Quarantine Circular is an experimental short text-based game A group of scientists interrogate an alien discovered at the heart of a global pandemic. Work with your team, make decisions and uncover the alien's true intentions.
Very Positive
437 Steam reviews
| LANGUAGE | AUDIO | SUBTITLES | INTERFACE |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | — | Y | Y |
not as good as subsurface circular but it does expand on this world ALOT! i wish tehre were more games that would build out this world even more!
this is a fun game! i played it a while ago and recently revisited it with a few friends. the characters are fun and the story is gripping. simple decisions can feel weighty, characters feel consistent and well written, and the stakes escalate to ensure interesting tensions and conflicts.
Uno de los mejores juegos filosóficos que he jugado. Muchísimas gracias a Bithell por escribir tremenda cosa hermosa. Espero jugarlo después para ver las demás rutas, pese a que me de tristeza tratar mal Gabriel.
Less singular than its spiritual predecessor, Quarantine Circular offers a similar text based science fiction adventure, this time offering the chance to play from multiple perspectives. Rather than a detective game, it veers more towards traditional narrative dilemmas and their consequences. While the writing was still superb and the atmosphere captivating, I felt that some of the characters (one in particular) was unrealistically stereotypical. I understand that this was necessary for narrative reasons, but it could have been done a bit more subtly. Still, I has a lot of fun playing through this high stakes philosophical thriller, and I was surprised by the various ending choices, one branch in particular ([spoiler]the one concerning AI[/spoiler]) coming in very unexpected. For me it is a tiny step down from Subsurface Circular, because I felt that had a tighter and more focused plot. Still, if you're a fan of narrative games, this is a very interesting addition in that genre, with the typically enjoyable Mike Bithell writing to back it up.
subsurface stuck with me much more than this one will but i think that the story was actually pretty dang intriguing and human in this one. i think what really shines through the most is gabriel as a character and as a symbol. it's for sure worth buying for the $3 as i spent. i'd say it's around a 6/10 compared to subsurface which i'd put closer to an 8/10, mainly because of the setting and narrative being a bit less unique and captivating in it's direction. it also lacks as much charm and style but the focus is the story anyways i suppose!
Review from 2018:
Another Mike Bithell joint that is loosely connected to the previous games, choices create far more branches, the story was fantastic and the music was really on point as well
После относительного успеха Subsurface Circular многие нарекли Майка Бителла мессией от инди. Хотя как по мне вопросов к его третьей игре хватало. Да были интересные философские размышления на тему роботов и их места в нашей жизни, выбор реально имел последствия, но предсказуемый финал здорово портил общее впечатлений. Quarantine Circular попытался зайти немного с другой стороны, земляне переживают массовую эпидемию, а к ним прилетает непонятно как настроенный инопланетянин и по факту в диалоге с ним решается судьба нашей планеты. Вот только в этот раз даже нет иллюзии выбора, нас практически сразу заставляют положительно относиться к гостю и постепенно ведут опять же к пробиваемому завершению. Хотя как по мне учитывая сеттинг можно было сделать куда более напряженное повествование. Так что по мне не дожали 6.0 исключительно за нетрадиционный геймплей.
I was on the fence about Quarantine Circular. It tells a compelling story, but it feels lackluster and overly verbose. This game leaves me feeling like it could've been an email. I would play Subsurface Circular instead if you haven't picked it up.
Simple hour long adventure game. I quite enjoyed it. Story and characters were well written.
Not as good as subsurface but still a good narrative game with a spin that I hadn't seen before, it's short but still really worth it if you enjoy narrative games.
Criminally underrated Text adventure that tackles what the world would do in a global pandemic. Too bad we know now. Still, well worth a play for the brilliant writing alone.
Project Pantheon 17/275
So - This is very much like Subsurface Circular - a short narrative choice driven game, with a very interesting premise. It's not so much a mystery as its predecessor, but a story that requires you to navigate moral quandaries while switching perspectives between characters in the story. It feels like a natural expansion on the systems that Subsurface was based on ( and based in the same world too!) but for some reason, the narrative itself feels flat and I can't help but feel like it falls short of the tightly written story of the first game.
It's not a bad game tho - the writing is weaker, but worth playing through... though I really have major gripes with the way one of the characters in the story was written. They stick out like a sore thumb, like a poorly implemented trope instead of a real person in the game's world like the others.
Enjoyed it a lot, probably more than Subsurface circular. Not long to finish but has different endings I believe.
Has some interesting choices and the story is rather good for something so short.
Only thing I found annoying was the constant screen wobble, no option to turn it off and nothing online to find a fix or change this setting.
Otherwise, not a bad short story.
Fun, good, ~90 minute game. I was pro-alien from the get-go. The mystery wasn't as engaging or complex as in their previous game, [i]Subsurface Circular[/i], but it would spoil it if I say why. I got the good ending ([spoiler]Teng gets beat up[/spoiler]) on my second try.
