Recent reviews by saepe8

I adore languages and puzzles. Heaven's Vault seemed like a perfect fit for me.
The story behind the game seems wonderful and interesting too. I wouldn't really know because the way the game presents the story is rather underwhelming. Your general game mechanics are walking around and interacting with certain things; and talking to your robot and others. The story unfolds itself randomly, and you are supposed to piece everything together using the timeline. However, for me at least, the timeline tool did not provide a framework at all, but only complicated things some more.

Then there are the language mechanics. I expected these to be the core of the gameplay. After playing the game however, I found the entire language angle unnecessary. I think you can finish the game without translating one word. The translated parts also added very little context to the story, rather general flair. It didn't help that the translating itself is rather random whereby you're given random options for each word. Validation of your chosen translation happens through the main character who says either "Yes, this is accurate." or "No, this seems wrong." which makes zero sense in-game.

I kept on expecting that I would need to get some big revelations from the language translations which would lead me somehwere grand to solve some kind of puzzle. Instead the game just ended. I was exploring and before I knew it I was at the end phase of the game. To make matters worse I didn't get to end the game how I wanted to because the clunky UI shifted right when I wanted to make my final gameplay choice. This resulted in accidentally chosing the 'do nothing' option, ending the game on a sour note. Although it was also kind of fitting as throughout the game you mostly 'do nothing' anyway.

Awesome game. So much freedom!