When The Past Was Around
Last updated: 2025-12-30
- Emotional storytelling through stunning visuals
- Beautiful hand-drawn art style captivates
- Captivating soundtrack enhances emotional depth
- Tedious gameplay mechanics slow progress
- Short playtime reduces overall value
- Technical issues and bugs disrupt experience
Emotions
Players consistently praise the game's artistic and auditory design, highlighting its beautiful visuals, soundtrack, and emotional storytelling. The integration of music and art to convey deep themes without dialogue is a recurring cause for admiration, along with the game's attention to detail and philosophical depth.
The game evokes nostalgia through its themes of love, loss, and memory, often reminding players of personal experiences or other beloved games. Its portrayal of past relationships, shared moments, and the bittersweet nature of recollection resonates deeply, creating an emotional connection to the characters' journeys.
Players report frustration due to confusing or illogical puzzle design, unresponsive controls, and technical issues like bugs, performance problems, or lack of autosave features. The game's difficulty spikes, obscure mechanics, and occasional lack of emotional payoff despite personal relevance also contribute to this emotion.
The game's narrative, centered on grief, loss, and irreversible separation, elicits strong emotional reactions, often reducing players to tears. The portrayal of the protagonist's visible grief and the tragic, unresolved nature of the story amplify this emotion, making it deeply personal for many players.
Players express disappointment when the game fails to meet expectations in storytelling, emotional depth, or technical execution. Common causes include rushed endings, shallow symbolism, repetitive puzzles, and unpolished elements like poor audio balance or abrupt narrative twists that undermine the experience.
- Sample precision
- Helpful reviews
- 49%
- Unhelpful reviews
- 51%
- Protest reviews
- 0%
- 89%Helpful reviews with positive sentiment
- 11%Helpful reviews with negative sentiment
- Positive points
- 751
- Negative points
- 241
- Gameplay points
- 418
- Perf. points
- 14
- Rec. points
- 108
- Misc points
- 30
| Point | Description | Importance |
|---|---|---|
Emotional storytelling through visuals
| The game excels in conveying deep emotions without dialogue, using illustrations, symbols, and music to tell a resonant story about grief, love, and loss. Players consistently praised its ability to evoke strong feelings through subtle narrative techniques. | 99% |
Beautiful hand-drawn art style
| The game’s hand-drawn visuals were widely praised for their warmth, detail, and ability to complement the emotional tone. The art style enhances the storytelling and creates a cozy, immersive atmosphere. | 60% |
Captivating and emotional soundtrack
| The soundtrack, particularly its violin themes, was highlighted as a key element in enhancing the game’s emotional depth. Players noted how the music perfectly complemented the narrative and evoked strong feelings. | 44% |
Themes of grief and healing
| The game effectively explores themes of grief, loss, and moving forward, resonating deeply with players. Its portrayal of these emotions was described as comforting, hopeful, and beautifully executed. | 23% |