I had discovered Jason Godbey in 2017 thanks to The Search, a narrative game he had developed in his spare time, alongside his work as aEnvironment Artist. Since then, he founded Godbey Games and launched the Discolored series, of which I was able to try a rather long demo of the second episode.
lady in red
Imagine a world whose colors have one day begun to fade, everything gradually becoming gray and bland. Gradually, people also lost their colors. Their personalities began to change and they began to look for ways to remove all the colors from the world. In response, a group of investigators, scientists and inventors came together to conduct research into these phenomena. They discovered that these color disappearances were not an accident, but a deliberate act. A crime committed by an evil organization. As you prepare to go back to investigate in the field, you are attacked by one of the members of this organization. You need to unravel the mysteries surrounding this organization and this mysterious woman in red who seems to precede you. But be careful, now they know who you are.
We remove colors, we add ambition
Developed by Godbey Studios, Discolored 2 is the sequel to Discolored, a 2019 first-person adventure game. Not too nostalgic anyway since you can move around both in point’n’click mode and in free mode. You are dropped somewhere, without explanation and you have to use your sense of observation and your logic to discover the clues that will allow you to move forward. However, the game adds an additional subtlety here with the management of missing colors.
On the right, the prism which makes the color “green” to the area
Indeed, the player discovers color prisms which, when placed in the intended place, make it possible to render the color corresponding to a place. Far from being anecdotal, the use of colors is a real important mechanism in the gameplay. Uncovering and adding a color can, for example, reveal a clue that would otherwise be invisible, while conversely, temporarily removing a color can remove an obstacle preventing you from accessing an important puzzle for the sequel. As part of this demo, the game really only used two colors, but that’s already enough to see the interest of the mechanics.
A clue, for the moment hidden
A hallway, with more colors
A logic that shows all the colors
While the idea is interesting, a good part of the difficulty of a game of this genre lies in the player’s ability to understand and adhere to the logic of its designer. And I am quite divided on this point after this demo version. I can’t really fault the puzzle part of the game. They’re generally not overly complicated, although fairly standard. On the other hand, it gets a little more complicated as soon as you enter the dimension a little more point’n’click and exploration of the game which suffers from two more or less important defects. The handling, when it comes to taking an item from inventory and using it in the world, isn’t always top notch. But certain objects to discover sometimes seemed to me a little too well concealed, not standing out enough from the decor. Fortunately, there is an index-based help system, which prevents you from staying blocked for too long.
A puzzle, more subtle than it seems
Conclusion
This preview of Discolored 2 announces a game in the continuity of the first episode of the series, but with an ambition that seems slightly revised upwards. However, we hope that the duration will be there this time. Answer next year, since the game only has a wave of 2023 as a release date so far.
Preview made on PC using a version provided by the developer.
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