Reviews

• 

  Midnightshadow20000

  Dec 24, 2021

  There is a 50/50 chance of the game not working, or not even reaching the menu. Depending on how new your computer is and updated, there's even less of a chance. This game is more of a trap than anything, there are no updates for issues fixes and seems to have been abandoned. I myself have tried to change settings, windows, etc, and have done everything recommended and possible. The beta might work for some, but hasn't for me. According to several others, even when the game works there are still many issues that prevent the player from actually playing. I love playing games of this variety, but I just can't with this one with all the issues presented. If the problem ever gets solved I will fix my review. Till then I can't recommend this game to anyone who is interested and highly discourage it, even when on sale. Until then I must hope there are enough reviews about the problem that something is finally done. Even if you doubt you will have this issue, I don't recommend finding out. Especially since I cannot get a refund after wasting my life trying to solve it's issues. This game isn't worth the effort, even if it just costed a quarter.
• 

  bottolo

  Jul 19, 2022

  [h2]On the cuter side[/h2] I think Yomawari is a great game which encapsulates really well the "PS2" horror game vibe. I can't quite describe it, but given it is a Japanese studio I must say that each time they put out an horror game they at least try to be unique and send off a certain range of emotions. Maybe it's me, but I've found this game [i]cuter rather than scarier[/i]. It still has its spooky vibe, but I can't stop finding everything cute. [h3]Briefly: mechanics[/h3] Long story short: you're a little girl who needs to find her dog and her sister on a long hallowed night. To do so, you'll need to explore the area and solve mild puzzles (which require only picking up certain objects or keys in order to proceed). But beware: spirits are all over town, and they're not friendly. Not everyone is, at least. You'll need to hide. In fact, you'll find bushes and signs to hide in throughout the game which will help you in tight situations. You're able to sprint, but once enemies are nearby you'll begin to feel scared, greatly reducing your stamina. Lastly, you can pick [i]usable items[/i] to help you face these spirits and to quicksave around town. That is all. [h3]Oddly Effective[/h3] UI wise, this game is simple and a bit [i]odd[/i]. It's really not a negative oddness, but rather a charismatic one. The devs kept the UI simple, with little to no information on screen while playing. In fact, the mechanics in Yomawari are really simple: press RT on your pad to sprint, occasionally press A to hide and X to throw objects. By oddness I mean that the overall design leads towards something like Rule of Rose, which isn't the most advanced UI design out there, but it helps to embody the game's core feeling really well. I liked the scratchbook, although it may result confusing at first. The map is something which I also really liked, since it says where you are and puts a circle in the area around you, aiding your quests. Thanks to that, Yomawari is really effective at conveying emotions through design elements. I found this to be the case in most Japanese games, but maybe that's just me. The whole style suggests playfulness (since we're literally a child), yet mystery. I don't know, I like the style very much. Combine this with the fact that the whole game is in 2D with a really detailed Japanese scenery and you'll have a really good time. [h3]Yet, sometimes...[/h3] The run and hide mechanics [i]don't really work as intended[/i]. I won't spoil, but in Chapter 6 you'll need to run from a certain spirit, and you'll be forced to pick a key by going through an alley and by facing this said spirit. Well, you'll die a lot, trust me. Not because it's difficult, but because the game isn't really designed to endure fast encounters in tight spots and the protagonist doesn't have the required stamina to overcome them. My main complaint stops here, because for the most part you'll have no problems playing and you'll be able to dodge basically every enemy by observing their behavior. In fact, I think most enemies are well balanced and offer a fair amount of challenge. Another little inconvenience is the use of [b]items[/b]. I've never once used rocks, because I didn't find them useful at all. They didn't serve at taunting enemies... they were just there. Strange. Same with the salt: I've been given only 3 salts near the end of the game and nowhere else. I would've liked more item presence. Also, I would've really liked the possibility to re-enter home after exiting, since sometimes I didn't have the time to finish the chapter. These are small additions, but they would greatly boost the game's playability. [h3]Other than that[/h3] I would say that NIS did a great job on this first iteration of Yomawari. The art style caught my attention and hasn't left me disappointed at all. Instead, it reminded me that horror games can still be unique and give off a vibe which seems a bit lost today. I have hope for the series, and I can't wait to play Midnight Shadows and its sequel. More on them soon. Recommended. More reviews: https://steamcommunity.com/id/bodolovsello/recommended
• 