I wish I could recommend this game but I cannot. After my second playthrough, it immediately become clear that this game has too many poor points despite an otherwise okay initial visual novel experience.
* The UI is stylish but has very poor feedback. On my first playthrough I missed several moments to ask questions because topics to talk about that you unlock are kept separate from actual dialogue options and are only usable in certain moments, indicated by them lighting up slightly. Furthermore, a particular character has dark grey dialogue options, which just ends up looking like the buttons are disabled.
* While the general writing is okay, too many dialogue options amount to be polite or be cruel while pretending there's moral or political nuance to these choices. This is made worse by the fact you are often given the option to take a 180 turn on your current stance in the worst way, which doesn't really feel like player agency so much as a bizarre self-destruct button.
* As mentioned, the game doesn't hold up well with multiple playthroughs. Mostly the game just doesn't feel like it has much to offer despite its seemingly large amount of choices to make. The reason I played the game twice was because the first felt like a "bad" ending, and after I corrected my one mistake for a "good" ending. Past that, I didn't feel like I missed anything special or hidden. I certainly don't find the game entertaining enough to scour for secret routes.
* A particularly frustrating part of the game is code puzzles. For some reason at a couple (at least maybe there is more) of points in the game you are expected to look at your character notes (which is fine its just more reading which is what the game is comprised of) and then solve a puzzle. The very first puzzle you get is literally just reading the answer in the notes and that's fine, but depending on your choices later you have to solve some odd ones that destroyed all the flow I had with the story. Both of the puzzles require knowledge that the game doesn't provide you, or the use of an internet search. There is a "hint" system which is also extremely unhelpful, since it literally just tells you to read the notes.
* Some of the character interactions feel a bit strange and unbelievable, and sometimes it feels like characters have just forgotten things that were already covered, though this is somewhat forgivable.
Игра от создателей неплохой Thomas Was Alone. Собственно, именно это и привлекло моё к ней внимание когда-то и по этой причине она оказалась в моей библиотеке. Представляет собой текстовый квест, оформленный в виде группового чата в каком-нибудь мессенджере. На фоне стоят и шевелятся персонажи, участвующие в беседе, летают чайки, шумит океан. Ну, т.е. это, по сути, визуальная новелла. По какой-то странной традиции (возможно, у автора даже есть объяснение, зачем он так делает), текст только на английском. Мне, в принципе, обычно всё равно, но как бы... игра, в которой весь геймплей это читать текст. Соответственно, для меня отсутствие локализации в такой игре равносильно корявой стрельбе в каком-нибудь шутере или там кривым хитбоксам в каком-нибудь соулслайке.
Ну да бог с ним, с текстом. История: её трудно описать, чтобы сильно не наспойлерить, но я попробую, используя максимально общие понятия. Происходит первый контакт человечества с инопланетной расой, инопланетная раса может оказать некое влияние на судьбу человечества, в зависимости от непродолжительного общения представителя инопланетной расы с несколькими представителями расы человеческой. В принципе, почти всё тут просто и линейно, да и сама история сводится к поверить/не поверить рассказам пришельца. В общем и целом, некоторый интерес есть - персонажи не безликие, диалоги местами неплохие. Но тронула ли меня эта история? Нет, не особо.
The game from 2018 with the main themes of plague and AI. They predict it all :)
You know for a game that's strictly reading it sure is stressful
I liked the story in the first one better. I really don't care about invading aliens when I've only seen the face of one. In this one I "feel" like there's no stakes, no danger, no stress, i'm good. The story of a robot revolution works better IMO. And the plot twist in the 1st game was amazing. That said, I do like this game style in-comparison to the first game, where instead of sitting in 1 location, you see yourself walk off, control multiple characters, day/night, a different location(even though its on the same boat, but different room). You can't do that in the first game, in fact the first game is so limited. If there are future games, don't do anymore games like this. Let us walk around and interact with stuff for God sakes.
All the characters were one dimensional. Teng and Lisa were insufferable.
Writing was subpar comparative to the predecessor "Subsurface Circular".
Tempted to get a refund, but for $1.70, I can't really complain.
Overall, a playable experience that left lacking greater in-depth writing and sense of urgency as every choice you made actually does not matter.
Muy bueno, aunque me sigue gustando más Subsurface Circular (por poco).
Impecable desde lo técnico, como suele entregar Bithell. Las interfaces, bien trabajadas en conjunto con todo un fondo animado en 3D, hacen que se sienta más como un cortometraje que como una novela visual.
