North

NORTH is not a video game, per se, at least not in the traditional sense. It is an interactive piece of electronic art one can choose to indulge in order to better understand the plight of refuges. As such the messages might escape those who are too young to understand the real-life parallels or those who are too old and with prejudice to care. If you like cyberpunk science fiction and don't mind experiencing simulated oppression, give this a shot. There is certainly nothing quite like it on the eShop and for the asking price and a mere moment of your time will give you modern society conundrums that will haunt you for years. The experience is so subjective we have no choice but to leave the score for each individual to settle on their own. The biggest tragedy here is not that number on the bottom of the review, but the fact that if this ‘interactive art piece' was released 100 years in the past or a century in the future, the lingering topics would and will surely still be completely relevant.

The worst quality of North isn’t its obtuse game design, rough visuals, or jumbled storytelling, but rather the self-aggrandisement encompassing it all. Outlands saw an interesting real-world topic and settled on exploring it through a vacuous, insincere art-house demo.

NORTH carries an important message that it wants to impart, but whether it manages to successfully convey it to the player is debatable. The cyberpunk atmosphere helps it to stand apart from other games on the Nintendo eShop. But, with the developer having exerted more effort to create unpredictable and trippy scenes, you soon come to the realization that it is reading the letters sent from brother to sister that beat at the heart of the experience. In comparison, everything else feels meaningless.

While the game set out to invoke some sort of feelings in people regarding refugees and their plight. I feel that it failed on that message and really was just an unintelligible mess. It just became a walking simulator where weird shit happens unexplained. It seems that their intended message just didn't translate over in to gaming as well as they might have thought it did.

NORTH is rather brilliant game, but poorly executed. It's a commentary about asylum, immigration, and proving your worth to the society. It's not as good as it may seem. Or is it?

North is an interesting game with something special to offer despite its flaws.

NORTH is a special experience that, despite the lack of a proper gameplay and its short duration, succeed to make the player feel what it means to be an immigrant in a foreign country, hostile and far from the dearest loved ones. A nice experience with a futuristic cyberpunk style and an excellent soundtrack.

It would be dishonest of me to say that North is good as a game. It lacks polish, standard options, is glitchy, and is over too fast. But as a type of interactive art/short story blend, it did grow on me some, and ended up leaving an impression.

Unsatisfying ending aside, North is an interesting, insightful game that's worth a look. It doesn't ask a lot of your time (or wallet), and when it's firing on all cylinders, it has something genuinely important to say.

More than an interactive experiment than anything, NORTH is still a title created for a good cause, even if it's not really entertaining.