Gods Will Be Watching
Last updated: 2025-08-10
- Unique and captivating experience
- Excellent art and sound design
- Core resource management gameplay
- Excessive difficulty and frustrating RNG
- Repetitive and tedious gameplay
- Meaningless choices and consequences
Emotions
Players experienced frustration primarily due to the game's high and often unfair difficulty, exacerbated by excessive reliance on random number generation (RNG) and a trial-and-error gameplay loop. This led to tedious repetition, lost progress, and a feeling that player choices or skill had little impact on outcomes, particularly in specific challenging sections or due to unclear mechanics and slow animations.
Satisfaction stemmed from overcoming the game's significant challenges, particularly difficult chapters and puzzles, which provided a strong sense of accomplishment. Players also found satisfaction in the game's compelling narrative, well-designed mechanics, high-quality aesthetics (music, pixel art), and the overall rewarding and impactful experience it offered.
Disappointment arose from the game not meeting player expectations, often due to misleading marketing regarding meaningful choices and genre. Technical issues, unengaging gameplay, a perceived lack of genuine player agency, and the story being overshadowed by difficulty or tedious mechanics also contributed to this feeling.
Appreciation was driven by the game's unique design, narrative depth, and high artistic quality, including its music, visuals, and clever writing. Players valued the game's philosophical themes, well-developed characters, and its overall professional and well-crafted presentation.
Intrigue was sparked by the game's unique and dark nature, its philosophical themes, and the thought-provoking moral dilemmas it presented. Players were drawn in by the strong narrative, surprising plot developments, and the game's ability to evoke a sense of helplessness and provide a lasting, impactful experience.
Verdict
Mixed
Summary
Positive 65% · Negative 35%. Score: 35 / 100
Positives:
- Players consistently praise the game for its originality, unique gameplay mechanics, and captivating narrative. Many found it to be a memorable and rewarding experience, despite initial challenges, highlighting its innovative approach to the genre.
- The game's artistic direction, particularly its pixel art style, received widespread acclaim. Reviewers frequently mentioned the high quality of the soundtrack, noting how it effectively enhances the game's atmosphere and emotional impact.
- Players found significant satisfaction in overcoming the game's challenges, particularly in later chapters. The sense of accomplishment after successfully navigating difficult levels or understanding complex mechanics was a major source of enjoyment.
- The game's structure, divided into distinct and interesting chapters, was well-received. Each chapter offers unique scenarios and gameplay challenges, contributing to a varied and engaging experience throughout the game.
- The game is noted for its challenging levels, which require strategic thinking and often multiple attempts to solve. Despite the difficulty, players found the varied level design and multiple difficulty options to be engaging rather than frustrating.
Negatives:
- The game is perceived as excessively difficult and frustrating, often due to unclear mechanics, reliance on luck (RNG), and a punishing trial-and-error loop. Players frequently have to restart entire chapters after minor mistakes or unlucky rolls, leading to tedium and a lack of enjoyment. This high difficulty, especially in 'Original' mode, is seen as artificial and designed to prolong gameplay rather than provide a fair challenge.
- The gameplay loop is described as repetitive and monotonous, often involving the same limited actions and forced restarts. Players are forced to re-experience long dialogues and cutscenes after each failure, which quickly becomes tedious and detracts from the story and immersion. This repetition, combined with the high difficulty, makes the game feel like a chore.
- Despite being marketed with a focus on choice and consequence, players feel their decisions are largely meaningless. Characters who die often reappear in subsequent chapters, and choices do not significantly impact the linear ending. This undermines the narrative's emotional weight and the player's sense of agency, leading to a feeling that time spent on moral dilemmas is wasted.
- The game's marketing, particularly on store pages, is criticized for being misleading. It is advertised as a 'point-and-click adventure' or a game focused on 'ambiguous moral choices,' when in reality, it functions more as a strategy or resource management game heavily reliant on specific optimal paths and RNG.
- The game features a dark, nihilistic worldview and pixelated visuals that, while minimalist, depict harsh and gruesome scenes. This aesthetic, combined with the game's punishing mechanics, contributes to a bleak and often unappealing atmosphere for many players.
Gameplay:
- The core gameplay is a demanding resource management simulator, often described as a puzzle game in disguise. Players must meticulously manage various resources, time, and multiple complex tasks simultaneously, often under pressure, making it a micro-management heavy experience.
- The game is structured into distinct chapters, each presenting a unique crisis scenario with different mechanics and objectives. These chapters vary in length and difficulty, often requiring multiple attempts to complete, especially on harder modes.
- Specific scenarios involve managing complex, high-stakes situations like hostage crises or torture. Players must balance multiple objectives, make tough choices, and endure extreme circumstances to survive and achieve goals.
- Despite its complexity, the game's core mechanics are straightforward and concise. While initial playthroughs may be challenging, players can grasp the fundamentals through repeated attempts, with typical playthroughs ranging from 3 to 8 hours.
- The game incorporates a time loop or 'death regression' mechanic, where players repeatedly attempt scenarios. This design encourages learning through repetition and experimentation, as progress often resets to the beginning of an episode upon failure.
Performance:
- Players are experiencing frequent crashes and freezes, particularly when using controllers or attempting to alt-tab. This leads to significant frustration and loss of progress.
- A notable number of players report a complete lack of controller support, which is a basic expectation for many modern games. This significantly impacts accessibility and player experience.
- One user reported a smooth experience on a specific Linux setup, indicating that technical issues might not be universal and could be platform or hardware-dependent. This positive feedback is an outlier compared to other reports.
Recommendations:
- The game is consistently described as a challenging, demanding, and often 'masochistic' experience, particularly on higher difficulties. Players are advised to manage expectations regarding difficulty and be prepared for trial-and-error gameplay, resource management, and a significant time commitment.
- Player sentiment on recommending the game is highly divided, with many suggesting it's not for everyone due to its unique and often frustrating nature. Many recommend purchasing it only on sale or after trying a demo, indicating a cautious approach to investment.
- The game offers a unique and impactful narrative experience, often described as an 'emotional test' or 'existential punch'. Players are encouraged to immerse themselves in the story and commit to finishing the game to fully appreciate its depth, despite potential frustrations.
- Many reviewers suggest trying a demo or watching gameplay videos (Let's Plays) before purchasing. This allows potential players to gauge if the game's unique mechanics and difficulty are suitable for them.
- There's strong advice to start on easier difficulties like 'Original Light' or 'Narrative' to experience the story without excessive frustration. Players can then attempt 'Original' difficulty for a greater challenge if desired.
Miscellaneous:
- The game was initially very difficult, leading to negative reviews. Developers responded by adding three easier game modes post-launch, specifically for players who want to enjoy the story without the high challenge.
- The game originated as a Ludum Dare prototype in 2013, specifically Ludum Dare 26 and 28. Its success led to a Kickstarter campaign and a full release in 2014, featuring a minimalistic pixel art style.
- Players desire quality of life improvements such as an option to skip dialogue and the addition of voice acting for dialogues, which would enhance the narrative experience.
- Many negative reviews appear to come from players who have not played the game extensively. Finishing the game significantly impacts how it is evaluated, suggesting that initial impressions might be misleading.
- The game's narrative draws heavily from classic literary works such as 'Heart of Darkness', 'Lord of the Flies', '1984', and 'Metro 2033', enriching its thematic depth.
