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Mary, Mary, Quite Contrary

  • Addit
  • 12/12/2014 10:46 PM
  • 5423 views


A Game Made By: accha & Trass
Created Using: RPG Maker VX Ace
It's A: ADVENTURE Game
That Roughly Takes Around: 25 Minutes To Complete
And It's A... COMPLETED GAME!!!


It’s amazing when you think about how some games here just manage to achieve almost universal praise, whether it’s in regards to story, graphics, technical aspects, the overall concept – or maybe even the incredible soundtrack behind it - and how it manages to stay in the minds and the hearts of people everywhere for what seemingly seems like forever and forever…and forever…and…forever…

…Wait – are we talking about Pom again, or is that other cutesy looking game that’s all pink and has a cute little mute animu girl as a silent protagonist, Pocket Mirror? It isn’t!? *phew* Thank god…

No, today I’m looking at the other “won’t disappear off the buzzing list for whatever the reason may be” game – and quite an anonymous choice to bring home (at least) a couple of Misaos this year and is the overwhelming favorite to take the gold: “Dreaming Mary,” developed by the lovely, and quite talented accha with some good help from Trass in the music and technical department.

Before Dreaming Mary came around - nobody knew who these two screws were. Well…at least, not here. But after the overwhelming success of this game and just how extremely well it did, these two became mega-stars, and it’s actually quite astonishing just how well known this game is even outside the RM community. I tell you, this game has a pretty impressive cult following! (You should check out their tumblr page!)

But just why is Dreaming Mary so loved and endured so much? Is it the pink? (It’s gotta be the pink!)

Well, whatever the reasons may be, it’s time for this rugged b*astard to put on a pink wig, find some cheap eyeliner hanging around, and dive into the mysteries and suspense that is Dreaming Mary and find out what really makes it tick.

I mean, what could possibly go wrong???

The Story


…God how I look so animu today.


Welcome to the Dream World, as you are greeted upon entering after Mary, our main protagonist of our story (duh, her name is in the title), awakens from her big, comfy queen’s size bed from all the troubles that plague the real world. Everything is pink – including her hair. But this is no time to dawdle! A dream only lasts so long, so why not go out there and explore what it has to offer? I guess the good thing about all this is that since this is Mary’s dream – she can do anything she wants! Fly a large kite; eat a big bucket of ice cream; and even run around the hallways with no one telling her what to do! Heck, even all her imaginary friends are here, eagerly happy to see her again.

But, of course, like every dream, there’s a difference between having a good dream and a having nightmarish one. Sometimes even the best of dreams can slowly start to turn into a nightmarish one if one’s thoughts go astray. But hey - this is Mary’s dream. As long as she keeps control of herself in the dream world and thinks happy thoughts, no such bad things can happen to her…right?

What seemingly starts off all cute, and friendly and full of fuzzy-wuzzies, you’ll eventually slowly realize as you progress on through that things aren’t quite what they seem. If you had no prior knowledge about what this game is or even in regards to the actual plot behind it, you’ll definitely be in for a bit of a shock at the end, that’s for sure. And although it’s never truly flat out said in-game, if you can slowly piece things together as you go, you’ll find that Dreaming Mary’s biggest strength is in its overwhelming undertones in regards to a touchy subject that I don’t really find myself too comfortable talking about myself but is, sadly, something that unfortunately happens to a lot of kids in regards to certain authority figures. It definitely is something that can change an outlook on life for a child, especially at such a young age. And while most younger audiences who play this (why would you even?) will dismiss this as just another cutesy game that suddenly decides to go sour, adults who decide to stick through the whole adventure will fully understand about the truth behind Mary and all of her dreams, both good and bad. I really liked this direction that the story took, as it definitely talked and dealt with a subject that you don’t really see too often in games, and that I applaud accha for that.

It also helps that Mary, despite her not having much of a voice or even much of a personality herself, is such a likeable character because you really begin to sympathize with her more as you begin to unravel the truth about herself and her in the real world. (I guess sometimes the best characters are the ones who say the least.)

This game also boasts around a total of more than four different endings that vary depending on what you do and how many rose petals that you have left at the end. Despite each playthrough being around 25 minutes or so to complete, you’ll definitely want to stick around and try to collect all the other endings including unlocking the bonus stuff. (Isn’t it nice when you get to have more choice in life?)

The Gameplay


Now who in their right mind would read this crap?


Dreaming Mary plays like one of those old interactive adventure games where you can only go in only two directions, left or right, while interacting with various objects and NPC’s in the four different directions. There is no life bar, and there’s no inventory screen to bring up any items that you have collect and what not. What you see on screen is pretty much it. It’s as bare bones as it gets.

