Inhuman Resources: A Literary Machination was a fun game that was deeply mysterious that made me question everything as I played it.
This is a very narrative focused game being a visual novel-like game (less emphasis on the visual as this mostly consists of character art for whoever your character is speaking to at the time). It is well written as it kept me deeply intrigued and wanting to find out answers as I dove deeper into the insidious workplace you are interviewing for/starting a job with while being provided with absolutely zero answers on the job and what you’re getting yourself into. Desperate times and all that. It is dark, it is creepy, and it is filled with mystery and tension all which kept me coming back for more.
I really loved the added aspect of choices mattering and having a significant effect in Inhuman Resources. This was a nice little touch and a way to add something unique to each run you play through based on what answers you give. How do choices matter? Well, depending on how you answer certain questions, it effects what skills you gain, which in turn effects how you can answer future questions because you gain stats based on how you answer some of these specific questions. For example, answering a question one way might increase your technological skill level, whereas answering it another way might increase your physical skill level. Then later you might come across a question that can either be answered with the generic, skill-less way, or you could have the opportunity to answer a special way if you have the proper stats to allow for it. This opens unique dialogue and can work in your favour if you have the requisite skills to allow you to answer in a way that could possibly save you because it allows you to provide a solution that makes your overseers happy, over an answer that will make them look upon you less favourably.
All this to say I really enjoyed seeing how my choices opened up certain doors for me, particularly in my hunt for answers as to what was going on at this terrifying workplace. The dialogue did seem to mess up for me on a few choices, written as if I had made another decision over the one I actually made, but as it seemed more like a proofreading error than actually affecting the outcome of things, it didn’t seem like an overly big deal. Aside from this, I wish it was a little clearer on when the game saved, or even allowed you to save manually as I ended up losing some progress when it didn’t save at the start of a new day like I expected it to, but all together this is a pretty minor issue in the face of how enjoyable the rest of the game was.
A big thanks to keymailer and the devs for the gifted key!
