Mosaic

« Mosaic is a cold game in which you strive to find even a shred of warmth. It fills you with a desire to be better, to talk deeply to yourself and reassess your values. It doesn’t feel like a game, exactly, but more of an experience in empathy. Full of quirky dark humour that for once doesn’t come in the form of cringy dialogue, and enriched with concepts that could make even the most steeled among us weep, Mosaic does the heart some good. »

« Mosaic gives meaning to the meaningless; it’s existential nihilism in digital form. It's lovely. »

« It’s not a game you play, but more an interactive experience, somewhat an art piece that is a meditation on modern life or the difference between the commercial world and the artistic/creative world. It’s not a long experience but it’s worth a go, though for the length of it I would still wait for a special before shelling out money on it. But if a good special comes along I would recommend grabbing it and letting yourself float along with the story. »

« Although Mosaic’s gameplay is simple and the play length short, it boasts a powerful story with many unique elements you won’t find anywhere else. »

« Mosaic might only last a few hours, but within that time it has moments that can stick with you, bring you joy amidst the monotony of everyday life. There's a message here to say that there is always a glimmer of hope even if it isn't always obvious, which is a good message to send. Plus, there's a talking goldfish. »

« Are games meant to be fun, or simply something to distract us from the injustice around us: homelessness, deforestation? Mosaic's gameplay is purposefully opaque, the meaning behind your actions blurred to a point where continuing on may seem pointless. It may not always be engaging, but those with patience will unravel an uplifting message about human connection. The irony is hopefully not lost on the player; that a game about freeing oneself from your phone... is played on one. »

« Mosaic is a remarkable narrative game, suggestive in its small length, telling of a silent revolution in an oppressive dystopian society. »

« This is the beauty of Mosaic; it’s not just another tale made up for storytelling impact. These are feelings and situations I felt empathy with and that are a current problem within our world today. It’s great to see more developers wanting to go down this route when creating games and wanting to make a difference. I’d be surprised that when the end credits roll on Mosaic, you wouldn’t want to change even the smallest details of your own life for the better. »

« ======== not worth it watch it on utube ======== - 2 hour torture long. -rebitive very slow walking simulator and very bad mini games. -good atmosphere and best part the fish. »

« Твоя жизнь - одинаковые серые будни с монотонной работой. Тебя окружают людей, давно потерявшие себя. Ты часть системы, которая выкачивает из тебя жизнь. Это игра - художественное высказывание, побуждающее выбраться за рамки обыденности »

« I think the only reason that Mosaic wasn’t named “The Depression Simulator” is that there is already a game with that title. The game is told without any dialogue so you have to figure out the story through context alone. I can only say that this seems to be the story of a depressed man with no joy in his life who is trying to change that. Maybe the game was just making me depressed playing it, I don’t know. You start each day waking up with messages from work berating you and your progress; then you fix your hair and brush your teeth (seriously no shower ?); then you make your way to work. Along the way to work you encounter various bits of colour in an otherwise grey looking world. These bits of colour seem to awaken something in the main character if just for a moment. You then go to work and have to complete this resource gathering mini game before going home and doing it all over again. I detested this mini game but a part of me feels like I was meant to. I also didn’t like the many frequent camera angle changes while moving around the world, it made me think of the old school tank controls of 90’s horror games and I didn’t like that then or now. You also can’t move freely, you have to hold down the left mouse button to move in the direction you placed the arrow. If the goal was to make a bleak world the game succeeded. It is filled with ads for ways to increase productivity; a colourless world; and people who look away if you look at them. The backdrops; objects and water were well done. The music was great as well and reminded me of Off-Peak. I in some ways enjoyed the story that unfolded but hated the game play required to advance it. The aforementioned mini game was annoying; there were also a conveyor belt puzzle that was frustrating due to the camera angles. I played Mosaic on Linux. It never crashed on me. I did notice some flickering textures a few times throughout the game such as windows or the characters tie. There was also one scene on a train where if I go left instead of right the screen just went black until I went right. There was one graphics setting and a v-sync option. The game ran great aside from a few moments where the frame rate would drop to the 60’s and 80’s. This was still very playable but I couldn’t find a good reason why the drop happened based on the image quality and what was going on at the time. The game uses a checkpoint save system and a terrible one at that. There are major checkpoints and minor ones. I say that because at certain points it actually registers a checkpoint in the menu but any other time it says “saving” it won’t actually bring you back to that point if you exit the game but will bring you back to the last major checkpoint listed which will lose you progress. Why it says “saving” at times when it clearly doesn’t save there is unknown and very annoying. Game Engine: Unity Save System: Checkpoints Graphics API: OpenGL Game Version Played: 1.1.9:113 Disk Space Used: 3.3GB Settings Used: Max Quality @ 1080P with v-sync on GPU Usage: 25-100 % VRAM Usage: 824-1547 MB CPU Usage: 11-35 % RAM Usage: 2.2-3.6 GB Frame Rate: 65-144 FPS Overall I find it hard to recommend Mosaic. It does a great job painting a bleak world and making you feel trapped in a routine you want to break but maybe the developer forgot games are supposed to be fun as well which is something Mosaic lacks. I finished the game in three hours and ten minutes. I paid $22.79 CAD for it and feel that is a bit over priced. The $10-15 price point would have suited it better based on content. The annoying mini games; poor camera angles; and terrible save system ruins any enjoyment I had of the world and story. My Score: 6/10 My System: AMD Ryzen 5 2600X | 16GB DDR4-3000 CL15 | MSI RX 580 8GB Gaming X | Mesa 21.0.1 | Samsung 970 Evo Plus 500GB | Manjaro 21.0.1 | Mate 1.24.1 | Kernel 5.11.10-1-MANJARO | AOC G2460P 1920*1080 @ 144hz »

