Review for Orten Was The Case
Stories based around time loops are a familiar concept, but they tend to try and differentiate themselves by how the cycle is broken and what has been learned. Some stories put characters through the course of a day to make them change as people, while others are about finding the cause of the time loop and stopping it. Orten Was The Case, which is the latter, reveals a convoluted yet engrossing mystery that players will want to see all the way through. Unfortunately, certain gameplay elements are underdeveloped or frustratingly tedious.
Developed and published by Woodhill Interactive, Orten Was The Case places you in the barely dressed shoes of a kid named Ziggy, who wakes up in the town of Orten with no memory and a mysterious mark that gives him the ability to loop back through time. He needs that power because an imminent explosion will soon destroy the town, and the day repeats until the explosion is stopped. The story starts simply enough with Ziggy following clues as to who he is, where he was last night, and where he is supposed to be. However, as the player progresses, the conflict of the explosion turns into one of spiritualism, occultism, and the secrets of illusive corporate bigwigs. Part of the mystery is seen by moving through the main narrative, but there are optional quests to restore Ziggy's memory and a couple of posters in the environment that hint at the larger world. Many threads make up this vast web, and the investigative player will enjoy untangling them.
The presentation itself is relatively unique but also bizarre. The graphics are rendered in a stylized, hand-drawn aesthetic, making the world a beautiful canvas. The character designs, though, range from peculiar -- like the goblin and a couple of the masked men you will encounter -- to slightly dreadful, like Ziggy, with his fish lips and big eyes. This can sometimes be effective because the worldbuilding also features unexpected elements. Certain characters have quirky characteristics and animations, amplified by the fact that there is no voice acting, only text boxes supplemented by grunting and whispering. For example, a cop exerts himself through gymnastics and breakdancing and talks as someone who wants to be professional, but mixes his authoritative dialogue with humorous claims.
At the same time, however, other character models clash with the world itself. This is because most of them are rendered in a cel-shaded palette that, while stylized, makes them stick out from the backdrop. Some look more in line with the environment but are downright creepy. This leaves an unforgettable impression, but not always in a good way.
The gameplay itself is a mixed bag. The loop mechanic is well integrated, starting from when Ziggy awakens, right up to the explosion -- a roughly 12-minute period. However, the timer does freeze when in a menu, during certain puzzles, or in a boss fight (more on that later). You can restart it manually or use the checkpoints that are spread around the world. You are encouraged to start over because certain quests require you to be punctual, and you won't be able to complete all of them in a single cycle. These timings are recorded in your logbook, along with visions/memories, clues that help with certain puzzle sections, and your overall status. Each loop and quest gives you knowledge permanently added to the clues tab, though any items you picked up must be retrieved after starting over, and you can only carry two items at any time.
Mind you, this is all happening within a reasonably small, semi-open world. Yet, it is very dense with secrets and optional quest opportunities. There are apartments, caves, and hideouts to explore and investigate. There are even multiple endings with varying requirements.
It is also worth noting that you do not need to advance any quest to achieve an ending. In fact, a couple of speedruns on YouTube show you can accomplish an ending in just one loop (as in starting from a fresh save) if you know what you're doing.
And yet, the other elements of the game, notably the mechanics, feel lacking. It's a third-person game with platforming and jumping to reach certain areas, but it can feel somewhat floaty and imprecise. Your indicator of whether you are about to land on your intended destination is a tiny white circle on the surface you are dropping towards. It is something that players may get used to, but it still feels off, especially in later sections where you are rushing to get things done in a timely matter. An option exists that makes Ziggy grab a ledge when falling, but again, the latter part of the game necessitates making haste to get an ending. Depending on how many loops you go through, there is also a lot of backtracking, making the player question whether adding a sprint button would have been preferable.
There are also times, specifically when pursuing objectives, when the game doesn't reward you for being ahead or when navigating a couple of places feels unnecessary. For example, an objective tells you to explore a particular area, and you follow a route that successfully leads you where you need to go, yet the objective remains incomplete. It turns out that there is another specific route the game wants you to use to find that same location, which triggers a particular cutscene to see NPCs perform a certain action you can still observe outside of said cutscene. Why doesn't the game reward you when finding the location using an alternative route, or provide this crucial vision when seeing it from a slightly different angle? Instances like these are infrequent but still annoying.
Finally, the game's weakest link has to be the combat. You only fight two enemies by going through specific routes, and you can battle them repeatedly in each loop if you want to. However, the skirmishes themselves boil down to dodging their assaults and swinging at them a few times. Both bosses have unique attacks, and one of them is slightly challenging, but the complexity is bogged down because their attacks are easily telegraphed, and dodge rolling gives an unusually generous number of invincibility frames, or moments when onslaughts do nothing to you. This makes the option of requesting "easy" combat, which the game allows you, functionally obsolete. Only one boss battle is necessary to complete an objective, and the other is absolutely avoidable. But as stated previously, you can complete the game without pursuing many or all objectives, making the bosses feel like an afterthought.
In the end, however, through a 10.7-hour journey, the story of Orten Was The Case proficiently draws the player into its multi-layered mystery. Ziggy's predicament, the cause of the explosion, and how all the pieces fit together are definitely worth investigating. If players are willing to persevere through the game's shortcomings and are enthralled by the unfolding enigmas, they will discover an engaging narrative supported by a beautiful, well-constructed world.
