Source: pixiv.net

by Kristian Calalang

Being alone is fearful, A group of two can have relief, a group of three….

When I first saw this game, I was very eager to play it since it has garnered a positive reputation over the net, (Nico Nico Douga <link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nico_Nico_Douga> particularly). It’s a fairly new game and free with an English patch that was just released so I decided to play it and see what it is about. Based on what I have seen, I would say that it is pretty much a simple horror survival game with no complex mechanics, but it became popular not only because of the horror aspect, but also the underlying short story. The story of Ib begins with a girl named Ib visiting an art gallery with her parents. As she walks around the art gallery, a voice tells Ib to go downstairs, deeper into the structure.  And when she returns, nobody can be found in the gallery and the entrance is locked.  Now, she has to find her way out.

                One of the major things that annoyed me at first were the “???”’s that appear when you examine things, leaving you to fill in the spaces to interpret the meanings and make sense of them. After you reach a certain point, though, you can go back to examine those things again and the “???”s will be filled with actual words, giving you a more concrete idea. This is trivial though, as you don’t really need it to finish the game, and most are just the names of paintings but it would have been nice to know what the “???” means the first time around.

Because ??? is such a nice word

                One of the things that I really liked about Ib is the art style, which, while it looks like a series of elementary school doodles, matched the theme perfectly for the game. The soundtrack is nice, too. It gives the game a nice feel and switches the sounds when appropriate from melancholic to disturbing.

As you plow through the museum, you get events which show more of the characters, and help flesh out the story. In the end, you are left with the question, “What could I have done differently?”, which in turn motivates you to go through the game again. I suggest not rushing through the game because the character interactions are nice enough and part of the experience. Puzzles vary from easy to annoying (I hate “Liar Rooms” where you examine the clues to discover which pictures are lying and which ones are telling the truth). The solutions are fixed, though, meaning that if you want to go through the game again, you can opt to use the same solutions as your first playthrough, making subsequent playthroughs faster. Do tread carefully as there are many things which will surprise you the first time you go through Ib and, sometimes, they can result in you either losing a lot of health or dying. (As a side note, dying is barely a worry on future playthroughs unless you really have problems with arrow keys. Except for one or maybe two parts of the game, you can get to the end faster.)

At the end of it all I was satisfied with the 8 or so hours I spent playing Ib (getting all the endings, sorting out my emotions) as there is no right or wrong end for the game (save one). I experienced many emotions—shock, surprise, fear, sadness—and the game really struck a chord.

Source: pixiv.net

In the end, the journey is more important than the destination

                To end with a quote from the game,

“If your spirit suffers too much, you will soon start to hallucinate. And in the end you will be destroyed. And more worrying yet, you will not be conscious of the fact….”

Have fun with Ib. And remember to take breaks from time to time.

Game with translations can be downloaded at http://vgboy.dabomstew.com/other/ib.htm

Image Sources:

Front page Image: Image byてるこ at pixiv.net

2nd image is an in-game screenshot

3rd image is byはーち at pixiv.net