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Behind the curtain, The Gaming Adventure

A Weirdo Whammy Gaming Adventure Game

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This is definitely one of the weirder games in my Gaming Adventure List.

This game is a rather odd, deeply disturbing, and definitely dark game called Bad Dream: Coma. This is from the Bad Dream series (Coma, Fever, and Stories) developed by Desert Fox. I also have Bad Dream: Fever, but if I am honest, I am not sure I will play that one. This game was not my cup of tea by a long shot – definitely not what I was expecting, if I even know what I was expecting.

According to the blurb on both Steam and GoG (I got my games on GoG, by the way) – Bad Dream: Coma is a point-and-click adventure game with a unique minimalistic art style. The game takes place in a surreal and disturbing dreamland where everything depends on your actions. You can’t die, but you can suffer greatly.

And suffer you do. The game starts out only slightly weird… you get told to sleep well, and the lights go off…

It only gets weirder and darker from there.

Just a word of warning – there are several ways to play through the game, and every time it’s slightly different, depending on your actions (right from the start!) and there are multiple endings.

Another set of warnings – First, the game’s art style is very minimalistic and almost “dirty” (in terms of cleanliness not sordidness) which can make the disturbing imagery even more jarring. Second, the game’s story is very dark and twisted, and it deals with some very heavy themes, such as death, loss, and mental illness. Third, the game’s gameplay can be incredibly frustrating at times, which can add to the overall sense of unease, as things will break or disappear or be used for something other than what they should be used for. I also didn’t like the underlying … violence? Not even sure that’s the word I want here, but it’s a strange undercurrent, and I really found it unsettling.

The game is divided into four chapters, each of which is a different dream. In each chapter, you come across strange and disturbing characters and situations. This is not a hand-holding game. You will definitely need to have your wits about you, and think outside the box, or, in same cases, incredibly literally. Every “scene” has multiple puzzles, and some can only be solved by solving another from a different scene, using items you got by solving another puzzle in another scene. My TBI-brain struggled sometimes with holding on to multiple “thoughts” and steps at once (do this to get this, but do this first to get this to get that, to go back and finish that first one) but I’m sure it would be simple for anyone who can multitask.

Each chapter is represented by a different color: red, green, blue, and black. The color of each chapter represents the different emotions that you will experience during that dream. The game is full of symbolism and hidden meanings. The game is designed to make you think about your own dreams and your own subconscious. Clearly, this is not something I was very comfortable with, and the intended “uneasy” feeling definitely hovered over me the whole way through, and with each try.

What I worked out by playing is that you are a patient in a coma, and you are experiencing a series of disturbing dreams. The dreams are all interconnected, and they all represent different aspects of your subconscious. I’m not sure if these are a reflection of what is going on in the waking world, or just something that’s crept into your mind due to being in the coma.

I played through the game 5 or 6 times, reaching various stages in each play through. On my first play through… I lost my fingers on my right hand… so I cut someone else’s off and glued them to my own hand. That was probably the moment when I thought, “eh, I don’t know if I want to play this game anymore…”

The game is full of surprises and twists, and each scene is designed to make you feel uncomfortable and uneasy, and it definitely worked. If you are looking for a challenging and thought-provoking game, with a very dark, disturbing theme and style, then I would definitely recommend giving Bad Dream: Coma a try.

Bad Dream: Coma is a unique and unforgettable experience – and not necessarily in a good way. It is a game that will stay with you long after you finish playing it. Like the bad taste in your mouth from a bad apple, or an overripe orange. *wrinkles nose*

Behind the curtain, information, life, Shiny, The Gaming Adventure, Uncategorized

Hello, 911?

My next game in the Great Gaming Adventure was “911 Operator” which is produced and developed by Jutsu Games, a Polish crew, I believe. They also developed various other sim games in the same vein. This is not my usual fare, but it came with a Humble Bundle, I think, and as per my Gaming Adventure rules, it was next in line.

I completed the game over 3 evenings, but I think the “Career Mode” can easily be completed in one sitting, perhaps 3 to 4 hours on the Easy level, which is what I chose. There’s a “Free Play” mode, where I think you can pick a city and just play until you get overwhelmed, growing your teams and adding firepower and technical support. (MORE HELICOPTERS! MORE MOTORBIKES! Cue the “Chips” theme!)

Surprisingly, once I got the hang of it, I rather enjoyed the challenge of the game. In career mode, you start out in a small town in Hawaii, with minimal crime and few incidents. Obviously, this is all on Easy Mode, as I prefer “story” over challenge – I’m a bit of a wuss like that 😀 – but there are 3 other modes of progressively crazy difficulty to choose from. Once you successfully complete a few duty shifts in this town, you are moved to a slightly larger town with more crime and incidents.

Loading screens were various helpful REAL LIFE hints and instructions for a multitude of medical or safety issues! Ranging from hostage situations to poisoning, burns, and, as seen below, hypothermia.

You have the 3 services to control, with incoming dispatch reports that you have to send out teams to as needed. Once I played a few rounds, I realised your “efficiency” rating depended on your response to each incident – Did you sent the SWAT team to a pickpocket report? Or did you send a single motor bike team to a gang shootout? Was the main fire truck sent for a cat in a tree? I was then able to prioritise and send the right unit for the appropriate incident level.

Scattered in between these incident dispatches are the bread and butter of this game – the 911 call. You get everything from men trying out their pickup lines (yes, seriously – “This woman must need an ambulance… because she just fell from heaven!” along with some other gems) to stolen cars, illegal parking, hostage situations, bank robberies, burning hotels, terrorists, and random political bombings.

Each city was progressively larger and more complex, or, in the case of your final city, Washington, not the largest, but filled with politicians and intrepid journalists – and yes, they call you, asking for information and comments. Sometimes, people even attempt to bribe you not to send the police, or they inform you that they know “important people” and that they could end your career, and you are given various choices regarding your reaction things like this. One caller wanted us to send someone to sort out her 14-year-old daughter who was throwing a tantrum and breaking things, and another as a politician who had gotten himself into a little pickle and wanted an ambulance, but “no cops!” I sent the police anyway.

The voice acting was pretty good, with about 9 pages of “Voice Actors” with about 4 to 6 actors listed on each page. They did a great job! Some of the calls were repeats, but generally, each call was unique in some way, even if just in the dialog options you were offered, or the location and level of threat that was present.

Overall, I would actually highly recommend this game for people who enjoy the “simulation” genre – and there are more games like this one under the same umbrella, made by the same small development crew.

Stay on the line, help is on the way…