''Dead Synchronicity: Tomorrow Comes Today'' is an episodic

point-and-click adventure game An adventure game is a video game genre in which the player assumes the role of a protagonist in an Interactive storytelling, interactive story, driven by exploration and/or Puzzle video game, puzzle-solving. The Video game genres, genre's focus ...

set in a

post-apocalyptic Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction are genres of speculative fiction in which the Earth's (or another planet's) civilization is collapsing or has collapsed. The apocalypse event may be climatic, such as runaway climate change; astronom ...

future. The game was partly funded through the

Kickstarter Kickstarter, PBC is an American Benefit corporation, public benefit corporation based in Brooklyn, New York City, that maintains a global crowdfunding platform focused on creativity. The company's stated mission is to "help bring creative project ...

crowd-funding website, with the first episode released in April 2015.

Plot

Players control Michael, an

amnesia Amnesia is a deficit in memory caused by brain damage or brain diseases,Gazzaniga, M., Ivry, R., & Mangun, G. (2009) Cognitive Neuroscience: The biology of the mind. New York: W.W. Norton & Company. but it can also be temporarily caused by t ...

c who awakens in the apocalyptic New World, where many humans, known as "the Dissolved", suffer from a terminal disease. Michael navigates the area, attempting to discern the truth behind his situation, while grappling with perplexing visions and dreams that obscure his thoughts. According to the studio, the game features "space-time distortions, a

dystopia A dystopia (lit. "bad place") is an imagined world or society in which people lead wretched, dehumanized, fearful lives. It is an imagined place (possibly state) in which everything is unpleasant or bad, typically a totalitarian or environmen ...

n atmosphere... and a dark, bloodstained plot".

Development

Fictiorama Studios consists of three brothers, Mario, Luis, and Alberto Oliván, and artist Martín Martínez. This story was pitched by Alberto, and the art, plot, and music were designed to fit his vision. The developers cited influences such as ''

The Secret of Monkey Island ''The Secret of Monkey Island'' is a 1990 point-and-click graphic adventure game developed and published by Lucasfilm Games. It takes place in a fictional version of the Caribbean during the age of piracy. The player assumes the role of Guyb ...

'', ''

12 Monkeys ''12 Monkeys'' is a 1995 American Science fiction film, science fiction thriller film directed by Terry Gilliam from a screenplay by David Peoples and Janet Peoples, based on Chris Marker's 1962 short film ''La Jetée''. It stars Bruce Willis, M ...

'', and ''

The Road ''The Road'' is a 2006 post-apocalyptic novel by American writer Cormac McCarthy. The book details the grueling journey of a father and his young son over several months across a landscape blasted by an unspecified cataclysm that has destroyed ...

'', among others. The art style borrows from

expressionism Expressionism is a modernist movement, initially in poetry and painting, originating in Northern Europe around the beginning of the 20th century. Its typical trait is to present the world solely from a subjective perspective, distorting it rad ...

and

tribal art Tribal art is the visual arts and material culture of indigenous peoples. Also known as non-Western art or ethnographic art, or, controversially, primitive art, Dutton, Denis, Tribal Art'. In Michael Kelly (editor), '' Encyclopedia of Aesthetics' ...

. One of the main challenges for the production team was designing the non-linear narrative and complex branching-tree dialogue, eventually settling on a software called articy:draft to collect all the data needed to streamline this process. The game was partly funded through the

crowd-funding website, raising $51,501 in April 2014.

Reception

According to Carsten Fichtelmann of Daedalic Entertainment, ''Dead Synchronicity'' was a commercial flop. He said in 2016, "Unfortunately, it did not sell well, only a few thousand units, so we had to say to the developers that we cannot put money in a second game, because we lost money with its first part." ''

PC World ''PC World'' (stylized as PCWorld) is a global computer magazine published monthly by IDG. Since 2013, it has been an online-only publication. It offers advice on various aspects of PCs and related items, the Internet, and other personal tec ...

'' praised the game as a brave and "surprisingly disturbing" title, but said it lacked a "catharsis" due to its abrupt end and lack of narrative cohesion in gameplay. John Walker, writing at ''

Rock, Paper, Shotgun ''Rock Paper Shotgun'' is a British video game journalism website. It was launched in July 2007 to focus on PC games and was acquired by Gamer Network, a network of sites led by ''Eurogamer'', in May 2017. History ''Rock Paper Shotgun'' ...

'' had been very enthusiastic about the game during its Kickstarter campaign. However, upon reviewing the first chapter, he too was disappointed with its abrupt ending. The ''

PlayStation 4 The PlayStation 4 (PS4) is a home video game console developed by Sony Interactive Entertainment. Announced as the successor to the PlayStation 3 in February 2013, it was launched on November 15, 2013, in North America, November 29, 2013, in ...

'' port received positives reviews, with ''Crash Landed'' scoring it 4 stars, praising the game's control method: "Developers Fictiorama Studios have gone a step further and transformed Dead Synchronicity - a game that would usually be more suited for the PC space - to feel right at home on the console using a controller, thanks to some smart game design decisions." Kai Powell of ''wccftech'' scored the game a 7.7, praising its "macabre" setting; meanwhile, ''Jose A. Rodríguez'' of ''

IGN ''IGN'' is an American video gaming and entertainment media website operated by IGN Entertainment Inc., a subsidiary of Ziff Davis, Inc. The company's headquarters is located in San Francisco's SoMa district and is headed by its former e ...

'' scored the title 7.8.

References

External links

''Dead Synchronicity'' official website
2015 video games Android (operating system) games Daedalic Entertainment games IOS games Kickstarter-funded video games Linux games MacOS games Nintendo Switch games PlayStation 4 games Point-and-click adventure games Post-apocalyptic video games Video games about amnesia Video games developed in Spain Windows games{{IMDb title, tt4899320, Dead Synchronicity

Plot

Development

Reception

See also

References

External links