The real objective of Dreaming Mary comes in the form of your own curiosity, interacting with things, and solving the occasional puzzle set forth by all your imaginary friends within the dream. The puzzles and tasks that you do are pretty mundane, especially if you examine and explore pretty much everything and have a good memory. Even if you don’t have a good memory, you can always save your game right before a difficult challenge and just try again if you so happen to fail. (Yes, this game allows you to save your game anywhere and everywhere you want.) What’s worse about this is if you’re planning on completing all the different endings to unlock the special bonus, you’ll need to replay and do these puzzles again and again with no alternating changes or challenge between them. You’ll eventually get pretty sick of trying to find that stupid Fox over and over again, which is a shame, because I felt that this whole part is the weakest part of the entire game.

The only real exciting part here is when you jump into the nightmarish part of Mary’s dream and deal with trying to run away from the creature that’s chasing you, since it just comes straight out of left field and gives you that nice sense of rush.

I mean, I understand that this game was meant to be short and more focused on the subjective matter that’s at hand, but the whole puzzle solving aspect in regards to the three rooms is just way too easy and felt kind of uninspired. I mean, this sort of thing would work well for younger children that were playing this game, as this sort of thing feels right for somebody of that age group, but the underlying themes suggest that this is more for mature audiences, so it’s like the gameplay is designed for more of a young audience in mind but the narrative is for adults. Hmmm…

The Soundtrack


Hmmm…this usually always works…


Color me impressed! Not only did this game have an original soundtrack created by Trass that not only fits the mood and the whole setting perfectly, but it also supports vocal tracks as well that sounds something like it was straight lifted from an anime. No, really – I am impressed. I originally thought that the ending arrangement was ripped straight out of an anime, but apparently not. Wow… I also really like all the different arrangements used of the main theme throughout, especially when you go into the bar and the library.

This game also features some voice-overs done by accha and everyone else that was also involved with the game. And even though they’re not professional voice actors or anything of the sort, they still managed to do a pretty good job. I even like the whole Q&A sessions that you can listen to on the radio in Mary’s room that was also a pretty nice touch.

The Aesthetics


Mary: “I’m sorry, I guess accha forgot to add a background for this room. Oh well, budget cuts and all…”


Just like the soundtrack, it’s fantastic! From the impressive looking backgrounds, to Mary’s weird, but loveable walking looking animation, everything may be too pink for my tastes but it sure looks awfully purdy on screen. If there was one thing that instantly drew me to this game originally, it was definitely the visuals, as I really like the high quality sprites used here and the entire setup. If there’s one thing I can admit that accha kicks my butt in – it’s definitely her artistic flair. Hell, even when things go to absolute shit in this game - it still looks good.

But what the heck was up with that last room with just the plain white background? (Did you really forget to put in one or was that on purpose or was that because of time restraints?)

The End Result


Um…no…???


Despite it lacking a little in the gameplay perspective of things, Dreaming Mary did ultimately deliver on its promise and showed me why this game has been so universally praised throughout and is considered one of the best games released this year. From its amazing narrative that deals with the type of hardships that some unfortunate children go through to its brilliant soundtrack with its fantastic voiceovers to the pretty as pink artistical look, I enjoyed this game quite well and its many different endings that it had. Sure, I would have loved to have just a little more variety sprinkled in, in regards to the overall puzzle designs, but I like to think that this was one of those games that the rest of the package basically carried the rest of the weight for it and wasn’t as glaring of an issue as some other games go.

If you had to play one game this entire year that pretty much sums up everything that was released in 2014 – definitely make this one. Despite your age, even with the mature subject matter at hand at times, I think this is an experience that anyone can seemingly enjoy, both young, old, male or female.






OVERALL GRADE:
4 / 5 - B ~ Pretty Darn Good!!!

Posts

Pages: 1
accha
1260
12/14/2014 07:06 PM
Thank you very much for your review, Addit!
I chuckled quite a few times hahaha XD

I agree, the technical parts of the game (and some of the dialogue) are pretty much the worst parts >__< You can see my inexperience with gamemaking there, lol. I've gotten a lot of good advice from people here so I'll try my best to improve.

The white room is intentional! I won't deny that laziness 'budget cuts' had a part in the decision, though...

In any case, thank you very much for taking the time to play the game and to write a review. I'm very honored!
Addit
6394
12/15/2014 08:07 AM
Ehh, no problem. I’m just glad that you had as much fun reading it as I had as much fun writing it. ^^

And I’m sorry that it took so long for me to finally get off my butt and finally get it done. (I have a serious problem with doing that lately.)

I’m also glad that I didn’t read too much into it before diving into this thing and then getting scared shitless about the monster chasing you. To me, “he” was the star of the show.
Pages: 1