Muy recomendado si te gusta la ciencia ficción. Eso sí, el precio regional en LATAM y MENA está desactualizado, por lo que diría que esperen a que entre en oferta.
my biggest issue with quarantine circular is similar to my issue i had with subsurface circular, the previous game from this developer: it's just too damn short. both games are relatively simple but very memorable nonetheless. the UI and storytelling both felt more fluid in this game and the art style/animation gave more life to the characters in this story. overall, this is a pleasant experience, exploring an interesting concept about aliens, and humanity banding together to overcome adversity. i feel that this is a much better implementation than the predecessor in this series.
It’s a tight, thought-provoking sci-fi game where you play as part of a team communicating with an alien in a tense, isolated setting. The game focuses on dialogue and decisions, making you think about ethics, communication, and what it really means to understand something completely alien. It’s a little on the short side, but the writing is top-notch, making it a solid pick for anyone who loves story-driven games. Definitely worth checking out if you’re into deep, reflective narratives.
Interesting visual novel with quite a few endings! ~2 hours per playthrough.
This visual novel felt like no other I had played. Despite its short length, it manages to build up a whole universe-as well as characters and organisations which all have different philosophies and motivations.
Interessante, mas não tão bom quanto o anterior.
bithell doing their thing
A very strong first-contact story. You play as different characters who are on a medical vessel that has imprisoned the first alien contacted by humanity. During this time, humanity is being attacked by a plague that is devastating populations. You have a lot of decisions to make. Do you trust Gabriel, the alien? Is Gabriel responsible for the plague attacking humanity? Can you work with Gabriel to cure the plague?
I really enjoyed this game.
I recommend this to anyone who likes short narrative driven text based games because this too is well written and somewhat unique, like Surface Circular from the same devs.
Here is what you need to know:
?This is like a visual novel of 3D scenes. Although everything is in decent 3D, there's no character animations except when there is significant movement, such as a character entering or exiting a scene, a major action, or an escalation of an argument.
+All dialog is text based but well written.
?Music is fine, nothing really impressive to me.
+Expect 1.5 to 2 hours per playthrough if you dont skip a scene, but afterwords individual scenes are selectable.
-I was not very motivated to replay it again because I think the different endings and major choices that lead to them are relatively obvious.
?In game hints are not as helpful with the prior game if you get stuck, because the few puzzle/riddles are from a small set of notes, but they're not as clear to figure out.
+"Dev commentary" available after one playthrough is done in a unique format that I recommend at least trying for a bit.
Very engaging narrative science fiction. A interactive exchange between a ship's crew members and a massive crab alien. Absolutely worth the price of admission. Will checkout the dev commentary on a second playthrough sometime.
Interesting, engaging, and even a bit funny at times. Love a game experience that makes you think a bit about life on a larger scale, ol' money bags Mike hits another one outta the park
Yes.
I cannot describe my seething hatred for Teng. gud game though
The story was fun, get to play characters with different personalities and different choice of words which is new and refreshing. Like previous circular games the story gets you thinking of the what ifs.
[spoiler] I'm glad there's closure at the end unlike the Subsurface [/spoiler]
You don't need Subsurface Circular to understand this story, but it gives you a little nod to the events in SC that it's a connected universe and all possible end from that game is plausible in this game.
I bought this game because I completd the first game in the series Subsurface Circular and thought this was a sequel (it's not but it is set in the same universe), and I do like Mike Bithell's style of writing.
Like the first game this is a well written choose your own adventure type game.
Think end of the world plague with an alien storyline delivered in an interesting story with limited but nice graphics.
Two very small ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ is that the endings feel so unfinished and sometimes it's quite easy to miss a conversation point as they can be greyed out even if they offer something new.
Apart from a small design niggle and the fact it just sort of ends , its still worth playing for a few hours of interesting dialogue and an enjoyable gaming expierence.
While I prefer Subsurface Circular, I still believe this title is worth playing, particularly for the price it was listed during the steam sale I purchased it.
The narrative feels less complex this time around, but perhaps that's because interventionism and a global pandemic aren't as foreign as embodied artificial intelligences. Additionally, the usage of a translation device makes the lack of voice acting less impactful than it was in its predecessor.
Only real criticism is that by spreading out the branches more the loss of quality of life improvements that have become ubiquitous amongst visual novels, specifically skipping over previously heard dialogue and the ability to save at any point in time, are more notable. Consider taking a break between play throughs/alternate endings to avoid monotony setting in.
Bithell shorts are...short. But effective!
Wow... premonition much? The game came out in 2018, some time before a certain real-life quarantine made us learn what it is trying to teach us the hard way.
Always love what Bithell games does.
This is a fascinating, mentally stimulating, sort of visual novel-style 100% narrative game.
Highly recommended to anyone that likes scifi narrative driven games.
Great Game!
Not as good as subsurface circular but still p good. 6/10
An excellent evolution of the formula presented in Subsurface Circular, with a bit of an expansion in scope, style, and aesthetics.
