My Sister Loved "To The Moon", Any Similar Games?

ZedCavalry

My sister is a person who I would say doesn't play games at all, but, when I purchased "To The Moon", she finished the game and absolutely loved the story. I was just wondering as to whether there were any games (preferably on PC) which have the same caliber of storytelling, or somewhat close to? I've struggled to find any, but my list of possible titles to get her so far is:

Shadow of the Colossus (PS2)
Mother 3 (GBA)
Journey (PS3)
Erm... that's it. :S

Any help? Especially on the PC games department.

ceres

I've heard ICO (PS2) is quite similar to Shadow of the Colossus, but I've never played SotC. ICO, much like Journey, is basically completely free of dialogue, and a nice little puzzle-platformer type thing. It's pretty, and the story is neat, but know that it's about as long as you are bad at that sort of game.

Essee

Well, To the Moon is in a category of games known as 'visual novels', which are usually light on gameplay but heavy on story. There are a lot of them out there, and what your sister would enjoy depends on what kind of fiction she enjoys in general (because a fair number of them definitely contain mature content or have very dark stories). A good, free intro to visual novels would be Narcissu, which has a touching (but not dark) story. Digital: A Love Story is free too, with a paid sequel set into the future Analogue: A Hate Story that has been very well-received and is itself receiving a direct sequel soon. Other good (and cheap!) intros to the genre include Planetarian (the trial is easily gotten from that page, but you would need to buy the full version from Amazon.jp; here is a link for that to save you time), and both Hatoful Boyfriend games (don't let the pigeon dating throw you off-- about halfway through the game you have the option for a very different sort of story and it becomes surprisingly great). There IS a trial for Hatoful Boyfriend but it doesn't include the best part of the game... Each of those games is under $5 so you really might as well just grab them. :P None of these games I'm recommending contain mature content or get very dark (I haven't played To the Moon yet so I don't know how dark the story is).

Most of the games in the genre are originally Japanese (because that's where the genre first came from), but I have noticed there are lots of visual novels popping up on Steam and other places recently (many of which are specifically targeted toward women), so you could check those out. There's actually also an entire visual novel thread on these very forums that you could ask for more advice on stuff to check out, again depending on your sister's taste, because there's definitely more out there (and some of them are free!). Most games in the genre are on PC, so you're in luck there! Relatedly, many visual novels that were originally in Japanese require translation patches to make them English (like Planetarian linked above). Also, for some Japanese visual novels (shouldn't be necessary for anything I just linked) you may need to set the computer's locale to Japanese, which mostly changes almost nothing on your computer except that "\" will look like a yen sign. So be forewarned if your sister starts exploring into unknown territory! (Which I highly recommend because there are some truly amazing stories told through this medium.)

Anyway, it might be obvious that I'm a big fan of the genre because, yep, they have great stories! I think other people can chime in here regarding other games with good stories (the Mass Effect trilogy is a really obvious one that I'll go ahead and mention, and both Portal games have a fun, light story to them too) so I figured I might as well just talk about this specific genre since you did actually use a game within it as your example. Hope all this talk was helpful to you!

ZedCavalry

Essee wrote: »

[snip]

Wow, thanks! I never really expected such a detailed response, so thank you for that. Digital: A Love Story is apparently already on my computer, so I guess I'll let her know of that today, as well as the sequel. Hatoful Boyfriend did put me off because of the ridiculousness of the game being put up on Youtube, but we'll see I guess! Planetarian I'll definately check out as well.

CelestialBadger

Planescape:Torment?

LoveIsUnity

Essee wrote: »

Well, To the Moon is in a category of games known as 'visual novels', which are usually light on gameplay but heavy on story. There are a lot of them out there, and what your sister would enjoy depends on what kind of fiction she enjoys in general (because a fair number of them definitely contain mature content or have very dark stories). A good, free intro to visual novels would be Narcissu, which has a touching (but not dark) story. Digital: A Love Story is free too, with a paid sequel set into the future Analogue: A Hate Story that has been very well-received and is itself receiving a direct sequel soon. Other good (and cheap!) intros to the genre include Planetarian (the trial is easily gotten from that page, but you would need to buy the full version from Amazon.jp; here is a link for that to save you time), and both Hatoful Boyfriend games (don't let the pigeon dating throw you off-- about halfway through the game you have the option for a very different sort of story and it becomes surprisingly great). There IS a trial for Hatoful Boyfriend but it doesn't include the best part of the game... Each of those games is under $5 so you really might as well just grab them. :P None of these games I'm recommending contain mature content or get very dark (I haven't played To the Moon yet so I don't know how dark the story is).