  kiko_kitsune

  Oct 18, 2022

  Potential neutral review which turned extremely negative. At the first glance the game looked like I'll love it. Pretty graphics, intriguing start of the story and a grim world which you'd like to discover. At the first glance... Then gameplay happened. And it's awful. We have to go somewhere, and the same moment try to avoid enemies whom we can see only in the flashlight. Some spirits fast and specially for that we have a sprint bar. Which continues in danger situations for a second only. Just one second, Carl. I retried some moments dozens of time. Gameplay here extremely annoying and repulsive. I continued to play because of the atmosphere and my curiosity about the story. Here I wasn't rewarded too. They didn't explain anything even after the final. What did happen with the town? Why it happened? A lot of questions without answers. Anyway, after the end of the story developers let us free walk through the town. And now appeared some collectibles for achievement, which weren't here while I had played before credits. Cute, right? So, I am a trophy hunter and I like achievements. It's 40% of formula "why I buy games". But here they are disgusting. I'd call them like a time-wasting trophies. Seriously, they were made specially for taking your time as much as it could be. For example, while I am writing this lines, I am earning a trophy called "Long night". I have to play the game 50hrs. So Yomavari just working in the background. Yeah, I finished this game in ten hours with other achievements and a guide how to reach 'em. If you think that was the worst kind of trophies, you're wrong. The game has some with a small random chance of getting it. Even if you fulfill all the conditions it does not mean you can take it. Proximately 5-10-% of success. And if not, so go home and try again. To take a "monster cat" took me about 30 attempts (1,5 hour). Checked my PC resources for a case of mining after all. Big expectations about this game were pointless. Silent Hill, they said. Deep grim atmosphere and story, they said. *Sigh P.s. All my short reviews you can find

  here

• 

  Nuclear Nessa

  Oct 25, 2022

  Just beat it a few minutes ago! I think a lot of the criticism in the negative reviews for this one is warranted. It has a lot of flaws. For me, it was buggy. If I tried to do anything in the menus too quickly, the game would just lock up and stop functioning altogether. In essence, quicksaves were pointless. A lot of the gameplay was very trial-and-error, which is a really negative strike against it. There are a couple of parts that seemed impossible to me and I ended up making progress only to discover I had to backtrack and do some really tight maneuvering if I wanted to actually move forward. More than likely, you'll need to look up a guide for parts of it. However, the mechanics at surface level are really good; it's a tense game and you really have to manage your stamina properly. The atmosphere is on-point and really draws out the feelings the devs are looking for. There's a couple of jump-scares, but for the most part, this is proper horror game. If you're willing to look past some of the glaring flaws, I'd super recommend this one--especially on sale. But, if you want a fully functional and stable build, I'd assume the console version is a much better option.
• 

  The Dispenser

  Nov 26, 2022

  Poro! Catch the pebble!
• 

  Prime

  Oct 26, 2016

  [h1]Horror has never been this Kawaii[/h1] [i]This is an early review from me. I'll edit this when I have more time to play this and the inevitable game updates. Start playing this at 0200am and I have class at 0800am. GG.[/i] Possible spoilers. Though I don't think I spoil anything, but you know, just in case... I wanted to play this game so bad ever since it came out on Vita last year in Japan but there's no way I'm cashing out a few bucks for PSVita just to play this game. To my suprise it gets a Steam release. I got so excited that I pre-ordered it. Does it meet my expectation? For now it exceeds way more than my expectation. [h1]Don't judge a book by it's cover[/h1] Despite the cute art, the gameplay can be hard and brutal. Heck,[spoiler]this game f@$k you up when you just in the tutorial.[/spoiler] In general, you play as a little girl who tries to find her older sister. You have to dodge,hide or find a way to get past the ghosts lurking in your neighbourhood while finding her. What I really love about this game is that most of the time it force you to figure things out on your own. You'll collect tools along the way and it's up to you to figure out what it does. [h1]Details at it's best [/h1] The background art is filled with all those little details you might miss in your first glance. It looks like it was painstakingly hand-drawn each. But what really sold me is the sound. Each different surface you step on has different sound. You also have to pay attention to sound when you play this game. Your heart beats louder indicates a ghost is getting closer. In this game you can set what language you want to play in. English or Japanese. Choosing one of them will change the language not only to dialogue, but the street signs, notice board, and almost all the in-game enviroment all changed into the language you choose. [h1]Controls [/h1] Playing with gamepad is highly recommended. I mean no suprise,right? Since it's a console port. You can play with keyboard and mouse but it might be hard to get used to for some players. Credits to the devs still as they had make playing with keyboard and mouse not as awkward as some other port I know. For me it works just fine. [h1]Technical [/h1] Though it wasn't a problem for me and I don't know if anyone find this as nuisance but just for a heads up, my RX480 can't reach a solid 60fps. Which for me is weird for a game like this. It ranges from 56-50fps. Do tell me how the game performs on your rig.
• 