The subject matter is timely, interesting, and engaging, and handled well, as is the case for its predecessor.
It flows nicer and feels faster to play through, which is a nice mark for how well structured and paced it is.
Definitely worthwhile.
A sort-of sequel to the excellent Subsurface Circular, Quarantine Circular takes place in the same world (it seems), on a very different day at a very different place. More sci-fi, question-your-morals fun as can be expected from Bithell Games, with boosted polish versus the one that came before. If you read fast, it's over too soon, but is somewhat replayable to explore different outcomes. Especially pertinent post-pandemic.
Muy bueno
very interesting premise!
A mild recommendation for an okay story, that's nowhere near close the level of Subsurface Circular.
My biggest gripe with this game is: the alien is not alien enough. This story could have been entirely about humans and the interstellar part was neither explored in any meaningful way, nor added anything meaningful. The aliens just feel way too much like our own regular humans, except they look funny.
My complains about the plot are a bit spoilerific, I'll try not to get overly specific though. [spoiler]Aliens' motivations align WAY too much with humans' needs and goals. There's pretty much no reason to reject their help. And you can see that most players think along this way. If you check the achievements for the endings. people choose the ones, where you get help from Gabriel almost 30% more often then the others.[/spoiler]
The story itself is pretty interesting and thought provoking. It is not explored properly though. The characters are a little bit of a one note kinda deal and are too easily convinced any time there's an argument. The switching of the perspectives didn't add anything. Trying to change someone's mind in one scene and then immediately swapping to that character in the next just doesn't work. Was I supposed to play god and force them to act in spite of themselves to achieve "my" goal? Or was I supposed to roleplay as each and one of them? Getting 10-15 minutes per character is simply not enough.
The themes of this game could very well spiral into something great, but it's all ends up being almost too simple, considering the circumstances and thus the peaks are never reached.
Overall, Quarantine Circular is an interesting short story, that could get your mind cogs spinning, but do not expect a grandiose tale of universal proportions.
A much better implementation than the predecessor (Subsurface Circular). An overall pleasant experience, exploring an interesting concept about aliens, and humanity banding together to overcome adversity. The gameplay is very simple and straightforward ( just dialogue choices) but the writing is quite well done, and overall I felt engaged in its story.
Corta pero intensa e interesante, no se alarga innecesariamente ni introduce mecánicas que sobran para contar su historia. Como se dice: lo bueno, si breve, dos veces bueno.
The visuals are nice. The story pace and character depth seem appropriate for a story of its (admittedly short) length. It was an enjoyable experience and well worth the price imho.
My one petty criticism would be about the nature of a codeword puzzle sequences later in the story. It did not add much to the story. While likely serving as a push to read the notes of all the characters, hinting at access to all the notes was more than enough for me. As such the codeword sequence just feels unnecessary to me, especially because the player is forced to figure out the codeword to continue the story. Failure is not an option.
FYI:
I first played this game in mid 2019 and enjoyed it. Coming back to get all the achievements after the Corona pandemic felt incredibly surreal.
After playing all the storylines, I consider the selfish choice to be the most fitting one from an RP point-of-view.
<Subsurface
Not as good as Subsurface Circular, but still enjoyable as a one time thing. Like Subsurface, I feel like the short length holds the story back.
Another wonderful game from the Bithell team. Has one of my all time favourite tracks and intriguing story/gameplay. Definitely worth a try!
Well, that was genuinely interesting!
I enjoyed my time with it a lot and will probably replay it in a few days or weeks.
It's definitely worth the price, less than a movie ticket, can give you entertainment for a lot longer, hast just as interesting a story and makes you engage with it A LOT more than any movie would.
I really feel this is conceptually a movie but elevated massively by making it an interactive experience, really cool.
If anybody is looking for an intriguing, relatively short, and thought-provoking game then I highly suggest checking this out. I played Subsurface Circular and absolutely loved it (I wish I had left a review for that too); Bithell Shorts are an absolute pleasure to play through. It's been sometime since this one but I really hope they can make more of these...it was an absolute joy to play through.
Quarantine Circular é um bom suco de Sci-fi, conta uma história boa e contida em cerca de 3 horas e deixa querendo mais. Único ponto negativo é que não tem fast-foward então tentar pegar outros finais é demorado. Recomendo a qualquer um pra jogar numa tarde
:)
Very short, but an excellent story
A fun way to pass four hours with a decent story.
I really like the premise and how it was executed
The 'puzzles' weren't really any challenge
Being able to act/speak as different characters was a nice difference from Subsurface Circular
The game has a few more endings than Subsurface Circular, but I was interested in all of them
Would recommend if you have played through Subsurface Circular (and liked it) and want something to pass the time.
God I love Gabriel, I wish Gabriel was real
Very cool switching between different characters perspectives and goals. Didn't enjoy it as much as Subsurface but I think that might be because I liked the setting more of that one and your purpose in that game is more straightforward.
