I was originally going to wait for the physical version of AI to be released next week but ended up purchasing the digital version on the Switch. I finished the first Somniun section and I am still in the early stages of the games. So far though, I am liking it quite a bit. Compared to Uchikoshi previous two games, Punch Line and Zero Time Dilemma, AI feels like it was actually given a proper budget and a healthy amount of development time. While his previous two titles had sloppy presentations that felt like they were trying to do too much with the budget/time they had, AI feels like a much more polished experience.
Just like was mentioned in a few pre-release interviews, AI is more of an adventure game compared to Uchikoshi's previous games where you can investigate environments, gather clues and solve puzzles in the game's Somniun sections. These sections, where you explore a character's dreamscape to help solve mysteries, are under a time limit where time advances whenever you move or interact with anything. It seems really interesting, especially how you have to figure out the strange logic of that character's dream world in order to solve puzzles, but I feel like I made some bad choices in my first Somiun investigation that might come back to bite me. I'll have to play a little more to get a full grasp on how all that works out.
The game's story just throws you into the middle of an investigation, with the characters causally talking about past events and their relationships without going into details. On one hand it is cool because you feel like you are piecing together the story through normal conversations instead of exposition dumps but it also makes me feel like maybe I am already suppose to know all the stuff they are talking about. Like I am jumping into a sequel that assumes I am already familiar with the series or I was suppose to read a prequel web-comic before starting the game. It is still very compelling so far and I'm sure that the game will explain more once I get further into the story.
The characters also seem pretty fun so far and they are backed up by some very solid English voice acting. Plus the Switch version, which I am playing mainly in handheld mode, seems to run without any issues. I saw some reviews that complained about the game's performance on Switch but I have been playing it after downloading the Day One patch and have had no real problems.
Anyway, is anyone else planning to pick up AI? And if you have, what are your impressions so far?
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