Review for Dry Drowning. Game for Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, Steam and Xbox One, The release is scheduled: 08/2019
About a month after our preview, we entered again the alleys of Nova Polemos, the setting behind which the story of Dry Drowning, to uncover the mystery of the serial killer Pandora, her obsessions with Greek mythology and detective Mordred Foley and his assistant and partner, Hera Kairis.
Needless to turn around, our own Studio V have touched sadly current issues in Europe and have pushed this visual novel from thriller / noir shades to shades more closely linked to social commitment to underline once again how the videogame medium, in its maturity, offers much more than mere entertainment.
Dark Ties
As suggested by the name of the fictional political party Black Bonds (whose translation from English is precisely dark or black ties, Ed), bonds are one of the main threads of Dry Drowning. Starting from the complicated of affection, or rather love, between Mordred and Hera up to the connection between the killer Pandora and the political movement, with a markedly sovereign streak, vying to take the political reins of Nova Polemos, a fictional European metropolis as flourishing as it is dark.
But the fulcrum of the title published by VLG Publishing is certainly the tragic that binds the serial killer to the detective who should have framed him. This is not the classic between good and evil or darkness and light as it is Detective Foley has multiple gray areas in his past that tie him to the mysterious murderer of Nova Polemos. Pandora is in fact the cause of its decay and its ruin, following an unfounded accusation that sentenced two innocent people to the death penalty.
Redemption
Ma Dry Drowning is also Foley's story of redemption who, thanks to our choices, will perhaps be able to wash away his sins and rediscover a moral integrity now lost. The player's decisions represent the flagship of Studio V's work, because they will be able to influence the plot and lead us to one of the various epilogues packaged for us by the team. As can be seen, the plot is solid, well written and intertwines distinctly investigative elements to situations with which we are forced to confront every day, in a perhaps too detached way, and which will be one of the turning points within the narrative of Dry Drowning.
We are of course dealing with a visual novel and as such, the dialogues will be fundamental to cover our investigations, together with more markedly point & click adventure elements in the phases in which we will solve an investigation, unmask a culprit or more simply we will reveal the truth behind the mask of lies.
Every reality is a deception
This sentence taken from Luigi Pirandello's “One, None and One Hundred Thousand” sums up perfectly what awaits us, in the role of detective Foley, in trying to discover the truth about the mystery of Pandora. The detective's psyche and his intuition for the truth are projected by depicting the interlocutors who tell the false with masks of monstrous and animalistic features and represent a fundamental element in the investigation, as well as torment for the Foley man.
In these situations we will be given the opportunity to reconstruct and reveal the truth hidden by the mask with a limit of three errors in our deductions. Failing to find the true nature of our suspect will lead to the end of the game, but not definitively since it will be possible to try again immediately. These stages of gameplay, characterized by both a pressing sound and visual setting, are among the most successful of Dry Drowning and represent one of the most satisfying components of the entire gaming experience.
Excellent work also with the character design and graphic style of environments and protagonists that compensates for the limited general animations of the title. The whole scene is then masterfully accompanied by a very vast and varied soundtrack with various appreciable pieces, including the compositions of Hera for her piano.
The title guarantees several hours of play thanks to the alternative endings and the wide longevity promised by the developers is easily confirmed and facilitated by the possibility of starting a 'New game +' which allows you to change the choices of the first chapter, thus avoiding starting the narration from the beginning. We also find a nice extra in the mini game "Be a Good Citizen" present in our AquaOS, a device that acts as an archive for our investigations as well as a system behind which all Nova Polemos documents and secrets are protected.
The various levels of this puzzle will be a pleasant interruption from our investigations and will be able to break up the more static game phases.
Finally, we cannot fail to mention the complete and precise localization of Dry Drowning in Spanish, absent in the preview version of the title, and the excellent post-launch support with constant updates from Studio V following the feedback received from the attentive community of players.
There is nothing more to add, Studio V with Dry Drowning has packed a compelling and exciting story thanks to a captivating script and gameplay mechanics that are as simple as they are effective. It can only be reiterated that the genre may not be ideal for all players, as this is an action-free visual novel adventure with minimal interaction in environments. However, if you are looking for a well-written storyline, well-defined characters and mature themes, Dry Drowning is a title worth playing on PC and soon consoles as well.
► Dry Drowning is a Visual Novel type game developed by Studio V and published by VLG Publishing for Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, Steam and Xbox One, The release is expected: 08/2019