Still, great one session game.
Improves on some aspects of Subsurface Circular but lacks the fun atmosphere and more interesting premise of it. Still enjoyable but not as good as the previous game.
Great lil Gem of a game
I enjoyed the choices and intend to wait a year before playing though again to see what choices and outcomes I get.
Good game, great story. 8/10
Brilliant narrative conversation-tree game and a follow-up to Subsurface Circular. There is a lot of depth and mastery in the exploration of the several entangled themes: collaboration versus conflict, trusting your kind and strangers, galactic-wide political ethics, pandemics (those who played this game before 2020 and paid attention must have been a little bit more equipped when COVID broke out)...
I found a lot of bits of anarchist philosophy in there, plus some quite Star-Treky thoughts and settings (who ever respected the Prime directive anyway).
Choices do matter, and a few are difficult to make out the consequences, for those who like the feeling to be played by the game.
Once again the cheap, short game delivers so much.
ye
It intrigued me early on, but Quarantine Circular commits the cardinal sin of roleplaying - it forces you into a tiny box where all of your character's dialogue options are terrible, for no meaningful reason.
All of the characters are one-dimensional, as the game is too short for any of them to have motivations that feel realistic. But at the very least, the game could have left me with some sense of control over the actions of the characters I'm ostensibly meant to be playing. Instead, I had to spend two entire chapters as an entirely unrelatable character with dialogue options that ranged from ill-advised to just plain idiotic.
The jumping perspectives could have been a nice idea, I guess, but with a story so firmly on rails I just ended up feeling narrative dissonance between the version of a character that I was "playing," and the version of them on the other end of subsequent conversations.
After the first few conversations, I no longer felt like I had any meaningful control over the story. Another game might have at least intrigued me enough to want to play through it a second time to see other outcomes, but I just don't feel like putting myself through another two hours of this extremely slow-paced game.
Amazing story. The game is short but it has replayability.
if you liked Subsurface Circular stop reading Reviews and grab it.
Avoid Spoilers!
Im happy to say that I recommend this game because of its story even though i personally didnt like it when compared to the original, i mean the story was interesting and thought-provoking but I wasnt blown away either, I thought it was building up to something and then it ends, so I guess the ending was too abrupt??? but overall a good game, just not that great
kısa ama hoş bir oyun, ekibin diğer oyununu da denemelisiniz.
Interesting, but sometimes drags. You do feel the weight of your choices by the end though, which is commendable. Charming and makes you think. The music is good, too!
Quarantine Circular is a text adventure game in similar vein to Bithell's previous game, Subsurface Circular. However, whereas Subsurface Circular is presented one with truly dubious situation where there is no "right" answer, QC suffered from multiple problems, including a different narrator/avatar per chapter, as well as a very xenophobic attitude that came off as overdone. However, it is still recommended, due to needing more games like this in the market.
You start as Marc, who was only told to go setup AI translator routine. When he arrived on the ship in the middle of the ocean, he realized he's setting up AI conversation / translation with a genuine ET alien. But through the conversation, you (the player) realize a couple things: the world is suffering a pandemic and even a combined containment fleet from around the world can't stop it, only slow it. Right now, they are near the city suffering from the latest outbreak.
Assume the role of a translation AI engineer, a paranoid security agent, a naive PhD student, a inquisitive professor, a cautious admiral, and as the alien himself. What is the alien's agenda? Can we trust him/it? Can you convince the others to your viewpoint? Can you save humanity? What if you have to compromise your principles?
While there are a couple different paths, you eventually end up in nearly the same place, and have to make a huge decision.
The biggest problem, IMHO, is the shifting perspective. Subsurface Circular have you as one character only... but in this one, you shift perspective from chapter to chapter, and in one, it even shifts WITHIN the chapter as one character forcibly join the conversation. This can be problematic as each character has distinct personalities and you felt you don't know the character to give a response as that character.
Furthermore, some of the actions, decisions, and attitudes are problematic. There was at least a few occasionsl where whatever I chose was ignored and a scripted event happens instead.
[SPOILER]The story of how "Gabriel" the alien came to be on the ship was he was in the middle of the city in quarantine zone and was attempting to help people, when security team basically killed his partner and stunned him, then moved him to a ship, locked a stun collar on him so he can't leave a circle on the helipad. Really? Is that how we treat first contact nowadays?[/SPOILER]
All in all, QC is better, but writing seems to be a little worse. It's still recommended.
small experiment from Mike Bithell, very well done
not as tightly written as the first considering there are more characters involved and all of them are playable, which is something that wasn't entirely to my enjoyment considering you even have to play a character that is a murderer and torturer. the shifts in point-of-view did not add a different understanding to the situation but rather just solidifies what is already known and in progress, so it really wasn't necessary in my opinion.
perhaps this game could work as an alternative meyer-briggs test since each ending points to a different way people would handle the situation. if you're unsure about your new friend's political and social position in society, just ask them to play this and check their ending.
