Review for State of Mind. Game for Linux, Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, Steam and Xbox One, the video game was released on 15/08/2018
Body, soul, conscience, artificial intelligence and utopian society are recurring themes in modern and non-modern science fiction; they have always extended to media of all kinds, from print to film, from episodic animation, up to the youngest medium of all: videogame entertainment.
A a very first and very superficial impact, State of Mind would end up compared with Detroit Become Human, the recent Triple A son of Sony and Quantic Dream, but the reality is different: no doubt some tropes coincide, but the French company's work aims to touch more emotional and social chordsrather than presenting a tough, credible and not too distant future for the company.
State of Mind is an interactive experience, developed by Daedalic Entertainment, which in its curriculum boasts games of undoubted value, such as Silence, the Deponia series and Machinarium. The German company, after eleven years of honorable career, has therefore achieved a game with futuristic and thriller hues, strongly story-driven and focused on the (mis) adventures of Richard and Adam, two men, husbands and fathers extremely different and from almost opposite lives, but who for the development of events will discover to be much more linked than one might believe, as they are equally entangled in a whirlwind of events, plots and incidents in which the definition of material and virtual, natural and artificial merge and confuse, until they are indistinguishable.
The story (about 8-10 hours long) then unfolds through two main protagonists, flanked by numerous supporting actors. All the characters, even those apparently of minor importance, have been carefully thought and written to be credible during their short screen-time; in particular, Richard Nolan manages to maintain an adamantine coherence from the beginning to the end of State of Mind, without thereby appearing stereotyped or speckled, therefore predictable.
The only, objective flaw in the State of Mind narrative if anything it is a condition exactly opposite to banality: in the last third of the game the events follow each other without pause and this certainly helps the player not to get bored, but it violently tears that “neo-noir” feeling of the first ones hours and without hesitation throws into macroscopic actions and choices that could confuse or even indisposition, given their almost absent build-up.
It is not excluded that this lack of balance between the first and second part of State of Mind was due to the many, perhaps too many ideas put into play in writing and screenplay, impossible to develop completely due to the structural (and economic) limitations of the title: if the Detroit Become Human endings seemed to many smoky and too open, State of Mind will be able to upset the players even more, bringing up far more abstract and quirky concepts, even if incredibly fascinating and current.
Excluding the above, there is no lack of some ingenuity of plot, probably caused by not being able to dwell too much on secondary events and "explanations", which would have watered down a second part in which the developers were able to introduce fun (albeit simple) sections of environmental puzzles and puzzles, almost entirely absent in the opening section of State of Mind.
The game of the German company aims primarily to strike with its style and tell a good story. The graphics have a deliberately low-poly style and vibrant color palette in spite of the Berlin winter of 2048: both the neons of the urban and cold environment and the soft and warm light of the mysterious City-5 benefit from the aesthetic choice, as do the models of the characters. Beyond the minimalist graphic style, care for the title design (and above all for the construction of the interiors of the buildings) is able to immerse the player in every place and experience the adventure in the best way.
The excellent audio sector also contributes to this purpose, which it boasts a characterized and expressive OST and an undoubtedly competent dubbing team. Also the texts and subtitles on the screen, present also in Spanish, are almost free of errors and allow even the less accustomed to foreign languages to easily understand what happens and how to continue in the game. The only drawback for the immersion component are the animations of in-game models, extremely rigid and with glassy expressions even during movies; the problem is undoubtedly contained by the analytical cubist-like aesthetics, applied even to particle and environmental effects, but it remains a present limit, evident above all in the case of playing at a short distance from the screen.
The level of difficulty of State of Mind makes everything perfectly usable even for non-expert players: excluding the aforementioned environmental puzzles and some intuitive exploration mechanics, the game requires a consciousness in a cognitive state slightly higher than the Nrem and opposable thumbs and, if you were using a mouse and keyboard, these even become optional.
On the other hand, what requires the maximum attention threshold is the understanding (and appreciation) of the beating heart of the title, that is the story: it is undoubtedly issues already treated in other locations and in every era of the modern world, yet in its simplicity - and with some ingenuity - State of Mind offers scenes of great impact, which lead us to reflect (once again) on how fleeting the difference can be between our life and a very advanced simulation.
State of Mind is the Detroit Become Human we need. Waiting for much longer-lived works and with greater room for maneuver both in terms of time and resources invested in development to observe, hypothesize, reinvent the future of our species (Cyberpunk 2077 anyone?) State of Mind shows a split humanity and bleeding, between dreamers and disillusioned, powerless and omnipotent, humans, avatars and machines. The often mentioned final acceleration does not ruin all the good things the title offers, that is a confused, but full feeling of having lived something written with the head and created with the heart… organic or artificial.
► State of Mind is an Adventure-indie game developed and published by Daedalic Entertainment for Linux, Mac, Nintendo Switch, PC, PlayStation 4, Steam and Xbox One, the video game was released on 15/08/2018
