Recent reviews by Mushroom Juice #FixTF2

Not only is this not a happy game, it's not even really a game. The gameplay is absurdly simple and not to mention the game is very short, even if you take your time.

It's what I call a "youtube game" where watching a video of the game is the same as playing it. If you're really that interested in it, watch a playthrough, you really aren't missing much.

The game DOES manage to be scary at times, and has an uncomfortable atmosphere throughout though. I can't give it higher than a C grade though.

NOTE: this is one of those games where watching it is the same as playing it. If you want to play this, DO NOT watch a playthrough before.

It's short, very short, and easy, very easy, but it has VERY good art direction.

I'd love to see more work from this game's team, honestly. This game was really cool.
It doesn't take long to complete or 100% either.

To sum it up, this game is extremely gross for no reason, makes you feel awful for completing it, and takes way too long to complete.

-There's only one guy doing all the voices

-There's a puzzle involving mixing an old woman's bodily fluids together

-Feces, blood, boils, pretty much everything gross about humans is in here, and not even in a commentary-like way

-The puzzles are either pathetically easy or way too hard, with few exceptions (you better know astrology or level 9 is going to be hell)

-The secret stuff is the completely arbitrary "click on something that looks unclickable" type

-I feel like despite having voice acting, I barely got to know the characters versus how I did in Rusty Lake Roots, where I had a very good idea of who everyone was despite the lack of voicework.

-The game ends with the people you've been helping the entire game killing you for a very obviously implied reason, which sucks because you've been nothing but nice to people who don't really deserve it.

-At the end they try to tie the game to Rusty Lake Hotel by saying all of the Eliander family became the animal people from Hotel, but only Mr. Boar and Mr. Deer are remotely similar. Ms. Pheasant is a photography model, and the person she was originally was blind. It reeks of "we did this retroactively"

I normally like Rusty Lake's games, especially since this one is devoid of jumpscares, however I cannot recommend it. Please play Rusty Lake Roots or The White Door instead, they are much better and much more profound than this dreck.

Very short and every puzzle amounts to "check everything in the room until you get more stuff to do". It has an interesting concept, but doesn't really do much with it. Additionally, there is no music, which only builds tension that the game does not need, since it isn't a horror game.

Watch someone else play it if you're really that interested.

This game has an extremely strong aesthetic, both in the visual and music department. The music is unique in that it is improvised on the spot, with various tracks added and subtracted as you complete each level. It's a rather complicated process, and there's a rather interesting documentary on youtube about how they created it.

First I will say what I did not like.
All of the puzzles in the game revolve around the titular Creaks (the creatures that become normal objects when light is shone on them). While they did do some creative puzzles with them (especially later on in the game), it does get somewhat stale after a while, especially since the use of each individual Creak is not evenly distributed at all (for example the Male coatrack is rarely used after the female coatrack is introduced, and the goat is only used in one area).

The game is very linear and had very little backtracking. This is a problem in that you don't really get to appretiate all the work that went into drawing each individual screen, especially the "transition" screens between puzzles. The only "secrets" are a few of the interactive paintings you can find that are hidden away, which are usually as easy to find as "go through this wall that looks solid in this transition room".
Additionally, some of the ambient details got rather grating after being stuck on a puzzle for a particularly long time. What I mean by this is often random background objects in a room will move as if they're alive (an early example is the garden shears you see once you enter the attic). Some of them make repetative noises that become somewhat annoying when trying to solve a particularly hard puzzle (the laughing skeleton in one of the attic puzzles is a good example, as well as the creepy moaning face that takes center stage in a late-game level).

This next part contains spoilers for the end game. It is also the biggest flaw with the game.
The game has an extremely anticlimactic ending. After the yellow person is eaten by the Monster, you actually learn important bits of lore, in a game that hasn't really placed much focus on establishing who these characters are outside of what we've seen of them in cutscenes. The Blue bird and the yellow person are revealed to have created the Creaks, with the Monster being an attempt to power the entire mansion by having it run on a giant wheel (this is why they stop the Green bird from killing the Monster several times). This is the point where I was most strongly invested in the game, with the goal now being to free the Yellow person from inside the Monster by defeating it.
You go down beneath the mansion into the sewers, eventually reaching a cave with a glowing rock which you put in a lantern. Then begins a very long sequence where you and the Blue bird ride the previously-inaccesable elevators all the way back to the top of the mansion. Everything is building up to a climactic battle with the Monster, with all the birds armed. You finally get eaten by the Monster to attack it from the inside, and all you do to defeat it is watch a cutscene where the rock is released from the lantern and the monster explodes. Then the game's over. All this buildup was for nothing. I was half expecting the lantern to be another gimmick similar to the crank switch the Librarian gives you, but it wasn't. Especially since the Monster had been built up for literally the entire game. Amanita is no stranger to anticlimactic endings, but this one felt particularly dissapointing. Maybe the inside of the Monster could've acted as the real final area? I'm not sure. (Also we never got to see the Yellow person's face, which kinda sucked. Why was it covered?)

Now for the good stuff. Creaks has a very imaginative world and I LOVE how everything looks. It's the kind of game where I wish I could see more of how everything works and learn the backstory to everything. I attempted to parse information on the backstory through the paintings and various background details but I couldn't parse much. The graphics are definitely my favorite part of the game.

Additionally, the way that each Creak is introduced and the gimmicks associated with them are integrated incredibaly organically (for instance the Dogs waiting on whatever side of a ladder you last left from), and I was rarely confused how each Creak worked (except the Goats but I did eventually learn their gimmick).

It's also a fair bit longer than Machinarium, which it looks the most similar to graphically.

Overall I'd say Creaks is a fairly good game. It has interesting puzzles that while not as varietous as Machinarium or Samorost still manage to be engaging. The graphics are beautiful and every scene feels unique. The music is one-of-a-kind and will get stuck in your head in the best way possible. And it's fairly long as well. And while the paintings aren't the best form of replay value, it does actually have replay value, unlike some of Amanita's other games.
This is the type of game you play once, then play again a few years later when you can't quite recall all the details.
I give it a solid B!