2023-05-05 14:23:50
We were able to preview Harmony: The Fall of Reverie, the new narrative adventure from the studio Don’t Nod (Life is strange). An extraordinary experience as always with this studio.
It’s a separate studio. A small French video game creation company, despite a name that sounds Anglo-Saxon: Don’t Nod, which might be translated as “don’t agree”. A way of saying that the small indie team intends to do as it pleases and offer titles outside the standards. What she has been doing for many years with, as a highlight, the series Life is Strange, the first episode of which was released in 2015.
Since then, and following years of hardship, Don’t Nod has established itself as a major player in French video games. His DNA? games that focus primarily on stories. We are talking here regarding narrative adventures in which the story is central. The new Harmony: The Fall of Reverie, which will be released next June, once once more digs this furrow of history above all else.
Polly is a young woman whose mother has disappeared. She will then decide to carry out the investigation while discovering that she is linked with another dimension… With this title Don’t Nod offers a story where the action is reduced to its simplest expression. The design is reminiscent of animated films from the 1980s such as Tigra, Ice and Fire (1983) or Les Maîtres du temps by the illustrious Moebius (1982). The characters, animated at a minimum, appear on fixed backgrounds. The dialogues have a central place. Throughout the exchanges with the other characters, the player will have to make choices inspired by various aspirations: Bliss, Power, Link, Truth, Glory, Chaos… One thinks of Pixar’s Vice Versa (2015) when the heroine sometimes hesitates to rely on one or the other of these aspirations. The player has to decide and take a route on the great plot of the story where different paths are available to him.
These choices constitute the only action to be taken. Should we talk regarding an interactive story or a narrative video game? Everyone will have their own idea with this title which pushes the cursor of these titles like The Walking Dead or even Life is Stange in which we move a character and where certain actions must be carried out to carry out the proposed quests. None of that with Harmony. It is even possible to let the story unfold on its own to intervene only when a choice is necessary. Rare are the games that allow you to quietly drink your coffee while following a very mysterious story.
Yes, Harmony is a peaceful and gently intriguing adventure. Our first steps make you want to see and learn more. However, one wonders regarding the narrative tree, regarding the multiplicity of choices and therefore possible ends. On the consequences of our choices on the other protagonists. By making narration the main gameplay axis of the title, Don’t Nod is once once more off the beaten track. We suspect that the studio, a follower of the genre, will surprise us even more. Verdict next June.
Harmony: The Fall of Reverie, Don’t Nod, June 8 on PC (Steam) and Switch and June 22 on PS5 and Xbox Series X/S.
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