If there is a kind of game that always tend to grab my attention, it’s always the fourth wall breaking ones. I’ve played other kinds of games that feature this like There is no Game, Doki Doki Literature Club, Undertale, The Stanley Parable and I found them to be really fascinating. While this is a concept that has become increasingly popular over the years, it still works so well.
I might as well include OneShot into that list of fourth wall breaking games, because this is a good one. It also appears that OneShot is a game that flew under the radar of indie games because I had never heard of it until recently, and this game was released in 2018 which is quite a shame because it is a neat game.
From it’s given name, the main idea behind the game is that you only have one shot at beating the game. So that means that you cannot start over once you begin the game. I even closed the game and it jumped exactly into where I last stopped at.
Starting off with this as one of the first dialogue messages in the game kinda startled me.
OneShot is an adventure game where the protagonist – a totally-not-a-cat person – named Niko awakens in a mysterious world that has lost its sun and is slowly wasting away. After a while, the game reveals that you, like your actual self, are the god of the said world. The aim of the game is to control Niko to return the sun (which is a bulb) to the top of a tower that is at the center of the world.
Just to clarify, the game got my name by itself.
And Niko also has the ability to communicate with me, being the messiah and all.
For the main gameplay, it’s nothing really serious. A good chunk of the game involves walking around different areas, finding items, combining a few items together to form new items, and solving puzzles with those items. They aren’t really serious, in fact, they are rather pretty simple.
But it’s the puzzles that interact with outside of the game that are really interesting. In fact, the ways that they were presented are really clever. For instance, there’s one where the game either places a hint in a file on your computer and another one where the hint for solving a puzzle in the game is set as your computer’s wallpaper.
I honestly did not see this coming at all...
The world of OneShot is divided into three different areas – the barrens which is a deserted factory area with a bunch of robots around the place, the glens – a swampy looking area that is occupied by some bird-looking natives, and finally the refuge which is a city where most of the world’s residents seem to occupy and it’s also where the tower you’ll have to get to is located.
The world building provided in the game is really solid. At a point, I got really curious about how things were running in the world before the sun vanished. I actually spent time reading the books scattered around the library in the game trying to learn about how things worked in the world, and I don’t normally do this for every game.
I tried to put the sun in a crusher because why not 🤷♂️
Another thing that got to me was Niko's personality and character as a whole. I'm a fan of this character.
At first, I was more like "meh", but after a while, Niko's personality began to grow on me slowly, especially during times when Niko and I would have a little chat.
Plus I'm also a fan of this ram herder's ram puns.
To be honest, nothing much happens in the game. Most of the game involves a lot of walking around in a confused manner, figuring out what to do. In fact, the game doesn’t really stand out in terms of gameplay features. However, the game does stand out in terms of its characters and story. These are the main aspects that give the game its charm.
So, would I recommend OneShot to anyone? Of course!
On the surface, the game isn’t all that. But it’s story and visuals are what makes this game so special. The characters – Niko and the rest of the NPCs across the regions – are all charming.
But most importantly…
You can ride a Roomba!!!
That’s all, and thanks so much for reading :D
All screenshots were taken by me unless a source link was specified.