  Riruru

  Oct 26, 2016

  It's almost as kowai as it is kawaii.
• 

  낙제

  Oct 26, 2016

  [b]Highly Recommended That You Wait For This Game To Go On Sale[/b] TL;DR - This is a short puzzle game (even with a bit of exploration on my end it only took a little over 6 hours to complete), and the strategy tag is a mislabel. Still a fun play, but not for $20. ======== Coming on the heels of Firely Diaries, and considering it was a handheld game, I didn't expect a long trip. The overall atmosphere is self-explanatory - a quiet town in the dead of night. No music to intensify or interfere with the experience. Just silence and ambient noises. Since the game is played top down, it's less of a horror game (cute tag is of notable detriment) and far more of a puzzle adventure. The strategy tag really has no place up top, considering it's pretty basic what you can do: hide, run, and die. There [i]is[/i] a tiptoe option for movement, but I never found a use for it. Almost all the enemies are triggered by proximity, and distracting them with objects tended to only work on a few of the basic ones. Knowing when and how to hustle is your best (and later on only) friend. The difficulty is fairly casual, in that items you pick up are still in your log/inventory even after death. While this means some puzzles can be entirely negated by suicide running them, the intent was to soften the blow when confronted with the larger stretches of the game where save points are infrequent or don't exist. This is worthwhile in several scenarios beginning around the third chapter.
• 

  Azralynn

  Oct 27, 2016

  [b][u]See written review below[/u][/b] or watch it here: https://youtu.be/wXPiMHIOVqY [h1]TL;DR: SKIP TO CONCLUSION![/h1] Yomawari: Night Alone is a cute horror adventure game where you play as a little girl searching for your big sister and lost dog. You wander alone in the dark, with only a flashlight to help guide your way. Terrible creatures lurk in the night, and many of them will try to hunt you down. In this game, you don’t have a health bar to monitor, and you are always one-shotted if you get hit, so expect to die quite a bit. The only resource that you need to monitor is your stamina. While in close proximity to monsters, your stamina drains even faster, and the sound of the heartbeat intensifies; pounding louder and faster, it really makes you feel on edge, especially if you don’t know exactly where the enemies are coming from. Trial and error definitely plays a role as you venture around the town, and because of this, you will often learn what to do the hard way. Fortunately, death is very forgiving, and it’s more of an inconvenience than anything else. Some people will view this as a pro, while others will view it as a con, depending on what you hope to get from the game. You get to keep any items you found before dying, and you respawn at either your house, or the last shrine that you quick saved at. You quick save using coins that you find around the world, they are plentiful. [h1]Pros:[/h1] [list][*]audio is amazing; the ambience, music, and sound effects all do a fantastic job at creating an incredibly creepy and tense atmosphere [*]in addition to the overall eeriness of the game, there are a lot of jump scares, and on multiple occasions, the game scared me so badly that I actually yelled out loud [*]the game has a lot of collectibles, and to get the most out of this game, you will want to enjoy the atmosphere, and explore as much as you can [*]graphics look decent enough to accomplish what the game sets out to do - spooky environments, and nice character designs; friendly characters are cute, and the monsters are creepy and weird looking [*]intriguing story (I liked it, but in the end, I still felt like I had some questions left unanswered) [*]customizable controls for the mouse and keyboard, but it’s still best played with a controller (this game is ported over to PC from the PS Vita) [*]shrines you save at also double as fast travel locations once you discover them, so they are very helpful for those looking to backtrack or explore[/list] [h1]Cons:[/h1] [list][*]the game is a bit on the short for the price (especially if you skip exploring, and just go straight for the main objectives) [*]a couple crashes to desktop during the playthrough [*](nitpick) higher game resolution settings would be nice because the default display settings are really low [*](nitpick) even with the low resolution, the performance could have used some improvement as well (using a GTX 970 got me 55-58 frames, with some drops a bit lower than that) [*](nitpick) the worst part about dying is having to walk back, and watch the unskippable mini-cutscenes again (it can be a bit frustrating to have to keep watching if you die a lot in certain areas)[/list] There isn’t much reason to want to replay the game, but there are a lot of collectibles you can find. When you finish the story, it’s nice that you can continue collecting items if you want to. [h1]Conclusion:[/h1] The game took me a bit over 5 hours to complete, but this was with me exploring a fair amount, and dying several times on a few different parts. I enjoyed the game quite a bit, but I admit that there were a couple parts that I found frustrating. Overall, it’s a quality game though, and if you’re looking for decent horror adventure, it’s one worth checking out. I would like to see some improvements made to the resolution settings and performance, but it wasn’t enough to make me not like the game. Keep in mind though, that the game is a bit on the short side for the price, so you might want to wait for a sale. If you like my reviews, please feel free to join my Steam group, and follow my curations [url=http://steamcommunity.com/groups/AzralynnReviews#curation]here.[/url] You can also view this review on my website [url=http://www.azralynn.com/review-yomawari-night-alone-game/]here.[/url]
• 

