Game of the Month #91 (August 2022) - OMORI

Explore a strange world full of colorful friends and foes. When the time comes, the path you’ve chosen will determine your fate... and perhaps the fate of others as well.
When focusing on the main objectives, OMORI is about 21 Hours in length. If you're a gamer that strives to see all aspects of the game, you are likely to spend around 70 Hours to obtain 100% completion.

I'd played Omori before, the gameplay was meh and the story left me unsatisfied (this person articulates it better than I can, obviously spoilers), but the game's creativity and charm kept me going for 30 hours. I really enjoyed Undertale and the MOTHER series, this game captures a lot of what I love about them except I was emotionless at the end of this one. I know a lot of people praise OMORI's story so your mileage may vary.

I voted for it because I figured maybe I could re-play it with the Hikikomori route, but with emphasis on "maybe".

I'm liking it so far, just under 2 hours in. I'm very curious where the story is going to go and what's going to happen with the characters.

I have nothing pertinent to add other than I backed this game on Kickstarter back in the day.

You're welcome.

Loving the art so far and the difference between the light fun in the dream world and the depressing real world looks like it will be interesting.

Unfortunately for me, the combat looks like it will be a struggle. I thought it would be as soon as I saw the Happy/Sad/Angry chart then to be surprised by the additional choices you have only a second or two to make after the characters turn. Considering I almost never complete turn-based RPGs without some kind of assists, I have a feeling I will be retiring this soon.

I'd played Omori before, the gameplay was meh and the story left me unsatisfied (this person articulates it better than I can, obviously spoilers), but the game's creativity and charm kept me going for 30 hours. I really enjoyed Undertale and the MOTHER series, this game captures a lot of what I love about them except I was emotionless at the end of this one. I know a lot of people praise OMORI's story so your mileage may vary.

I voted for it because I figured maybe I could re-play it with the Hikikomori route, but with emphasis on "maybe".

Pleased to finally have a GotM game on my actual backlog!

Originally Posted by: gardenappl

I know a lot of people praise OMORI's story so your mileage may vary.

I'm excited to try this one because, like you, I really enjoy the Undertale and Mother games but I fear I may end up in the same boat.

Often games are hyped for their 'impactful' stories and then they do not resonate with me.

Played about an hour today. Reached the part where you go back to your bed after waking up. So I'm guessing I completed one cycle? So far the game is good enough and I was enjoying, but I'm wondering if I'm too much of a coward for this game. Had a part where I decided to just put my headphones down and play the game without sound because I was getting a bit too on edge. Hopefully I can push through, but if I'm feeling this way just an hour in, I may have to retire this one later...

3.5 hours in, just got through the junkyard, beat the download manager and hopped on the Pluto Express. When you are in the dream world, there is a lot of fun to have. And I am finally getting used to and starting to enjoy the combat.

Alright, I finally finished MGR and will be starting Omori tomorrowish. Looking forward to it!

Some spoiley photos. I don't want Omori to wake up.

I've played about 3 hours and I'm starting to lose interest. Does the game start out slow?

I adore the aesthetic and I think the game has some interesting themes but I'm finding it a bit boring to actually play.

I'm currently in Otherworld.

I'm going to put in a couple more hours to see where it goes.

I've played about 3 hours and I'm starting to lose interest. Does the game start out slow?

I adore the aesthetic and I think the game has some interesting themes but I'm finding it a bit boring to actually play.

I'm currently in Otherworld.

I'm going to put in a couple more hours to see where it goes.

I don't think it is very story heavy, or at least it's been so long since the last story point when you have spent a couple hours in the Otherworld. The combat doesn't seem that hard so far either to be honest but I am enjoying it.

Yeah, I'm kinda in the same place. Completely in love with every aspect of the game's aesthetic and writing style, but not hooked in by the combat yet, and I'm in Otherworld. I'm definitely gonna stick with it through to the end though. Looking forward to the story (hopefully) becoming more the focus.

Just finished the Otherworld and am back in the real world "3 days remaining". Finally getting some story here. Getting bad vibes about the church. I keep forgetting to heal Kel before battle but you end up not needing to win most of the battles in the real world, it seems. I even got an achievement for losing one of the battles.

