I have played a bit of PSX Iblard game (English fan translation). A sort of proto-walking simulator with light puzzle elements, very charming environments (the game is an excuse to traverse low res, polygonal versions of Naohisa Inoue works of art) and incredibly slow, tedious movement. Had to stop. But it triggered me to see the beautiful looking Iblard movie (basically a set of stills with little movement, animated by Studio Ghibli, with beautiful music) and I also decided to see the game ending, in a Youtube playthrough.
Speaking of Tedious, after 22 hours I decided to abandon 428 Shibuya Scramble. I could not stand the incredibly slow progression of the story, and I did not care for several storylines / characters (especially those thought as comical relief). So, in the end, it did not catch me enough. Uninstalled and deleted without looking back. But I did read the story on internet and it’s quite cool, even if maybe not something unheard of.
And, finally! I played and finished Baroque (PSX fan translated from Japanese). I quite liked it. The atmosphere, the desperate and fragmented story are quite intriguing. Movement is decent, combat is simple and traversal starts as interesting but can become quite monotonous; surviving in the different levels is mostly a game of inventory management. A not-that-great game enriched by its bleak atmosphere and scattered storytelling. Overall, I quite liked the game, but I don’t love it. I can understand why it’s gained a cult status (probably inflated also by its relative obscurity), although I don’t share the same view.
After playing it, now I have a question: would the PSX King’s Field and Shadow Tower be akin to a sort of non-randomized version of Baroque, game play wise? Or are they something else? In the former case, I am not sure that I’d want to spend much time on them.