  Yste

  Oct 28, 2016

  This is a very fun and cute "horror" game. It's sold as horror, though I found the most horrific thing about it to be the breath mechanic when running away. Basically, the closer you are to a monster, the more you panic, thus your little girl lungs cant hold much air thanks to hyperventalating. Overall, it makes sense, BUT making sense does not excuse poor design. This mechanic will be the bane of your existance on every, single, one of the boss "fights". if they had just disabled it on those i'd be fine with it.... Other than a few really cheap kills ( a couple unavoidable) i'd say they have the monster design down well, and is pretty fair. Little girls and horror are my favourite things when mixed together, and this game has a terrifically cutsey, yet gorey feel that I adore~ If you're looking for a pretty nice story with elements of horror, i'd say give it a go. And there's a lot of optional side tasks for you to find and complete, like chasing down headless chickens or playing tag with a horribly disfigured ghost child. And as a last bit of advice, play with a controller, or rebind the keyboard controls. the defaults are unintuitive at best, though i can excuse it due to the game being a port of a psp game. Overall 8/10
• 

  Akka

  Oct 29, 2016

  [h1]Instant kill jumpscares aren't fun the first time, let alone the 30th.[/h1] You play as a little Japanese girl exploring her town after dark. Devoid of people, the only company you'll find are yokai who want to eat you. They're generally invisible, coming into view when you stare at them point blank with your flashlight. A red filter and her pounding heart will give you a vague idea of their proximity, keeping the player fully submerged in suspense. There are over a dozen different demons searching for you, many of which have unique behaviors. You can only tiptoe around some, another lunges at you when you shine light at it, another only chases you from behind. With only one hp, the only way to learn how to deal with each monster is by getting killed by it. This presents a fundamental flaw. The game relies far too heavily on slaying the player with unavoidable instant death tricks. Even if you expect them, not getting killed is far more difficult than it should be. The more often you die, the less scary any game becomes. Enemies are reduced from mysterious horrors to mere inconveniences that set you back five or ten minutes. The game casually acknowledges its own unreasonable difficulty in three ways. Any items you collect stay with you even after death, autosave points are rather frequent, and most telling is the achievement for dying 30 times. Roughly the same number of people have died 30 times as have reached the end of chapter Three (The game totals seven chapters). Don't believe me? http://steamcommunity.com/stats/477870/achievements/ Without exaggeration, I easily died over 50 times. Even if I could see the threat coming (sometimes they're hard scripted to occur in a specific way) dodging was next to impossible. Why might that be? The single worst stamina bar I have ever seen. Stamina bars for running and performing actions are typically a blight (except in games like Dark Souls where it's integral to the combat). It's reasonable for a little girl to run out of breath and eventually slow her pace from exhaustion. However the stamina here is a bit different. The closer you are to an enemy, the faster your bar is consumed. If you're being chased directly then you're exhausted almost immediately. That is absurdly stupid. The isometric camera will block the player's line of sight path with trees and buildings, as if the invisible enemies you can't run away from weren't enough, sometimes the path is completely obscured! I thought of an alternative to fix these problems. If contact with an enemy damaged you, but refilled your stamina instantly so you could escape (adrenaline rush) then this game could be stellar. As it is, the base 1hp gameplay interferes with an otherwise pleasant journey through uniquely haunted Japanese settings. A school, factory, fields, mountains, shrines, rivers, dilapidated urban redevelopments, even another dimension occupied by a massive centipiedes and other outlandish crazy shit. I would have cherished this game if playing it weren't such a chore. At 20 bucks this game is overpriced. You'll be playing three hours, with another hour tacked on for backtracking after your many deaths.
• 