I gave a thumbs down to Subsurface Circular, but I had to give a thumbs up for Quarantine Circular.
Visuals is as amazing as always. Text is readable but would be nice if I can adjust the size and width of the text block.
There are more branching choices and the choices has a bigger impact on the story than in the previous game. Normally I hated branching outcomes as I didn't like replaying games but for short games, I actually quite enjoy them.
I also like that there are more animation and scenes. A change of the background is really nice and makes the game less boring.
It is also quite educational, teaching a thing or 2 about pandemic control.
It was an almost great game, it has so much going for it. An interesting story, unique characters etc. But in the last last 2 acts it forces your hand and falls short of the great promis the game holds. It has 2 failings for me.
First it forces word puzzles into the game, yet the worst for me was the way it forced my hand in the last act to send the character i wanted there the least, giving me a false choice. This was infurirating as all the greatness of the game fell short for one missinforming choice that you cannot step back from. It ruined all the interest i had put into the game.
best to quarantine this circular away from you;
it copies the format from subsurface, yet drops the AI context that made the format make sense;
it's too concerned with fulfilling its titular and sequential obligations;
i don't like the characters and wish i could have made choices i was not allowed;
the philosophy and biology don't feel nearly as interesting, especially on the other side of a real pandemic;
filling up a "convince them" meter despite high conversational tensions is just not fun for me
The ending does feel a bit more rushed than its predecessor, but I enjoyed it a lot nevertheless. Definitely recommend it to whoever's looking for a short but good narrative time.
Wild but intriguing premise (though, "quarantine" is now familiar to everyone, unlike on release of this game). Nothing follows up on it, though. Each chapter, almost everything is thrown out the window and you start a new short story... if you could call it that, even - some parts were silly puzzles that seemed to merely pad the playtime and, unfortunately, weren't even immersive. It's especially silly when you do wordplay in English while the setting is that nobody speaks English. I gradually lost faith in narrative and didn't care at all by the end. Didn't have any impact on me.
Very well written, thoroughly entertaining!
[h3]Narrative Trust Issues[/h3]
Quarantine Circular is another short narrative title from Bithell studios and does not only share the part of the name, Circular, with their prior game Subsurface Circular, but also uses an engaging dialogue system, albeit somewhat evolved. However, I'm not sure if I should call it evolution or rather a form of mutation as it ultimately led to my feelings of disappointment over an otherwise perfectly fine game.
[h3]Couldn't wait to reach the end...[/h3]
Quarantine Circular confronts the player with a dire situation of a world that fell in great parts to a global pandamic, assisted through the overly excessive use of antibiotics which led to resistent germs. A scientist ship made contact with a single alien, which they now want to interrogate, unsure about his origin and intentions. This is a great background story and you're thrown right into it, jumping from one person to another at a time. The graphics look great while doing so, especially for this kind of narrative game. It runs flawless, also on Steam Deck. That is where I did my playthroughs so if you have one, go for it. The sound is okayish but overall neither impressive nor exactly important for the rest of the game.
The gameplay is all about getting information by asking the right questions or the right person, sometimes also at the correct time. Unlike Subsurface Circular, which only gave you the choice of speaking as a Tek-detective, you're now part of everybodys decision making, which, in my eyes, is one point that makes Quarantine Circular as unfulfilling as it does turn out to be in the end. Dont' get me wrong - it is fun to be in the mind of the alien, whose agenda might still be unclear, trying to convince the others. Then you're one of the scientists who eagerly wants to know more, trying to find the correct questions and answers.
However, not every person is fleshed out as I had expected. Also, I couldn't shake off the feeling that, while there are branches - you can reach multiple endings - there were ways, was one way, that seemed to be the correct one and should therefor be preferred to use. One particular character in the team was written so full of hate, although she was standing for things that would totally make sense. Fear, Caution, Protection. Sometimes I was surprised by how bad things turned out when I said something that would, in my book, trigger a very different reaction from a thinking person.
Also, opposed to Subsurface Circular, where you're in the shoes of one Tek all the time and getting more and more comfortable with his reasoning and possible loss of it, you don't have that much time to muster up all the empathy needed to get all these different roles under one emotional umbrella. In the end you feel less for each of them. Speaking of ending.
[h3]...until I did[/h3]
To me, the ending(s) felt unsatisfiying at best and illogical at worst, at least in parts. Sure, there were some twists and turns, which I can't say without spoilering too much, but it all came down to the behavior of every character and the choices I was left with. See, I read some different oppinions about this game after I finished it and I found one that perfectly mirrors my feelings when I'm comparing this to Subsurface Circular. In Subsurface you were ultimately given choices that felt tough because of their ambivalent nature.
