Encoded War - REVIEW
Alrightio lets go and review Morse Code Ple- Oh I mean encoded war, excuse me. All jokes aside tho, this game is like a lovechild of world war 2 and papers please (Weird sentence to say, but oh well here we are) But is it as entertaining as papers please? Let’s go find out!
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The game's aesthetic greets you as soon as you start playing; the graphics aren't revolutionary, but they do help you understand the game's setting and the time period it takes place in. I do, however, have to quickly express my annoyance with one aspect of the game.
WHY THE HELL DO WE HAVE A SETTINGS MENU WITH LITERALLY TWO BUTTONS? I know there aren't many graphics or keybinds that can be changed, but the settings menu currently feels more like a filler than a menu, which is sadly far too common in indie games.
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But enough about the settings; let's return to the aesthetics. As I said, the overall aesthetics of the game accomplish what needs to be done; they immerse you, feel well thought out, and are complemented by some really nice sound design; in other words, they are exactly what you would expect from a game of this type.
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The gameplay is enjoyable, and even though it clearly draws inspiration from Papers Please, it manages to stand on its own quite well. Rather than feeling like an exact replica of Papers Please, it's more like a best friend who received some help with their homework. Additionally, there is a good variety of messages that you will encounter, as well as a good variety of words that you must fill in. The difficulty also scales quite well, so discussing that will be the next point.
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You will fail a few times throughout the game, especially in the later levels, but at no point will you get completely frustrated to death or decide to give up. Endless mode also poses a nice challenge and will simply overwhelm you at later stages, which is of course expected. The difficulty never feels too unforgiving or too easy either (apart from at the absolute start of the game).
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Yes, I didn't accidentally spell the title incorrectly; this game is the epitome of ENGRISH. My god, the English in the game is frequently a complete disaster. It is obvious that the developer's native tongue isn't English, which is totally fine because mine isn't either so I understand the struggles. But please , this is a callout to ALL INDIE DEVS, before you release your game, especially for money on steam, get someone to double-check all the translations for you, because it quite frankly absolutely murders the story, which, talking about that, is very forgetable.
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The story is the most unmemorable mess you can imagine, really, this game is for the gameplay, not for the story, it tries to tell a story, but it just ends up being unmemorable and really not that interesting to read trough ,especially because of all the translation mistakes which just butcher it further, it’s however not like it really negatively impacts the gameplay in any way, as the “story” in the gameplay notes is a lot better than in the “cutscenes”.
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Apart from the translation errors and the slightly iffy story, the game is really quite enjoyable, and for the price, I'd recommend it to all fans of paper please, provided that you don’t care too much about the plot in this sort of game.
7.2 out of 10.
We at NLM received a key for this game for free, this however didn’t impact our review in any way.