Blinking for the first time in Before Your Eyes is a truly magical moment. I don’t mean pressing a button to close your virtual eye. Through the power of a webcam, Before Your Eyes tracks as you blink, allowing you to progress in an amazing narrative adventure title from GoodbyeWorld Games. On the surface, it may seem like a novel gimmick, but the mechanism is so creatively used that it meaningfully enhances the already powerful storytelling that fans Many narrative adventure games will mistake it as a shallow trick.
Players will take on the role of Benjamin Brynn, a lost soul who has passed away. At the start of the game, you meet a dog ferryman who forces you to relive the events of Ben’s life, starting from his birth. All of this is to impress someone called the Gatekeeper, who wants an honest assessment of who Ben is.
By blinking when prompted, you’ll jump through days, weeks, and sometimes years into Ben’s life. I was impressed with how accurately the game recognized eye tracking. I’ve never had an issue with my blinks not registering or my camera needing recalibration. I’ve also never felt disoriented or uncomfortable playing with eye tracking, but those factors will vary from person to person. On that note, it’s nice to have an option to play the entire game with traditional clicks, but I think you’ll do yourself a disservice by doing so.
Having played Before Your Eyes twice, once using blink and the other using mouse, I think the story loses a bit of its charm when playing with traditional control inputs only. Closing your eyes, then opening them to a whole new scene creates the wonderful feeling that you are reliving a life through an old-fashioned View-Master toy. Ben’s memory was fleeting, and the mechanic sold the point perfectly. Yes, I get frustrated from time to time after I accidentally blink and tell the story sooner than I would like. However, I don’t mind it for long as I find that doing so brings out the dreamlike quality of the game and the feeling that even cherished memories eventually fade – when we hope Hopefully they won’t.
Some of my favorite moments involve closing my eyes to better eavesdrop on silent conversations or so my childhood best friend can leave a heartfelt letter without shame. It’s also more fun to “look and blink” instead of pointing and clicking on objects. Even while playing with your eyes, you still use the mouse for other actions like connecting the stars in the night sky to write a cosmic message or to keep the beat to the piano tempo. These interactions are largely basic but still enjoyable.
No matter which way you play, the story of Before Your Eyes is a heartfelt one that nearly brought me to tears at many points. Despite its delightfully whimsical appearance, the story’s themes of depression and existentialism exert a heavy influence, as does understanding life’s meaning from one’s perspective, although there is a wonderful family and born with extraordinary gifts, still struggling to find personal fulfillment. The writing is serious and thoughtful, and the story takes some unexpected turns that culminate in a bittersweet final message that is harder than I was prepared for (in a good way).
A good story needs good characters, and Before Your Eyes has it. Ben’s parents, a caring but demanding mother and a lovable goofy father, are lovers. The same goes for Chloe, your mischievous neighbor who comes across as a really adorable kid that you can’t help but want to impress and hang out with. I was surprised how much I bonded with the cast in such a short time, but the stellar performances and well-written dialogue did their job well and kept me enthralled with the characters. object.
Throughout the story, you will make a number of choices, but I am disappointed that they have little effect on the whole story. Don’t stress over whether to sneak out with friends or get enough sleep to prepare for your grand piano performance; This is one of those games where you merely choose the color to paint the road instead of creating entirely new roads. Since the game only takes about an hour to complete, you should replay it just to see a few of those scenes, but I wish my decisions had more weight given the large number of choices being made.
The story of Before Your Eyes left me reeling at the end, and it’s a memorable journey worth going through. You rarely get much of a unique experience in games anymore, and Before Your Eyes largely plays a major role in implementing its main bottom line. It’s a concept I’d love to explore further in the sequel, and I couldn’t be happier that something like this exists.