Here I was like - okay there are a couple of choices to make and different outcomes to head on to - but there is only one that really makes sense if you've just played this game with these characters in this world setting. It wasn't tough to decide by any means. Which is a bummer since the way to reach the end felt very rewarding sometimes. Overall, the writing was too inconsistent to make every person in this drama a credible actor. Sure, you could go for all endings, seeing what minor or major difference they might have to offer but I always got mixed feelings when characters forgot what they said or stand for 5 chapters ago.
[h3]What remains[/h3]
If you haven't played Subsurface Circular, you could play this first as no information from the prior game has impact on this. I honestly would recommend to do so since I find the first game to be superior in writing, story development and conclusion. After finishing Subsurface, my head was full of pictures, thoughts and lore constructions. Quarantine managed to make me think as well but I already lost the emotional connection to its base topic.
Still, the writing is good and the world is interesting as it unfolds through your different choices in the dialogues. Sometimes I just wished for better or rather more realistic outcomes which actually fulfilled the intent my words seemed to have in the first place. I couldn't shake of the feeling of a slight agenda which, in a choice based game, always feels pointless to me. Make me think but don't tell me which thoughts are actually correct. This game could have been way better if they had tried to cut some people out and used that amount of now free time to make the rest of the party more realistic and reasonable.
[code][i]If you like reviews about indie games and want some soundtrack recommendations, consider joining [url=https://steamcommunity.com/groups/indiestructible] INDIEstructible [/url] and follow [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/41972991/]my curations[/url].
A good narrative game in it's whole, but the endings are very underwhelming
Bought it on sale and didn't regret the purchase or the time spent on it
Gabriel best girl/boy/enbie
An interesting short story. I was a bit disappointed with the lack of player choice, but worth it nonetheless.
Make more games like this, please.
I am happy to say that this is legitimately one of the best short story games I have played.
I can only imagine the masterpiece that could be cooked up by this team with a few million quid and a decent turn around time.
9/10- Seahorse games
A great followup to the previous game.
This is a visual novel with multiple endings, buoyed upwards by strong writing (even if one of the characters is cartoonishly unpleasant/adversarial) and good graphics (they serve as the backdrop to the dialogue choices).
Positives:
-Writing- It's kind of dropping you right into the middle of things, with zero preamble, but this media res approach works quite well, and allows the story to cut to the core of the matter. Most of the characters are distinctly written, so you can tell who is who just by their manner of "speech", and with the exception of the security officer, the majority of the dialogue is believable (she is written to just be inexplicably xenophobic and belligerent to a virtually malevolent degree).
-Graphics- There are some moving parts, but the scenes are largely static other than shifting mouth parts for the alien and adjustments of posture and poise for the armoured humans. Given as this is a game based almost exclusively on text, this is scarcely a concern though. What is on display is more than competently done, and while a little more movement/variety of scenery and/or character design wouldn't have been remiss, by and large the game is quite visually appealing.
Meh:
-Endings/Achievements- In order to get all the endings and achievements, you will have to play multiple times (use the walkthroughs on Steam to learn the best order of chapters to select and restart from to reduce the amount of time you spend hoovering up the last few achievements), which would be fine except that you will have seen all the dialogue there is to offer MULTIPLE times, and even if you adjust the speech/paragraph flow toggles to their fastest, it still takes way to long to get through further playthroughs with little additional
changes to plot/dialogue just for the different endings, and there is NO way to skip dialogue.
Negatives:
-Security Officer's personality- She's just so needlessly unpleasant, and there is zero explanation as to why she is such an impossible to like human being, and how someone as bellicose and aggressive as her ended up working in a medical team to try to cure a lethal pestilence beggars the imagination.
All in all, while I found getting the different endings to be a bit of a chore, especially with zero skippable dialogue, and one of the characters is unrealistically, cartoonishly mean for no appreciable reason, this is still a fun and intellectually rewarding visual novel.
Recommended!
Fantastic quasi-sequel to Subsurface. I like the aesthetics and in-universe justifications for the mechanics of the first game a little better, but this is still quite good. Highly recommended.
*POSSIBLE SPOILERS* [as if there is anything to spoil though]
Atrocious writing on all levels – from shallow characters and amateurishly unrealistic dialogues to primitive and lazy overall narrative structure. Emotions are virtually absent. I won’t delve deep into this but anyone who read a good book in their lifetime risk of facepalming all through the game. Some of the most jarring things are: unbelievably willing cooperation options (if you choose to follow this path when possible) and absolutely unjustified, discordant and silly 180 shift of the alien’s persona and attitude in the denouement (don’t know if it’s present in every paths).