Most of the games in the genre are originally Japanese (because that's where the genre first came from), but I have noticed there are lots of visual novels popping up on Steam and other places recently (many of which are specifically targeted toward women), so you could check those out. There's actually also an entire visual novel thread on these very forums that you could ask for more advice on stuff to check out, again depending on your sister's taste, because there's definitely more out there (and some of them are free!). Most games in the genre are on PC, so you're in luck there! Relatedly, many visual novels that were originally in Japanese require translation patches to make them English (like Planetarian linked above). Also, for some Japanese visual novels (shouldn't be necessary for anything I just linked) you may need to set the computer's locale to Japanese, which mostly changes almost nothing on your computer except that "\" will look like a yen sign. So be forewarned if your sister starts exploring into unknown territory! (Which I highly recommend because there are some truly amazing stories told through this medium.)

Anyway, it might be obvious that I'm a big fan of the genre because, yep, they have great stories! I think other people can chime in here regarding other games with good stories (the Mass Effect trilogy is a really obvious one that I'll go ahead and mention, and both Portal games have a fun, light story to them too) so I figured I might as well just talk about this specific genre since you did actually use a game within it as your example. Hope all this talk was helpful to you!

I like where you're going with this post a lot. I think a good visual novel (or similar sort of game) would be a good starting point. Christine Love's Analogue is considered a quasi-sequelish thing to this game, which is available for free and is super good: http://scoutshonour.com/digital/ The entire game takes place in BBS systems like those that were prevalent and popular in the mid to late 80's. No experience with that is necessary to understand and enjoy the game, though.

If old school BBS drama isn't up her alley, Love also made Don't Take It Personally Babe, It Just Ain't Your Story, which can be found here: http://scoutshonour.com/donttakeitpersonallybabeitjustaintyourstory/

Here's the overview: "A spiritual sequel of sorts to Digital: A Love Story, set in a prestigious private high school, and on the social networks of 2027. Seven students, three endings, one eavesdropping teacher. A full length visual novel about the erosion of privacy, gay drama, young sexuality, and the perils of modern online life for a high school literature class."

(I know you mentioned Digital. I wasn't trying to be redundant, but I wanted to emphasize how much I enjoyed it.)

TychoCelchuuu

Actual Sunlight.
Everything in our Interactive Fiction thread.

melting_doll

If she has a DS, 999 is super underrated, and it's a visual novel. (The first one, not the new one) It's a mystery/horror/whodunit, with a bit of a love story as well!

A Dabble Of Thelonius

The Longest Journey. Fantastic atmosphere and characters.

Gog has a nice runnable version.

lessthanpi

Hotel Dusk (DS) Basically an interactive novel. Not exactly what you're looking for, but its probably worth a shot.

Lovely

melting_doll wrote: »

If she has a DS, 999 is super underrated, and it's a visual novel. (The first one, not the new one) It's a mystery/horror/whodunit, with a bit of a love story as well!

Wait. the sequel isn't a VN? Awww, man. That's a bummer .



Ah, anyways, ZedCalvary, if your sister dug the rpg-maker-ness of "To the Moon" and doesn't mind creepy stuff, then I HIGHLY reccomend Ib and The Witch's House. Which you can get here http://vgperson.com/games/ .

Tofystedeth

I haven't played it myself, but Dear Esther may be up her alley as well.

Taya

Dear Esther is an interesting style of game, but it's not a visual novel and nothing like To The Moon. You walk around and explore a mostly empty island that has a few things to see but you can't interact with anything. There appears to be a backstory but it's told in broken diary entries. I've heard that you need to play through multiple times to understand what happened. It was cool and I liked it, but it's hard to recommend.

The DS has a lot of great games that she may enjoy. 999, Hotel Dusk, Another Code, Ace Attorney.... maybe Professor Layton although these suggestions are less and less like To The Moon.

ZedCavalry

Frantically listing these down is fun, and she's super-stoked right now. Thanks to all who've posted so far.