The eighties and nineties hold a warm place in my heart. It’s when I went to school, experienced lots of firsts, and it was an exciting and memorable part of my life. Lost Records Bloom and Rage captures that feeling of exploration and innocence in the form of four young girls and their blossoming relationship. The main plot takes a while to build, but it is just pleasant listening to their conversations and being involved in their activities. Some of the scenes are emotionally charged, heart-warming, and often just silly or amusing, like care free teenagers often are. We listen to them talking about escaping their small-town existences and their lives are full of hope and promise. There’s not much to do in their town so they are always looking for imaginative solutions to combat boredom and it was fun to watch and participate.

You play as Swann, a shy and unconfident girl who meets Autumn, Nora, and Kat, at the local ice cream parlor in the sleepy town of Velvet Cove, where they all live. A friendship between the four begins and we follow them as they play out the Summer of 1995 in their own unique way. Twenty-seven years later a reunion is organized after a package is received by Autumn alluding to the fact that their dark and terrible secret of that Summer is known. The time line then flips and flops between the two periods as the plot is revealed. It’s worth noting that the game comes in two halves called Rage and Bloom, and the second part will be released on the 15 April as a free download.

Don’t Nod are masters at storytelling, presentation, and character development, and so far, part one of this installment has been very enjoyable. I love the retro atmosphere they have produced in Lost Records. The characters, locations, and their relationships are expertly done with plenty of well voiced dialogue and captivating cut scenes. The music is so good that I had to search Spotify for the soundtrack and found playlists for each character, along with the main soundtrack. The mellow synth sounds with retro vibes and soft female voices is very relaxing and hypnotic. If you enjoy storytelling then it is easy to get completely immersed and invested in Lost Records.

If you’ve played any of the Life is Strange series then you will know what to expect in the sense of how you can be transported into the story, along with interactive features that merge you effortlessly into various situations where you have to make choices and react to dialogue, either affecting relationships or having consequences further along the line. There are some timed decisions, and other decisions are not revealed until you find them in the scene, which could mean locating an item or a person before it shows. During normal dialogue certain answers will either please or displease that person and may have consequences later. At the end of the chapter, your relationship between each character is revealed and some of the more important decisions are compared with global stats.

The main protagonist Swann is a keen videographer, and was given a camcorder for her sixteenth birthday which she uses to film certain events and locations to create memoirs which she keeps in her inventory. It’s important to get your camera out in every situation and scan the area until a target area is revealed. Once you film it for a few seconds it will reveal a subject, for example if you film some ants eating an ice cream it will reveal critters 1/10, and therefore throughout the game you are looking for nine more critters. There’s a surprising number of these memoirs to find and they will keep you busy looking for them throughout the game. It encourages exploration and although the game is quite linear, you can often reveal interesting items lying around which you can pick up and examine, or reveal hidden elements through exploration.

Each scene can be replayed in either collectible mode or story mode, with collectible mode not affecting any progress, but story mode will reset any choices you have previously made and create new ones. I found the story mode to be a little tedious because although you can skip cutscenes through the menu, you can’t fast forward dialogue so you have to sit through all that again waiting for a chance to turn your camera on and locate the memoirs you have missed. There are also lots of achievements to get but you’ll have to consult a guide or similar to find out what they are because they are all hidden, but these can mostly be obtained through the story mode also.

The game revolves around the story though, and although I did enjoy the memoir parts of the game, I was more interested in the story and the girl’s relationships. There are some great characters in the game and the scenes feel so interactive sometimes and impressively realized. The voice acting was superb and the music compliments the story perfectly with some memorable moments throughout.

Lost Records: Bloom and Rage is another really enjoyable game from the Don’t Nod studio with a retro vibe and flawless voice acting.

If you are a lover of narrative games and appreciate character development and an interactive approach to storytelling, then I would urge you to try this one out. I can’t wait for part two.

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This game is what you’d get if Yellowjackets, I Saw the TV Glow, Paper Girls, It, Stranger Things and Life is Strange had a baby.

Great Game, great music, fun characters and the great thing is that the second part is included as an update with this instead of selling it later to us. Also loved recording random stuff and the nostalgia of experiencing a bit of the 90s again.