1000xRESIST is a game that is best experienced blind. It is perhaps one of the greatest narrative games ever created. I really cannot recommend it highly enough, it's as good as the Steam reviews suggest. It may not be for everyone but if it is for you, and for many people it will be, it will really be for you. The only "parish notice" I'll give is that the game will often show things (especially towards the beginning) that may seem artsy or make little sense. Just know that the game will give you the tools & knowledge you need to understand these scenes & the games more difficult parts, it's just withholding them until these reveals will have the maximum impact. Oh and keep a box of facial tissues nearby for when the game detonates your tear ducts, it'll do that a lot.

That being said, if you do wish for a more in depth (spoiler free) review...

1000xRESIST is a game with many themes. It's about love and loss, about memory and the human condition, about an Asian diaspora yet to come, about friendship & family, about political protest, about forgiveness, about poetry, and about motherhood and generational trauma. Any lesser game would struggle to handle all these themes cohesively but 1000xRESIST handles these with a beauty and grace that is exceptionally rare to find in the genre. It tells its story out of chronological order, rearranging events so that they are instead ordered to maximise their gut-punching effect. It doesn't waste a second of its fantastically voiced dialogue, and compensates for its lack in graphical fidelity with stellar visual aesthetics, experimental cinematography and a wonderfully emotional piano based soundtrack.

At its core the story of 1000xRESIST is like a jigsaw puzzle. Initially obscured it will, through the course of the game, give you all the pieces you need to complete the puzzle. Along the way it will throw curveballs, tear at your heartstrings and lodge itself so deeply in your head and heart that you will be thinking about it long after the final credits roll. It's a deeply personal experience that, like all great pieces of art, each person will interpret and take from differently.

It's a great shame then that there really is nothing else quite like 1000xRESIST. Nothing that can quite balance a grand post-apocalyptic sci-fi story with the intimacy of the games core themes. That perhaps is the greatest tragedy of 1000xRESIST, that nothing else will quite fill the void this game will leave behind in you. 1000xRESIST is criminally underrated and almost certainly the best game of 2024 (in a stacked year containing other stellar games like Balatro and Hades II). It's one of the greatest narrative games of all time, a masterpiece and a testament to what small talented indie developers can create.

I look forward immensely to whatever developers sunset visitor come out with next.

Hekki Grace
Red to Blue