Purpose 1951 Xbox Review 5/10 "These boots are made for walkin’ (and simulatin’)" 🥾 @TongucBodur #IndieGame #GameDev

Purpose 1951 is a brief little game that blends walking simulation with extremely light puzzle elements. Clocking in at around an hour in length as the character muses about the situations that have arisen to bring him to his current predicament.

Presented in a 1st-person POV style, Purpose 1951 is a very slender game in a lot of ways, you follow a mostly linear path – with the only branches areas leading to what are effectively ‘trophy points’ - as the narrator monologues as you trek.

It’s visually pleasant enough, and the accompanying piano music nails the tone as you march ever forwards, taking in the sights and tale being spun around you. The issue is that the visuals – although initially fine – quickly become repetitive, and in the more open areas, the points you must hit to move the game forward sometimes do not trigger, leaving you moving slowly around a blocked-off area, hoping you’ll somehow kick off the next narrative step.

This isn’t helped when you notice just how much of the in-game architecture is re-used over and over, taking away any sense of achievement and realism as you move through the chapters. In one section, every single room had the same flat interior displayed, and all windows and buildings were uniform, combined with how the narrative didn’t often line up with the type of areas you were exploring, it all ended up making the game feel a bit cobbled together, with the opening chapter being the most enjoyable, as it at least had a sense of pending intrigue.

Sadly, the way in which the basic story unfolds, combined with how listless and arbitrary the walking simulation part of the game feels makes it all feel rather underwhelming, and I found myself ready to wrap up the game around twenty minutes in.

SUMMARY

If you are a serious fan of walking simulators, there may be enough here to entertain you for its duration, but the story, presentation and gameplay were all a little too flimsy to grab me on this occasion.

5/10

💧MELTING💧