  GumGumCannon

  Nov 1, 2016

  I'll cut to the end here to save those of you not interested some time. Please buy this game. It's available for a mere pittance of $19.99. That's pretty reasonable as far as I'm concerned. For the rest of you that are interested, read on. In Yomawari: Night Alone, you're cast in the role of a young girl, who, while walking her dog Poro one evening, comes across a series of events that causes you to return home without your beloved pooch. The young girl's older sister, seeing that the player's character is emotionally distraught, offers to go out and find the dog, instructing the young girl to stay home until she returns. But as the evening wears on and the darkness of night swallows the sleepy Japanese town whole, the young girl ventures out on her, vowing to find her older sister and Poro. ...Completely unaware of what terrors truly await her. So, before I gush on and on about the game, I will touch on some of the more glaring flaws that the game has. For one, it is arguably somewhat difficult. I say arguably because chances are you will die. A LOT. Taking a page from the 8 and 16 bit era of gaming, the little girl can only be hit once before dying out right, and she has no means of defending herself. Navigating the haunted city will rely on lots of trial and error. Tying into that, the game does not offer much in the way of saving opportunities. Besides the little girl's house, you can't really save. You can take advantage of statues littered throughout the town to do a quick save, but if you up and leave before returning to the house (which is only done between chapters) you WILL lose all progress. The final major disservice for some is that the game is tragically short. I've only been playing for a total of four hours and I'm about halfway done with the game. ALL THAT BEING SAID: 1. The difficulty is curtailed by the fact that all progress (in terms of uncovering the map and any items collected) prior to your death is saved, even if your exact location you were at at the time of your death is not. 2. Similarly, although you can really only save at the main character's home, even if you don't use the aforementioned statues in question, your progress is still saved (again keeping any map progress or items you've added to your inventory). 3. Look, I can barely finish a game that's over 10 hours. While a short game is often tragic when it's a good game, there is such a thing as over staying your welcome and I get the feeling that Yomawari is exactly as long as the story its trying to tell needs to be The only negative comment I can't really argue against is that, as part of the game, when the girl gets scared, her heart beat races faster (alerting you to nearby ghosts) and she can no longer run for as long. I feel this should be the opposite, given the natural effects adrenaline has on the body. But this is about my only major complaint I've seen that I can't disagree with. So now that I've pointed out (and properly argued against) most of the game's major flaws, let's discuss why this game is so fantastic and why you should be playing it. Ya know, if you feel it's your sort of thing. Yomawari: Night Alone is truly a gorgeous game to see in motion. Its art style is wholly unique to the genre and absolutely adorable. But DON'T for one second think that means this game isn't scary. Because you'd be dead wrong (pun not intended). Steeped in Japanese lore, the monsters and ghosts that inhabit the haunted town are indeed quite horrifying. I confess that I honestly don't play too many horror games. Especially these days. The genre, as a whole, just tends to bum me out. And while upon initial play through, the jump scares that permeate most of the genre become tired and predictable, and when that is the major crux of your horror title, it becomes stale very quickly. Yomawari: Night Alone, is more than just jump scares. Yes, the jump scares are there, sure. But it didn't feel like to me that they're constant. On top of that, they are earned through genuine tension that game builds as your character, armed with only a flash light, the option to throw items to distract and the ability to hide behind select objects, navigates the terrifying city at night. Honestly, some of the best scares weren't even the jump scares. It was just the game messing with me. I'll give you an example: When I first started playing the game, I thought I could return to the little girl's house so I could save. As I turned a corner right near the girl's house, I noticed red foot prints started to appear behind her. I stopped and turned the girl around, swiveling her flashlight expecting to illuminate some specter that would then end me. ...Nothing. I kept walking. And the red foot prints continued to follow me. I stopped again, thinking that maybe I had walked through a puddle of red paint. Something that could explain why I couldn't see any sort of pursuer. But when I looked at the red foot prints again, I realized that they weren't shoe prints. They were bare foot prints. They did not belong to the little girl. Panicked, I started to run, but the bloody phantom pursued me at an equal rate. And now the game knew to crank up the terror, as the little girl's heart beat kicked into over drive (as part of the game play, when the little girl panics, her heart beat races faster to alert you to nearby ghosts and ghouls) causing me to lose my pace and make everything suddenly more intense. It wasn't until I got to the house that the foot prints stopped entirely. I have not encountered that phenomenon since. Yomawari is definitely a scary game, in the same way (I feel) that Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem (another criminally overlooked horror game) is a scary game. It mixes all the proper elements that make a good horror game and uses them to great effect. Also like Eternal Darkness, Yomawari is also ACTUALLY fun to play. The reason I never really hoped on the Five Nights at Freddy's bandwagon (or many of the similar games that make up the modern horror gaming sphere) is that they're just not very fun. I like the lore behind FNaF, but I simply can't describe the game as anything remotely close to fun. Meanwhile, Yomawari actually is very engaging. Your main tactic of course is to simply dodge, hide and run away from ghosts, but it is more complex than it sounds. Some ghosts you'll simply have to outrun, but others you won't be able to see without your flash light. Others will leave you be unless you shine the flash light on them. Others still will not attack you so long as you don't run or cause noise to draw them near you (and can similarly be drawn away by chucking a rock). Others are completely harmless and are simply parts of side quests to help build the world (and terrify you). The antagonists of Yomawari aren't so much antagonists as much as they are wild animals, that are best avoided and treated with the proper respect. If you can hack it (as the game does not hold your hand and tell you where to go. You have to figure it out on your own), your curiosity is rewarded not only with the aforementioned side quests and main story line events, but lots of trinkets and world building items to flesh out the game further. I have had a very hard time putting the game down. This of course cuts to one of the very best things about the game. Its story. It would be enough for most games to simply have it be a spooky story and call it a day. Few games really build their tale to anything remotely resembling masterful. Yomawari, on the other hand, while most definitely a horror game, goes a slightly different path. Its story has a deep, emotional core. I won't spoil anything (even though if you look at any of the game's art circulating the internet, I don't really have to), but even if you know what's coming, you're not fully prepared for it. Trust me. Like I said, buy this.
• 