« BREVE RECENSIONE (ITALIAN): Mosaic è un gioco molto breve, con un'estetica curata e uno stile originale. Queste sono le premesse che mi hanno portato a giocarlo e a finirlo, perchè il resto mi ha lasciato abbastanza perplesso (eccetto alcune chicche). Nel gioco si impersona un anonimo impiegato di un'enorme azienda, in una società distopica in cui tutti pensano solo al lavoro e al guadagno, alienandosi dalla realtà. Questo contesto l'ho trovato molto riuscito, anche grazie alla geniale integrazione di alcune app sul telefono del protagonista che aumentano la sensazione di ****. Il problema sta nel fatto che queste app sono l'unica cosa che permette di rimanere attivi nel gioco, perchè per il resto bisogna solo spostarsi verso un obiettivo senza poter interagire con niente (o quasi). Gli unici diversivi sono i sogni ad occhi aperti del protagonista, dove però il gameplay risulta lo stesso del resto del gioco. In pratica a parte l'estetica e l'ambientazione, il titolo risulta mediocre in quanto fondamentalmente noioso. Vorrei aggiungere qualche altro elemento che mi è piaciuto ma finirei per spoilerare, e in un gioco così breve e così mediocre non sarebbe il massimo. VOTO: 6/10 (8 audio e grafica, 6.5 storia e 3.5 gameplay) »

« Prima di un eventuale acquisto, bisogna essere consapevoli di trovarsi davanti ad un prodotto molto narrativo e al tempo stesso dalla scarsa longevità di circa tre ore. Ovviamente queste caratteristiche di Mosaic derivano dallo scopo che si è prefisso, ossia portare, chi lo gioca, alla riflessione su una condizione che lo coinvolge da vicino. Questo non risparmiandosi minimamente in una critica assai aspra della società moderna. A tratti può sembrare quasi derivativo, come già sottolineato, ma ad ogni modo “inscena” su schermo un racconto di forte impatto, che trova la sua diversità nella componente estetica. Di contro, come era facile aspettarsi, la struttura di gioco arranca a fare da collante ad una narrazione particolarmente ermetica. »

« This game was extremely disappointing. It was an endless parade of monotony and repetition of tone. »

« Although I like artsy melancholic games this one failed to bring any enjoyment to the playthrough. It gets boring after 20 minutes because it is literally the same thing everytime. There is no real gameplay, the "puzzles" are annoying more than anything and there is no wow moment in the story. Not worth it's price. »

« The gameplay is built on the plot. I also liked the graphic design. Need more of these games. »