PC Review Code Provided by Playbae Games
Yet another puzzle game developer has managed to bring us a new way to solve the challenges standing between the start and the finish of each level. Playbae Games has given us In My Shadow, with the help of Alcon Interactive Group who published it on Steam, and provided us with the new mechanic of shadows. Playing as the shadow of a girl’s memory in the house she grew up in, we must manage to get through each puzzle that blocks our pathway to reuniting with the happy part of our memories.
Story
After moving out of her family’s home, Bella finds herself in the pursuit of reconciliation with her past. Going through her memories in each core room of the house, she has imagined challenging puzzles to overcome in order to see the happiness that lies within her past.
Gameplay
Movement itself is split between two things: the movement of the objects that are casting the shadows on the wall and the movement of Bella’s shadow herself. You can jump between controlling these two aspects at any moment. This allows you the chance to adjust the objects to set the shadows how you think they need to be in order for you to get all the to the other side as the shadow of Bella.
Each room will have its own type of challenge, or change, when it comes to solving the puzzles. The first room starts off rather simple to get you started and then will quickly get harder before the end. This helps prepare you for what is to come as each room will be harder to complete than the last.
The whole reason you have to adjust the shadows is twofold as well. In each puzzle, you will see pieces of paper that you need to collect. If you fail to collect all of the paper before reaching the end of the puzzle, it will not be completed, so you will need to figure out how to collect each piece of paper. Also, the obstacles included in each puzzle will vary each time. This could include a spiked wall, spiked platform, moving saw blade, and a variety of other deadly obstacles.
As for the controls themselves, controlling the shadow of Bella is much like a 2D platformer game where you have your movement and jump control. However, you can not adjust the height of her jump as you can in many platform games, so you will have to take her height into account while trying to solve the puzzle. Then when you are controlling the objects to make the shadows, they will have arrows indicating which direction they can move. Most objects can move in any direction, but some can only go horizontally or vertically, depending. You will also have the occasional stationary glass table in the room that is only there to hinder your options when trying to solve the puzzle.
Visuals
I liked the way that the shadows of objects and Bella were designed, plus the physical objects that you move had a decent graphic value. It all gave off a fun, cartoonistic-style, but the actual character models used in the cutscenes were quite bad. Since each cutscene was shown in the form of multiple still images, they would have been better off with a concept art-type style instead with only the final chapter having the animated character.
Sounds
Music was pretty static throughout and only changed for the cutscenes in order to build up moments. The few sound effects used for the objects were fitting and the completed puzzle chime was nice though, so at least they included that. There wasn’t any voiceover for the story itself though, which is a shame because it would have increased the impact of the story and there really wasn’t a whole lot of lines overall.
Replayability
If you chose to use the skip option, which had no limit, then there is plenty of reason to go back. Complete those skipped levels you couldn’t manage. Other than that, there isn’t much reason to go back through the game unless you wanted to try other ways to complete each puzzle since there is room to have more than one answer to solve each puzzle.
What Could Be Better
I thought the character models were very ill-fitting to the game’s story and theme. They gave off a playful look when the story was supposed to be about accepting memories of times she regretted. Every mad face that was presented in the cutscenes just couldn’t really be taken seriously.
While I understand the reason you would include a skip option in the game, there needs to be a limit to how many a player can use or punishment for using too many. When I tested the skip button, I started at the beginning of a room and skipped all the way to the next room and it just continued the game. I went back and completed that room, of course, but I feel like I should have only been given a handful of skips or punishment for skipping too many in one room, like not allowing the story to continue.
The story didn’t really get as deep as I was expecting it to. For a story that is literally about reconciling with your past memories, I was expecting there to be some kind of actual trauma or drama, but it was pretty much just Bella being upset for her childhood and teenage angst phases - the ones we all go through. If you’d ask me, I would say that the story was just put in place to give a reason for the shadow puzzle game to exist.
Conclusion
In My Shadow provides fun-to-solve puzzles with a unique mechanic. The gameplay is interesting and the concept of the overall game is definitely going to catch many puzzle fan’s attention. I would have liked if they put more effort into the story and general graphics, but the parts that could have been better didn’t affect the most important part of the game - the gameplay experience. So, with great puzzles and an okay story, I would still put this on my recommendation list.
