Fragments of Him is a visual novel about the complexities of that human emotion we call "love" shown in a series of short scenes. The story is told by four individuals: the main character, Will, who dies in an accident, and three people who loved him. Btw, I'm not giving anything away by mentioning his death, as this is established very early in the game.

Sarah, Will’s ex-girlfriend, recalls her relationship with Will and how much she still loves him. Sarah, however, is a compassionate and selfless young woman who understands and accepts Will's relationship and love for his new partner, Harry, despite her continued love for him. She's happy for Will and that he found his true love.

Before Will dies, we hear how he feels about these three individuals who are most important to him. He reflects on his love for Sarah and the good times they shared. However, his relationship with Sarah and his love for her wasn't the same as how he now feels about Harry, his true love. Will also recalls the grandmother he had good times with as a boy. And, just before he dies, Will ponders on the deep love he feels for Harry. As Will's feelings come into sharper focus, he knows he wants to spend the rest of his life with Harry and urgently wants to tell Harry how he feels.

Will’s grandmother, Mary, is very close-minded about her grandson’s love for another man. She has fond memories of Will as a child and reflects on her love for the little boy she knew, yet bitterly expresses her disappointment in her grandson’s ”liberal ideas” as a man, which she believes “damaged” him. I see Mary’s bigoted attitude and conditional love for her grandson as a disappointment. Unfortunately, people like that do exist IRL. Some reviewers were annoyed by the grandmother's character; however, I don’t think the writers intended to annoy us, much less expect us to forgive or understand her behavior. All too often, this is a sad reality, so as much as we might not like it, including this narrow-minded old biddy in the story of Will makes the narrative more realistic. Fortunately, however, Mary eventually comes around, and she starts seeing her adult grandson for the kind and loving man he is. She also questions her flawed judgment and can see how shallow and misguided she was. If only all a**holes like this were capable of being enlightened, the world would be a better place.

All in all, Fragments of Him is a poignant story about love and the many ways in which people perceive this fundamentally human emotion. It’s also about grief and how people choose to remember and deal with the loss of someone they loved. I choked up a bit and got a little teary-eyed in the final scenes, but I’m kind of sappy that way. This visual novel is short. It runs about 2.5 hours. So, you might want to catch it on sale. I picked it up for $1.99 on a Steam sale. I enjoyed the story, and at that price, I’m not complaining.

One more thing I wanted to address are the complaints I’ve read about the lack of “gameplay.” As described on this page, Fragments of Him is a VISUAL NOVEL (see tags). And as almost all visual novels go, there’s not much in the way of “gameplay.” You’re not hunting for anything, you’re not solving puzzles, or walking around doing stuff. In this one you click on highlighted objects or individuals to progress with the story. So, just bear that in mind. You’re not going to find much “action” in this game. That’s how visual novels generally work. It’s all about the story. I give this game an 8/10.

NOTE: There are 30 short scenes in this visual novel, however, for some odd reason, I never got to see Scene 10 as it remained “locked” even though I played the game straight through from the beginning to the end credits. After it was over and upon seeing that one scene was "Locked" and realizing I never saw it, I played Scene 9 over, thinking it would go right to Scene 10, the one I missed, but no, it skipped right to Scene 11 as it had when I played the game straight through. Hopefully, the devs can look into this.