Also have had some of the soundtrack stuck in my head since last night and that ain't a bad thing.

I've played about 3 hours and I'm starting to lose interest. Does the game start out slow?

I adore the aesthetic and I think the game has some interesting themes but I'm finding it a bit boring to actually play.

I'm currently in Otherworld.

I'm going to put in a couple more hours to see where it goes.

I had the same issue. Played a couple of hours then sort of just fizzled out. Will be interested to hear what you think as you get further in. Just can't find the motivation to try it out.

Still playing through this one when I have an hour or so to kill...Currently about 9 hours in and in the middle of Two Days Left (specifically Last Resort) and just defeated Pluto (EXPANDED)

I'm....Enjoying it just enough to keep pushing through to get to the end, but really not very hooked on it. Battles are fine, story is fine, ambience is great, but...Nothing that really pulls me back in. I mostly want to keep going through it since it's one of the favorite games of my best friend and want to be able to talk more about it with him, but not super enjoying my time unfortunately. Probably will rush the back half of the game and see how it all ends

I finished the game earlier this month.

I was fairly happy with it until 90% through, at which point the writing completely fell flat for me. I was hooked on the story, and wanting to find out what happened in the "real world" sections of the game had me motivated to progress through it. The characters were (for the majority of the game) fairly well written, and I enjoyed spending time with them throughout the game, both the ones in the dream world as well as the real ones, and it was cool to see how things changed for the characters as they grew up after what happened to Mari. Especially Aubrey was shocking to see. Until you get to the latter sections of the game. I don't know what the writer was thinking, but since I can't discuss it without spoilers, don't reveal this section if you haven't finished the game (heavy spoilers ahead):

Throughout the game, it was alluded that Mari committed suicide, and that Sunny, Basil and friends were never the same afterwards. Sunny went full on Hikkikomori and didn't leave the house for years, while Basil now has a carer at home, parents who are always out of the house and don’t care much for him, and is heavily struggling with his mental health, barely keeping it together. So far so good. The game was tackling themes of grief, suicide and mental health, and did so fairly well in my opinion. As the story progressed, it became more and more likely to me that Basil possibly witnessed Maris suicide, but either failed to prevent it, or was too scared to try, and internalized the resulting guilt. Hence why the game alluded to Basil begging forgiveness from Sunny for what he has done. From the pictures in the photo album, it looked like Sunny was always melancholic even before the trauma, and what happened to Mari pushed him over the edge, hence him not leaving the house anymore. Powerful, and very believable stuff, and I as a player very much emphasized with the characters’ struggles resulting from the traumatic event.

Then, completely out of the blue and so out of character for Sunny and Basil that I audibly WTFd, it turns out Sunny, who is now revealed to be an insane sociopath, pushed his sister down the stairs and killed her, subsequently moved her body to a tree outside with the help of Basil, tied a rope around her neck and hung her. What. The. Fuck. There was nothing alluding to Basil or Sunny being capable of doing something like this, especially as they were previously being portrayed as innocent kids who were only concerned about playing together and (apart from Sunny who was already seeming blue at the time, but not portraying any lack of care or any sociopathic traits), generally having a good time. Surely, upon the accident the first thought would have been to call an ambulance. Or their parents, the police, or any other number of things that doesn’t involve brushing an accident under the rug and making it appear as a suicide. There’s no motive for doing so, and it isn’t believable that even panicked, previously traumatized children would act in such a calculated messed up way, especially without any incentive. Also, surely someone would’ve seen that there’s trauma all over Maris body from fatally falling down the stairs that doesn’t make sense if it was suicide by hanging. The only reason I can see for the plot going that way, is that the writer wanted to have some unexpected twist near the end, but couldn’t come up with anything better. But it just doesn’t work at all and completely invalidates the otherwise believable struggles of Sunny and Basil, as it’s now nearly impossible to emphasize with them due to them having acted like absolute monsters without motive, and shifting them to the role of perpetrators rather than victims of trauma. So strange. And then the rest of the ending is about them dealing with the guilt they logically feel from having done what they have done. Just bizarre.

The pacing was a bit off for me too. Real world sections were good, but the dream world dragged on a bit too much. Especially Sweethearts castle was way too long imho, while I was just wanting to get back to discovering more of the story.

