Game Thoughts: Mouthwashing
The second low-poly-aesthetics game I picked up recently was Mouthwashing. I'd heard a bit of commotion made about this one and was excited to jump into it as I'm a fan of narrative-only games.
This one was dark. Like, Children of the Sun was dark, but Mouthwashing put it to bed.
You play as the captain(s) of a stranded cargo-hauling spaceship, and the game primarily consists of scenes where you navigate the small ship and talk to your crewmates as they become increasingly desperate, with the occasional minor puzzle or micro-minigame like making a cake.
Potentially a slight spoiler here, but I've mentioned before that I had trouble in Disco Elysium willingly playing a horrible person. You don't get a choice in Mouthwashing. You play as a horrible person and you find out just how horrible as you go. You witness the human failings of the crew as they fall into insanity, and everyone suffers the entire time. It was awful and it was magnificent. It was literature.
I need to address again how refreshing the game was aesthetically. Something about the washed out colors and low-poly visuals felt amazingly on-point and I want to explore more games using low-end 3D to tell compelling stories.
Highly recommended, but maybe check the trigger warnings.