Intro

I'll admit writing a substantial review for "Dandelion" a short visual novel created by Smokingspoon using RPG Maker 20003 would be pretty hard in my opinion. That's because this visual novel can be beaten in it's entirety in about seven to eight minutes. And that assumes you stop to routinely talk with your crewmates throughout the story. A task that really isn't necessary and doesn't give that many helpful contextual clues for what is going on in my opinion. Though it isn't that hard to figure out what is happening part way through the story.

Story
Summary

Seeing as how this novel is super short and it's plot is extremely simple. I'm going to hide most of these section. Since I know some people get pretty upset when exposed to major plot spoilers in a review.



Greatest Strength/Weakness

If nothing else "Dandelion" certainly has an atmosphere to it. Though I'll admit pinning down that atmosphere is a bit harder. I suppose it's meant to be somber considering what's taking place, but I tend to find myself flummoxed by questions about the backstory to this project as well as by the game's music which sounds familiar, but I just can't place it.

Gameplay

Sadly there isn't that much gameplay to be hard here. All you really can do is walk around and interact with a few objects and characters. And that's really all there is to this one in terms of gameplay. Though, I suppose I shouldn't be that surprised considering this is a pretty basic visual novel that doesn't even have branching paths as far as I can tell.

Graphics

Graphically this project is definitely unique with everything being orange and black. A choice I don't entirely agree with since it really limits the game in a lot in terms of visual appeal in my opinion. It also ruins the final shots of everyone's favorite blue marble as well.



Sound

On the sound side of things the game is alright in my opinion, but I did find one or two of the tracks a bit distracting. Not because I felt they were inappropriate for the mood the developer was trying to go for, but because I found myself wondering where I had heard them before. To make matters worse it was those situations where it felt like the name of the track was on the tip of my tongue, but I never did figure it out. Even the names of the songs in the project's music folder did nothing to abate my feelings of these tracks being familiar, but I'll be damned if I can place them.

Conclusion

I'm not entirely sure what to feel about "Dandelion". On one hand it's a pretty short story that's easy to follow with the mystery at the heart of the game being pretty easy to figure out. At the same time this visual novel is so brief and visually limited that it's ability to have a major impact on the audience is debatable. Though I might be alone in terms of that concern considering this project has earned three reviews with four to four and half stars. Though I'm guessing those people were a bigger fan of the orange and black look than I am.