Combat was serviceable, and I liked the character interactions between moves. I’m no JRPG expert and barely played any in the previous ten years, but I found it fairly challenging until at least halfway through the game, probably due to me being underleveled from having avoided too many encounters, and having been reluctant to grind. The Rock Paper Scissors emotion system was pretty cool, and I enjoyed the focus of the combat system on essentially managing buffs and debuffs during encounters, and there were a bunch of cool abilities.

I have nothing to complain in the sound or graphics department. The pixel art was very nice, and the soundtracks were excellent, though I don’t think I’ll listen to them outside of the game.

Overall, I quite enjoyed my time with it, even if it doesn’t sound like it from my review here. I’ll just pretend the game ended differently and then it was all good.

Finished my playthrough of this today and thought it was fun.

The Good
-I thought the story was really good and it was easy to get invested in the main group of characters
-The soundtrack is terrific. A bunch of these tracks are going to be stuck in my head for awhile. I especially liked Mari's theme

The Meh
-The combat, while decent, I thought was a little lacking and thought could be a little more detailed. I also didn't really find it that challenging. I thought the toughest boss in the game was Sweetheart. Everyone you fight after that was pretty easy for the most part as long as you are leveled up appropriately.

The Bad
-This might sound nitpicky, but I didn't care for how the game decided you got one certain ending over another. I thought that part could have been a little more fleshed out.

Overall, still had fun with this one and it was definitely memorable. I am hoping to take part in the "Game of the Month" selections more often.

I finished the game earlier this month.

I was fairly happy with it until 90% through, at which point the writing completely fell flat for me. I was hooked on the story, and wanting to find out what happened in the "real world" sections of the game had me motivated to progress through it. The characters were (for the majority of the game) fairly well written, and I enjoyed spending time with them throughout the game, both the ones in the dream world as well as the real ones, and it was cool to see how things changed for the characters as they grew up after what happened to Mari. Especially Aubrey was shocking to see. Until you get to the latter sections of the game. I don't know what the writer was thinking, but since I can't discuss it without spoilers, don't reveal this section if you haven't finished the game (heavy spoilers ahead):

Throughout the game, it was alluded that Mari committed suicide, and that Sunny, Basil and friends were never the same afterwards. Sunny went full on Hikkikomori and didn't leave the house for years, while Basil now has a carer at home, parents who are always out of the house and don’t care much for him, and is heavily struggling with his mental health, barely keeping it together. So far so good. The game was tackling themes of grief, suicide and mental health, and did so fairly well in my opinion. As the story progressed, it became more and more likely to me that Basil possibly witnessed Maris suicide, but either failed to prevent it, or was too scared to try, and internalized the resulting guilt. Hence why the game alluded to Basil begging forgiveness from Sunny for what he has done. From the pictures in the photo album, it looked like Sunny was always melancholic even before the trauma, and what happened to Mari pushed him over the edge, hence him not leaving the house anymore. Powerful, and very believable stuff, and I as a player very much emphasized with the characters’ struggles resulting from the traumatic event.

Then, completely out of the blue and so out of character for Sunny and Basil that I audibly WTFd, it turns out Sunny, who is now revealed to be an insane sociopath, pushed his sister down the stairs and killed her, subsequently moved her body to a tree outside with the help of Basil, tied a rope around her neck and hung her. What. The. Fuck. There was nothing alluding to Basil or Sunny being capable of doing something like this, especially as they were previously being portrayed as innocent kids who were only concerned about playing together and (apart from Sunny who was already seeming blue at the time, but not portraying any lack of care or any sociopathic traits), generally having a good time. Surely, upon the accident the first thought would have been to call an ambulance. Or their parents, the police, or any other number of things that doesn’t involve brushing an accident under the rug and making it appear as a suicide. There’s no motive for doing so, and it isn’t believable that even panicked, previously traumatized children would act in such a calculated messed up way, especially without any incentive. Also, surely someone would’ve seen that there’s trauma all over Maris body from fatally falling down the stairs that doesn’t make sense if it was suicide by hanging. The only reason I can see for the plot going that way, is that the writer wanted to have some unexpected twist near the end, but couldn’t come up with anything better. But it just doesn’t work at all and completely invalidates the otherwise believable struggles of Sunny and Basil, as it’s now nearly impossible to emphasize with them due to them having acted like absolute monsters without motive, and shifting them to the role of perpetrators rather than victims of trauma. So strange. And then the rest of the ending is about them dealing with the guilt they logically feel from having done what they have done. Just bizarre.