What was the purpose of multi-character perspective? Should the player believably role-play each of them or break immersion and just work up their way for the goal they chose? Was it to raise player’s uncertainty and make them fluctuate between different points of view? (spoiler: doesn’t work with such poor writing and/or such short stage time for each character.)
Branching mechanics are blatantly crippled – you get stuck in notorious endless dialogue loops until you choose the right option, you get hilarious utterances like “we need a friendly face for a negotiator; let’s take *N*” (by far the most antagonistic and openly hostile character, which is absurd, and you (as a commander that makes final decision!) can’t object to this choice).
Because of primitive branching system gameplay is pretty much non-existent. Some sort of ultra-light puzzle element is laughable and simply superfluous and has no stake because you can fail as many times as you want with no consequences.
It even seems to me that the spiritual predecessor Subsurface Circular had a bit more complex and less obviously on-rails focus point mixing mechanic, but I’m not sure, it’s been a while since I played that first game.
Visuals and sound are fine for the genre.
If you crave for a good dialogue driven narrative experience (which is really rare) try playing free Paper Dino’s Save the Date. Such an innovative game seems to be totally obscured while the likes of Quarantine Circular get 300+ positive reviews.
Thought the writing was weaker than Subsurface Circular. Loosely connects with SC, but didn't feel as engaging. At its most fun when you take characters to their archetypal extremes, but not everyone is equally interesting, and some dialogue choices feel redundant or otherwise limited.
its like Detroit:become human and as good in 4th of the time which is actually better in a way bc u can change some decisions without another 10 hrs of game
This is my second game by Mike Bithell, and I absolutely loved it! He and his team have such a talent for crafting engaging and concise stories.
Quarantine Circular made a lot of improvements over Subsurface Circular. The UI and storytelling both felt more fluid, and the artstyle and animations, which similar, gave more life to the characters of this story. The soundtrack was excellent - eerie and driving. All of this came together to create a wonderful interactive story that I thoroughly enjoyed.
I do have one complaint about Quarantine Circular, though. I wish it was easier to see the outcomes of different actions. There are numerous endings to this game, and in order to see them all I had to play certain parts over and over, and essentially play through the full game twice. I didn't really mind it - each replay allowed me to select different dialogue options and roleplay differently, but I did feel that this could've been done more efficiently.
I'm hoping that someday we'll see another entry into the "Circular" universe - these have been some of my favorite gaming experiences!
Another pretty to look at text-based adventure, a successor to the also very good Subsurface Circular.
For some reason, I found this story more intriguing than the one in SC, which made me come back to this game and seek the remaining achievements, unlike the first Circular.
The art and sounds are on point once again, but the lack of movement compared to its predecessor is definitely a con. Like in the first game, there aren't really very many or difficult puzzles to solve, except one before the final 7th act, which can range from medium to high difficulty depending on your previous choices. You'll know which one.
It's biggest flaw, like others have said, is the ending. [spoiler] I don't know what on earth possessed the dev to end the game with just some script. It's evident that a lot of effort and thought was put into this game, so I can't fathom why they would come up with such a cheap and rushed ending. A simple static picture as a background to the script in each of the endings would have done wonders. A real shame. [/spoiler]
Despite that, this game is another terrific effort by the same dev that made Subsurface Circular, and I do recommend it wholeheartedly, especially if you've played and liked the first game.
Overall an enjoyable game with an interesting story that you can direct towards one of several endings depending on your opinion. The characters were well done with their own personality. My only complaint is the save system. In an effort to get some different endings (and the corresponding achievements) I loaded from the middle of the game. There are two more endings I could have gotten if I could load the last chapter from this partial-replay, but there's no way to save that. I would have had to replay from the middle another twice. Allowing manual saves would resolve this problem.
Verdict: 8/10
As great as Subsurface Circular, great storytelling with great characters and diverse choices to make.
Even more relevant in our current pandemic state, really interesting.
Great game for killing a couple of hours!
I liked it a lot more than Subsurface Circular, it feels more polished, and the story is more engaging.
The game looks great.
Ambiance doesn't get in the way.
Game mechanics are good.
[i]BUTs[/i]
The start of the game is enjoyable, but the moment more characters are thrown to the mix it fell apart for me. At times it felt like a whiplash when a character I played honest and open, now that I do not control them - acts like a little prick.
The story itself is intriguing, but playing puppeteer to so many characters in turns lessened it. Trying to pull information from a character I previously was felt needlessly frustrating.
Most characters are interesting, but a few are just cardboard level "people".
Due to the BUTs I personally do not recommend the game.
A brief, excellent experience.
quarantine, everyone's favourite right now!
♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ banger
Played the other circular title , had such a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ blast , but for some reason decided to wait a long ass time before playing this one , its ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ good. Don't Make my mistake , play this!
Art was pretty , Music was pretty.
A wonderful game which made playing through diplomatic negotiations fun and engaging
