LITTLE HOPE IS WHAT YOU SHOULD HAVE FOR THEIR NEXT GAME.

I have never been happier to have put a game on the back burner because I don’t think this game is fair to discuss without diving into its plot. Little Hope’s payoff is divisive to be sure, but I think it’s stolen the discussion away from a bigger problem in the story, and if I couldn’t discuss that then I would have little to critique this game on, which is crazy because the main selling point of Little Hope is its narrative.

But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Little Hope (because I’m not typing all of that out) is another interactive narrative game from Supermassive Games, and I will be upfront and say I have never played another one of their titles. I have been meaning to. I bought Until Dawn the day it came out but it has remained sealed to this day. That said I am familiar with these types of games because there are plenty, however Supermassive generally focuses on horror and that was new for me, so I was excited. The plot sees five people looking for their bus driver after the bus flips.

PLATFORMS: PC, XB1, PS4
MSRP: $29.99
PRICE I’D PAY: $9.99

Let me be clear, I enjoyed this game right up until the end.

Most of this game can be described as searching the environment for objects to be examined, dialog choices, and quick time events. At first these blended together really well, but soon I sort of saw through the Matrix and realized that there would be harsh cuts between these three portions of the game. Essentially, I had no fear of death in most dialog choices or just walking around, and once I realized that the game became not scary in the slightest. That’s extremely disappointing especially when the developers clearly know how to build tension; they just didn’t seem to keep it from breaking in Little Hope.

Speaking of not scary in the slightest, this game is ripe with jump scares. I actually have no issue with jump scares, but jump scares with piercing screams or loud sounds really don’t do it for me, and every single scare in this game is accompanied by a scream. It’s annoying. The worst part is the jump scares have nothing to do with the monsters of the game, which I found legitimately disturbing. One monster floats and drags its toes across the ground and it is highly disturbing, while another moved in an erratic, inhuman way, and I think was the best part of the game; but the monsters aren’t scary. That’s sort of a letdown.

Before I dive into the plot I want to note a couple things. I think the acting in this game is fantastic. Everyone did an amazing job. The grunge song in the intro was kind of cringey, especially when the curator is such an eloquent and cold individual. Also, the game crashed during the final cinematic for me; I am playing on an Xbox One and the console told me I didn’t have enough allocated video memory. I don’t blame Little Hope for this, but I feel like anyone looking at getting this should know that is a potential issue with your hardware going in.

Alright spoilers are coming now.

The whole game was in the mind of the bus driver all along. Every character you play isn’t real. I don’t mind this for the most part but I’m sure people will be irritated by the St. Elsewhere type ending. My issues stem from the problems this introduces to not only the story but the game as well. My first issue is that at times the group splits up and if all these people are in the mind of the bus driver that doesn’t really make sense, especially when the big reveal happens and the bus driver is seemingly only playing the part of a singular member of the group. It doesn’t make any sense that while he was off with Group A he was simultaneously imagining what Group B was doing because to him Group A were real. This also ruins some of the game itself because when prompted to play the Curator’s Cut (the parts of the game player two would have played in co-op) I saw no point because this whole series of events weren’t real.

The second issue is I think far more problematic as it implies that there was a massive oversight in their narrative writing process which is the most important part of a narrative based game. Early in the game the player is presented with a flashback in which they alter the outcome of the events within implying what happens in this flashback is canon because it affects the modern day truth instead of just the delusional world the bus driver sees. In this flashback we see the bus driver’s younger sister talking to a shadowy demon figure. She is the reason the mother gets locked in the bathroom, the sister and the bus driver get locked outside, and the brother gets locked in the attic. She is also the reason why the fire starts that kills everyone but the bus driver. The game is basically about the bus driver forgiving himself for the horrible events that happened when he was a kid but he didn’t cause any of it, and even if it is because he thought he was to blame that still doesn’t answer the question of what the hell the thing was that the little sister was talking to. I’ve seen theories that everything was in his head because we only see this vision after the bus driver crashes but if that’s the real answer then this game’s story just sucks.

Overall I think Little Hope is just alright. I don’t think there’s anything special to be found here. The twist in the story has been done way better as well as the gameplay by the same studio from all accounts. I guess that the good news is that if like me this is your first Supermassive game it apparently only gets better from here.

Review copy of game provided by publisher.