  AigisABC

  Jun 26, 2017

  This is the second game I have bought from this developer and after playing this game I expect I'll be buying from their games again and again. This game was what I hoped for and more, I expected a decent atmospheric horror game with cutesy art and I got an excellent horror game with an eerie but charming atmosphere, fantastic art that ixed cutesy with scary perfectly, great music, enjoyable and challenging gameplay, and an intriguing story. There were multiple times that I felt very moved while I was playing the game, these scenes where you get the chance to learn more about your main character and her world are rewarding. Honestly, half the fun was seeing what comments she would make about items as well as seeing the map. At first I felt the game was too difficult and died many times, but the game is very fair and balances out the difficulty of some encounters with a decent save mechanic. After playing through the game and looking for most of the collectibles my only complaint is that I still don't know if I'm using the rocks correctly! This game is worth your time and money, and so are their other games. I highly reccomend this title!
• 

  Aurani

  Jun 27, 2017

  TL;DR If the entire point of the game is to make me feel as insecure as a little girl exploring a dangerous town after nightfall, then it has certainly succeeded as I feel far too scared to step out the door, play the game, and ultimately be jumpscared by the game crashing. After clearing the prologue you learn that you can save the game by interacting with your diary inside your home, the problem is that you only have access to your home between chapters. While out exploring the town you have to rely on quick-saving by using a consumable at certain waypoints, all this does however is update your checkpoint which you'd return to should you die, the game itself seems to give out a free checkpoint after discovering certain events but no indication of a checkpoint update is given to the player meaning it is very easy to waste one of your limited quick-saves. Since you can only truly save between chapters we face another issue, if the game crashes or the player decides to take a break they'd have to restart at the previous chapter start, I myself crashed 3 times in my 1h of testing this game so it certainly wasn't an enjoyable experience. It doesn't help that the town is fairly big, full of dead-end roads, the map gives a vague estimate of your current position, and there's initially no indication whatsoever which destination you need to reach in order to clear the chapter, meaning you can wander around aimlessly for a very long time until you stumble upon the one cutscene that gives you a vague hint towards the goal. Does this sound frustrating enough? No? Then let's talk about enemies, they come in various forms but all of them (from what I've seen that is) will kill you in 1 hit, while most of them can be avoided through careful maneuvering and keen awareness by paying attention to the audiovisual cue of a pounding heartbeat that signifies the presence of enemies as well as your proximity to them, simply going around them is not always an option, one can distract them by throwing a pebble (another consumable) to the side in order to make an opening, but one little misstep is all it takes to send you back to your previous checkpoint. While you're able to both tiptoe and run, these 2 features come with their own set of issues. Running uses stamina which drains quite slow when no enemies are nearby, the closer you are to an enemy however the shorter you can run (apparently adrenaline rushes function completely opposite of reality in this game), which means once you're too close to an enemy there's no escape as you can only run for a split-second and a lot of enemies are faster than you which means your useless efforts will lead to your inevitable death. Tiptoing on the other hand seems to have no effect on enemies' ability to detect you (unless only some of them are affected), slows you to a crawl, and also zooms the camera in which reduces the vision of your surroundings, it seems to at best serve as a means of slowly moving towards a position to grab an item and then immediately run away. Due to the game being a port from the PS Vita a controller is highly recommended for playing this game, for some reason the mouse cursor remains visible when a controller has been detected. I'd talk about the game's story, atmosphere and soundtrack, but since the game doesn't allow me to make any progress I simply don't have anything to say about it. I'm going to refund this, if NISA ever manages to patch this game so it no longer crashes I'd probably not consider picking it up again as the game feels far too frustrating to waste my effort on. To explain further: If it was possible to save at your home at any point in the game it would be a lot more tolerable, but presumably this ability would render