After playing This Bed We Made, you will never be at peace again when staying in a hotel.
THE GAME
This Bed We Made is a mystery and investigation game developed and distributed by Lowbirth Games. In a 1950s hotel, we meet Sophie, our protagonist and curious chambermaid, who loves looking through guests' belongings. One day, upon entering one of the rooms, Sophie comes across a makeshift darkroom in the bathroom and, to her surprise, several photos of her as she goes through customers' items. Scared, she tries to understand what is happening and, unintentionally, becomes involved in a bigger plot than she imagined.
Now, our dear maid activates her detective mode to find out what's going on. As she is already used to snooping around rooms, Sophie goes in search of answers to many mysteries.
MY IMPRESSIONS
Investigation games need to be well done to keep the audience entertained with the story. This Bed We Made manages to keep your attention, so much so that you'll find the game short when you realize you're finishing the journey. However, I feel that even when the story reaches its climax, it is not as impactful as it should be. All the investigation before that is cool, with really interesting puzzles and nothing complicated, but full of texts. In fact, the game is not in Portuguese-Brazil, which may alienate non-English speakers, as it is extremely necessary to understand the story in order not to lose the experience.
The choices made change some directions, but in practice, they do not influence the course of the game. It will make a difference in the different endings you can do, which also didn't move me. No matter what the ending I completed, it had no impact on me. I think it's cool that your actions or lack thereof cause aspects to change, but in the end, I think it was misused to close the story.
I liked the atmosphere that was created right at the beginning of the game, an aura that, at any moment, someone would appear and catch Sophie in the act. However, as time passes, you soon realize that there is no threat there, which takes some of the burden off the secret investigation. The characters have a good personality and are well acted by their voice actors, which makes everything more real and less generic. Despite being really short, the game has a replay factor so you can make new choices and actions and see their results.
ACHIEVEMENTS
Like any game where choices are involved, you will have many achievements related to them. In other words, if you choose one path and unlock an achievement, you will have to do the other later to acquire the other achievement. There are also achievements for specific actions and achievements for each ending of the story. In general, you can get more than half of them once you finish the game, but you will have to start over making different choices to be able to complete 100% of the game.
CONCLUSION
I love investigation games and This Bed We Made is competent at what it sets out to do. I expected more from the story and its climax, but it's still a good story with good characters. The fact that the game is short isn't a bad thing, as we can be more direct and it doesn't make the player tired with lots of texts just to lengthen the game. I just wish This Bed We Made created more danger, because there comes a time when you are simply going through all the rooms in the hotel without even having any threat, as if it were the most normal thing in the world.
I hope to see more games like this, as it is interesting and rewarding to get involved in investigations. The characters are not generic, making them come to life, as if they were real people. As much as I felt there was a lack of extra spice, I recommend you play This Bed We Made and awaken your curious sides.
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