The pacing was a bit off for me too. Real world sections were good, but the dream world dragged on a bit too much. Especially Sweethearts castle was way too long imho, while I was just wanting to get back to discovering more of the story.

Combat was serviceable, and I liked the character interactions between moves. I’m no JRPG expert and barely played any in the previous ten years, but I found it fairly challenging until at least halfway through the game, probably due to me being underleveled from having avoided too many encounters, and having been reluctant to grind. The Rock Paper Scissors emotion system was pretty cool, and I enjoyed the focus of the combat system on essentially managing buffs and debuffs during encounters, and there were a bunch of cool abilities.

I have nothing to complain in the sound or graphics department. The pixel art was very nice, and the soundtracks were excellent, though I don’t think I’ll listen to them outside of the game.

Overall, I quite enjoyed my time with it, even if it doesn’t sound like it from my review here. I’ll just pretend the game ended differently and then it was all good.

Yeah, yup, this exactly. I was crying like a baby throughout most of the ending but I had to completely shut out this completely shoe-horned attempt at shocking the player. They wanted their horror elements and really liked the idea of a shadow that looked like a hanging dead girl, so they REALLY forced it in there. The story is so much better and more believable if you just cut out that revelation entirely. OK, Sunny is in a blind fit of rage because his sister can't understand that he doesn't feel good enough to play the violin, perhaps jealousy that he can't play as well as she can play the piano, so he shoves her without intending to kill her, but she falls down the stairs and dies on impact. Sure, that is horrible, it's shocking, it's believable. That's it. If Basil's there, and he's mentally unstable, sure, he might suggest that they lie and say that she tripped and fell, and then they call an ambulance and their parents, and they tell the lie and feel unimaginable guilt together and have to go through the same mental adventure years later to remedy it. No ridiculous hanging necessary.

The story was still mostly great though. I enjoyed discovering the quirky dream world, though I did feel some tedium as it kept going on, and my interest in what was going on in the real world and what had happened in the past grew disproportionately. There's a point in the story where you have a pretty good idea of what happened (aside from the completely absurd bullshit) and it feels like things are about to wrap up, but unless you really mainline things, the pacing falls off the deep end, like it teased the end and just went on forever afterwards.

It didn't help that I'm the kind of player that is dissatisfied when I know I'm leaving things I could do behind. I got most of the side quests done before I had to take a break because I was getting too bored to keep going. And on the opposite end from some of you in this thread, I was overleveled, and combat was boring instead of too challenging. Just mash attack and you'll be fine, and on bosses just use the same successful order of skills that I started using tens of hours ago.

The art was fantastic throughout. This is a great game that I'll recommend to anyone when I feel it's appropriate, but I still compare this unfavorably to Undertale: A game that clearly inspired Omori, has better pacing, better gameplay, and a better, though much less emotional story. It's still just the difference between a 4/5 and a 5/5.

Completed! The ending kind of did drag on. I loved the combat though. Might be the most fun I had in a turn based RPG outside of the Persona series. I was over leveled (at least according to one forum post). I did not do side quests but I also didn't avoid aggro and was just able to beat most bosses without a game over. Overall I had a great time.

I just finished the game, and while I didn't particularly love the game, I have to say that I disagree with a lot of people here concerning the ending. Some people here seem to believe that Sunny just randomly decided to push Mari for no reason. However you can tell from the pictures that Basil took of that scenario, Mari and Sunny were in an argument that simply got out of hand. Sunny pushed her, not considering the stairs, and ended up killing her. It's similar to what Aubrey did to Basil when she pushed him in the lake.

As for the part about them hanging Mari's body to make it seem she killed herself: the kids simply just panicked. That's not an unbelievable reaction, and with them being kids at the time that overreaction is ten-fold. They went the route they thought that'd get them in the least trouble, but by doing so we see throughout the game that the guilt of doing that eats away at the two of them. Is what they did right? No but they're flawed characters; that's the point.