the quick-saves mostly useless and the waypoints themselves would simply serve as unlockable warp points which would easily allow you to continue where you left off, strange, this actually sounds like a very intuitive game mechanic utilized by many other game titles. Other than that I should explain my frustration with this game, there are only so many times I can cope with throwing myself headfirst against a hurdle over and over again until I make some progress only for the game to crash and send me back to square one again. My gripes aren't that the game is hardcore (I'm a 90s gamer, I'm used to them), it's the fact that the game feels far too counter-intuitive and user-hostile by design. Hotaru no Nikki (made by the same dev), while equally hardcore and full of its own set of problems, had a linear path set ahead of you which meant the goal was always in front of you and the hurdle in front of you had to be passed no matter what and often rewarded you with a checkpoint right away, in this game you have no linear path placed in front of you and you have no means of knowing which of the multiple hurdles around you is the "correct one", wasting your time and resources on quick-saving out of fear of losing the progress you think you just made, and then the game crashes which deletes said progress. In short, not enjoyable.
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  Matryoshka

  Aug 31, 2017

  i loved this game it was a fun experience can be a lil overbearing at times but ultimately still great. i didnt get any crashes like others have been stating (maybe im lucky?) fyi heres some tips. you can save at you house anytime time if you just walk in and click on the diary also theres alot of places you can farm coins so saving at shrines is never really an issue if your smart about it. if the enemies are giving you to much problems it not shamefull to look up a guide to how to handle them. you will die a lot. you play as a lil girl not a warrior remember that. items you get in sidequest are very useful for bosses and enemies search them out. not everything is deadly. be brave. all and all, i really enjoyed this game. story 9/10 visuals 9/10 soundtrack/soundeffects 9/10 gameplay 8/10 though im just a humble potatoe farmer so dont take my word for it, you should check it out for yourself.
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  ranarif

  Sep 3, 2017

  If you watch any screenshot of Yomawari without knowing nothing about it, probably you could think that is the perfect game for your little sister. And you couldn't be more wrong, because behind the cute characters and the bright pastel colors, the heart of a real horror game beats. In Yomawari the history is simple and totally an accessory. A girl is searching her dog, later will search her sister. Done. The gameplay as well is very simple. You can just run and hide from monsters, with a stamina bar that depletes very fast. Even with these simple mechanics, the game is though and hardcore. But Yomawari has also one of the most interesting, inspired and wide selection of enemies, and an incredible sense of exploration. Surely a brilliant and original horror game in a 2017 full of clones and uninspired games. Complete review: https://surrealandcreepy.wordpress.com/
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  pblieka

  Jan 26, 2018

  So I wanted to enjoy this game, as it provides a really cute and yet horrific environment. I found as I played though, that there are some major frustrations holding this game back from being great. The quicksave system isn't really a save system, if you leave the game your progress will be lost. You can only truly save by entering your house, which you cannot do whenever you want. Playing this game with limited time doesn't really enable me to pick this game up and put it back down again. The controls are a bit clunky, but not intolerable, however combined with this strange question mark/exclamation point notification system, I find myself wondering what I am trying to interact with half of the time. There are too many enemies, scattered all throughout the level. A heartbeat sound warns you when they are close, but it is going off pretty much through the entirety of your trip. This makes it both kind of annoying, but also really frustrating when you are trying to ignore it and a monster runs out to kill you. Also the foreground, very often gets in the way of the view spectrum. This can be quite tedious to deal with, I don't mind the loss of control too much, but it makes dealing with exploration a pain because of its frequence. Pair this with a lack of direction from the game, and you have a mediocre experience. I can neither say you should play this game, or should not. I feel like most of the issues plaguing this game could be addressed with some QOL fixes, and then this would be something truly special.
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  kiich

