Imaginary Friends

"I've been alone
All these years
So many ways to count the tears
I'll never change
I never will
I'm so afraid, the way I feel"

- Fleetwood Mac

Imaginary Friends is a deceptively simple game.

At first blush, it seems to be a none-too-original take on the generic "young girl drawn into a horrific world" game, as exemplified by games such as The Witch's House and its numerous imitators.

At a second look, it seems to be a puzzle adventure in RPG format, providing a twist on the concept of "be careful of being drawn too far into your own fantasies". Again, this is interesting, but not too original.

Once you've played a little further than this, however, you realize with a pleasant shock that neither of these categories truly describes Imaginary Friends. Instead, like Resonate ~call out my angel~, the game is truly about overcoming barriers and obstacles that exist, not in the external world, but within one's own mind. While Imaginary Friends does not carry this theme to the depths that Resonate does, it still does so successfully.

Let's look a little closer.

Gameplay: (4.5 out of 5)
Imaginary Friends seems to break no new ground as far as gameplay is concerned; it's a puzzle adventure in which figuring out how the puzzles work can sometimes be more fun than actually solving them. While some of them resolve to fairly simple fetch quests (or "fetch X and use it to help Y" quests), others - like the puzzle in the school gymnasium - are refreshingly original. However, with the addition of dialogue trees and options to treat the other characters in a particular way (one of which comes off as a genuine shock at first) - the game manages to add in some visual novel elements, and this is carried through right up to the possibility of multiple endings, all of which ring true. This is a good lesson for game developers: to make a game enjoyable, you don't have to reinvent the wheel - sometimes, all you need to do is pull off existing devices successfully.

Story and writing: (4.5 out of 5)
While there are a few grammatical and spelling errors at times, and some descriptions come off as unnecessarily terse, the writing in Imaginary Friends is generally good - there's no undue use of purple prose, l o n g - d r a w n - o u t a n d o v e r b l o w n s c e n e s, or "forcing" the player to experience feelings or events that haven't been adequately built up. The game does a good job of hurling the player through the proverbial rabbit hole with surprising quickness (much like Chrono Cross) and then gradually allowing her to find her footing. This high standard of pacing is maintained until the final part of the game, where the sheer number of puzzles in the school sequence act as a slight tempo-breaker. Still, these are only minor issues in what is generally a very well told tale indeed.

Artwork: (5+ out of 5)
Wonderful! It is clear that the developer's strength lies in this area, as she uses a variety of artistic devices - from childish drawings to hand-drawn backgrounds - to capture the game's theme of "returning to childhood" in a manner that evokes both nostalgia and a sense of impending dread. While the facesets could do with somewhat more by way of expressing emotion, this is only a trivial issue, as the game does such a wonderful job of conveying and inducing emotional responses even without them. Bravo, mannytsu, bravo!

Music: (4.5 out of 5)
Imaginary Friends features a custom soundtrack of mostly laid-back, atmospheric tunes which are a refreshing change from the usual horror or RPG motifs, but also do a great job of complementing the art style and the themes / moods being conveyed in different sequences. I'm certainly going to be listening to some of these tunes again, which is always a good sign.

Wherein Professor Q rants a little: (Spoilers ahoy, caution!)


In the end, Imaginary Friends is simply a very likeable and enjoyable gaming experience, which manages to evoke a plethora of emotions and memories in the player as we navigate the landscape of Hailey's life. I rate it very highly indeed, and wish the developer all the very best with her next project.

I award this game 5 stars and a teddy bear.

Highly recommended.