As for the criticism that Mari's death should have been seen as anything other than a hanging suicide, I actually had to read this one online because I guess I missed it, Apparently it's implied that Sunny's parents knew about Sunny having killed Mari and covered up that he did it. There's a quote from the mom in the game "I've lost my only daughter, I cannot lose my only son". To me, the only context I can see that quote being applied is the mom protecting Sunny from other people knowing so she wouldn't lose him to prison or whatever. It could also be the reason why the dad left soon after Mari's death.

Whether you think the story is good or not, whatever. Personally, I lost some interest in the story as the game went along, but I don't think the ending is as out-of-the-blue as some people say.

I finally finished the game last night after playing on and off for the past 2 months. I have some very complicated feelings about it, but overall I think I walked away with more positive than negative--and I have to give it credit for how much it made me confront my own emotional reactions.

My gut reaction to the ending was also intensely negative. When the twist fully sank in, I hated it. I felt cheated and lied to. I honestly started to feel sick to my stomach. And it was only made worse because of how drawn-out the ending sequence is, with lengthy fights, memory sequences, and dialogue. I had to wrestle this anger the whole time. I wanted to stop playing, but I also knew I was close to the ending and didn't want to just throw away the last 25 hours of gameplay because of a bad ending.

Except, as I kept playing through the final sequence, I wasn't so sure it actually was a bad ending. Now, I didn't do a hard 180--I didn't suddenly think the ending was genius. It is VERY emotionally manipulative. I also think it sacrifices the player's level of identification with the player-character, which is inevitably going to be disorienting. But my feelings about the ending did soften. Maybe that's because I lucked into getting the best ending, so I at least got some satisfying resolution.

Ultimately what made a difference was examining my own emotions and questioning them. Why was I reacting SO negatively? I've experienced plenty of cheap twists before. Why was this one haunting me so much? My gut reaction was "They had such a poignant story and they ruined it, so it feels like my feelings are not being respected." But the more I dug into my thinking I realized what was really bothering me (and thus begins the extensive spoiler section): it felt like it removed the "meaning" of Mari's death.

When you think she committed suicide, you devote your emotional energy into trying to find out why she did it. I know I found myself reading too much into little comments, like the photo caption about how she wasn't satisfied with her flower crown or her piano playing--it seemed like her high expectations of herself became too much, so she took her own life as an escape. Thus she becomes a sort of tragic heroine, almost mythical. In the dream world, she is an almost otherworldly figure, teleporting around with no difficulty, always positive, providing the immensely useful services of restoring your health, giving you hints on side quests, and saving your game. In the real world, a pillar of light makes her grave stand out.

What actually happened is a shock for a number of reasons. For one, it's no longer a willed action of her own volition, but a complete accident. On top of that, her mythical (almost angelic) image is defiled by having the MC and Basil stage her suicide. It no longer has the veneer of a "beautiful tragedy." Suddenly it feels senseless and even detestable. I came to hate the MC. I no longer wanted to play as him.

But that in itself is significant. What I felt about the MC was basically how the MC felt about himself. Even Basil felt some of that contempt, but he concocted the "SOMETHING" as a scapegoat so he (and the MC) could project his hatred onto that rather than process what actually happened. I ended up asking myself, how could I possibly live with myself if I was responsible for the death of a loved one? Not just a loved one, but the person you love the most? Even if it was an accident? Even the hypothetical was too painful for me to bear. And so I started to understand and pity the MC. The amount of bravery it took to break down those defensive mechanisms is astounding. And not just for himself, but for Basil too. And then on top of that, the courage to finally tell the truth to his friends (who may very well go through an emotional whirlwind of their own, for better or worse).

That's how I was able to make peace with the ending. It still demands you stretch your imagination as far as what people are capable of in moments of crisis. You still have to accept hard truths about characters you care for. You need to steer certain characters toward a redemption you're not even sure they deserve. And even after all that, I wouldn't blame anyone for slamming their controller down, moving it to the Retired tab, and ragging on the writing. Certainly there are things in here you wouldn't get away with in a creative writing workshop. But I still feel like it accomplished one of the main goals of art: it complicated my beliefs about love, life, and death in unique and uncomfortable ways.