  Feb 18, 2018

  Can't recommend this one to people who have problems with frustration in video games. This game sometimes will feature some really awful design decisions with cheap deaths, unreliable controls and hitboxes. Still, visually charming as hell and the town can mimick both the feeling of fear and curiosity while exploring present in the best Silent Hill games. The monster design is pretty unique and I enjoyed the story quite a lot. Yomawari: Night Alone is no masterpiece, but what it does great is indeed great.
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  LocalFire

  Oct 10, 2018

  As much as I enjoyed my time with Yomawari I can't really recommend this game. Maybe I'm to picky with it comes to Horror, Yomawari isn't a bad game, its well made and certainly above the quality of the slapdash horror games that pollute steam, but it suffers from so many of the common problems of its genre. It certainly starts well, the introduction has some real "impact" (you'll get that if you've already played it) and the atmosphere and monsters bring the creep factor. You play the role of a young girl who has lost her dog, your sister goes out to look for it but never comes back and as night falls you set out in search of her. As you wander the empty streets you'll catch glimpses of shadowy figures under the streetlights, figures that literally fade into the dark. Its here that you learn that the various spirits that haunt the town cannot be seen except when light is shone on them. It creates some great moments as you are given audio cues and your stamina drains faster in the presence of these creatures, letting you know something is present as you search with your flashlight to find where it is. Everything sounds good so far, and yeah the opening is good right up to the second chapter, I'd complain that at first you're left abit directionless but you do get to explore the town, once prosperous now run down and encounter a variety of spirits from a distance setting the mood. So where does it go downhill? Well there are several points where the game will unavoidably kill you. Its a cheap death and forces you to replay a section from the last checkpoint avoiding that part where the death is. This might seem like a minor issue but its what kills the horror, repeating the same section repeatedly will quickly innoculate you against fear. This really comes to a head in chapter 2 where some rough hitboxes will constantly catch you on corners getting you killed and forcing a repeat. After that the horror, the fear is gone and what remains isn't enough to sustain the game. Horror games are often slow paced as a means to build tension but once that fear fades it becomes tedious, its something that rears its head in all horror titles but those other games have other features to carry them home, Yomawari does not. The story is basic, little more than a framing device to give you a reason to wander about in the dark. The monster variety at first seems impressive and could offer something if they were mechanically different and required different approaches but 90% of these monsters boil down to just running away from them, with the handful of interesting monsters restricted to small areas of the map and one and done encounters. Its a shame too as there are some really nice little side quests hidden away in the game, waiting for you to stumble into them; many of them only triggering by chance, they keep you on your toes and come as a surprise even late in the game. But in a way its too little too late and I'm sure that the RNG nature of these will mean many less diligent explorers will never even know they're there. Overall I enjoyed Yomawari and while theres alot worse out there, I'd only pick this up if you're a real horror buff.
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  sleepy toad

  Nov 7, 2018

  a VERY careful recommendation from me. Artistically the game is wonderful, it's a pleasure to explore the town and discover each unique area. Or rather it would be a pleasure, because as beautiful as it is to look at, Yomawari Night Alone stutters a lot when it comes to gameplay. Essentially, this is a die & retry game as much (if not more) as it is a horror one. Your death count will quickly start going into the double digits and by the end of the game it'll likely have reached the hundreds. There are plenty of chase sequences where the slightest wrong move will kill you. Outside of these scripted events you'll also encounter hostile spirits around the town, each with unique designs and behaviours. All you can do to defend yourself is outrun the spirits or hide from them using certains props in the environment. You also have usable items that supposedly help you deal with them, but the game never really explains what they do so you might end up not using the items that much. Yomawari Night Alone is divided into 7 chapters, all of which give you a specific task to have to accomplish in a specific part of the town. I thought these were varied enough to remain interesting throughout, and while i beat the game in about 7 hours i still have blinds spots on my map and PLENTY of optional items missing. If you're into treasure hunting, you'll get your money's worth here. Despite its most glaring flaw being its uneven difficulty (the final chapter is probably one of the easiest), i still think Yomawari is worth your time if a challenge doesn't scare you, as it has a wonderful atmosphere and some genuinely great scares in it.