such breaks generally denote chapter changes, driving the core story of the game forwards.
A short game, it’s easily completable in under 5 hours (for a fairly comprehensive playthrough), but this serves the game well: in its short time it manages to convey the personality of a variety of characters effectively, and uses those characters to tell the story of Emmett’s growth and journey of self-discovery aided by the Videoverse platform.
Whilst not an exact analog of any one individual experience, Videoverse captures multiple disparate aspects of my childhood and formative years which grants these references and designs an appreciable level of nostalgia:
- the game console itself could be compared to many historical consoles: indeed, the Nintendo DS or Wii, or Sony PlayStation 1 or 2 all spring to mind when I consider the ‘Dolphin’;
- the social networking platform itself is reminiscent of various forums I spent considerable time on during the early and mid-2010s - one of which, being the forum for an online video game which had its player count peak and rapidly decline, followed much of the uncertainty and dissolution of community that’s conveyed within Videoverse.
Sometimes, these memories can be painful or instill a yearning for the past, but I think the game’s capacity to instill such strong feelings is tantamount to the quality of its game design and status as a beautiful piece of art; I, genuinely, have to recommend you give it a spin.
That said, as it is attempting to emulate the behaviours of a real community, there is intolerant content and expression included (including general anti-LGBTQ+ sentiment from some ‘users’, for example), and discussion of complex or potentially triggering topics (such as depression, self-harm, and similar). I did not, personally, regard any of this as callous or unreasonable, however: you can push back against the intolerant remarks, for example, which can eventually lead to removal of the malicious users themselves, and the rest of the community is supportive in this (at least in my playthrough!). Other sensitive topics were similarly handled with care, with other users often attempting to offer assistance or advice, demonstrating an appreciation of the nature of the dynamics of an online community.