Dark Notes

Coming from Paper Bride developers, this Point&Click adventure game is filled with challenging puzzles. You play with two protagonists from different timelines, traveling back and forth through time to solve the mystery of the Wellbeing Mall. A boy's crying is heard, and many have reported the sighting of a ghost in red. Liszt and Caroline will communicate through a mysterious notebook and help each other to save a young child who's been missing. I don't want to say much not to spoil the horror aspect of this game.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3330273695

It has five chapters and plays like Escape Room games. I enjoyed the puzzles, which were challenging. I had to seek a guide for a couple of them because I didn't know what to do next. There is a hinting system, but it affects one of the achievements once it is used. Each item you collect has information and a hint of what it could be used for. The journal collects all the information you find through the chapters, which are all very important; you can also use your phone to search for extra details.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3286275879

The voice-over wasn't bad; you can choose either English or Chinese. I loved the artwork; it is so beautiful and dark. Once you finish a chapter, an artwork and information page will be unlocked in the main menu; the artists did an excellent job. The game saves automatically when you quit it. I also enjoyed the soundtracks; they fit the atmosphere nicely.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3330283289

There was one fighting sequence in the game, which was tough; I had to retry it multiple times to win it. You could skip it as it has three phases, but if you enjoy a challenge, you'll have it.

Pros:
+Interesting story.
+Beautiful artwork and area design.
+Fitting music.
+Variety of puzzles.
+Good journal.
+Voice overs.
+Hinting system.
+Automatic save.
+Steam achievements.

Cons:
- When you return to play the game, the main menu keeps giving you an error. Wait a couple of minutes until it loads, then click 'Start' to return to where you left your game.

When you finish the game, wait for the credits to end to watch the final cutscene. It is very interesting and adds to the story.

𝐹𝑜𝑟 𝑚𝑜𝑟𝑒 𝑟𝑒𝑣𝑖𝑒𝑤𝑠 𝑐𝘩𝑒𝑐𝑘 𝑚𝑦 𝑐𝑢𝑟𝑎𝑡𝑜𝑟 𝑝𝑎𝑔𝑒 𝐹𝑒𝑒𝑛𝑎'𝑠 𝐶𝘩𝑜𝑖𝑐𝑒

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For the most part, I enjoyed this game. Illustrations were nice and the majority of puzzles ranged from easy to average. A few had me scratching my head for a while and a couple were really obscure and didn't make much sense to me (using the mascara and lipstick for instance). They were satisfying to solve though and it was nice to see the ability to switch between characters in the last chapter. I wasn't keen on the timed based puzzle with the tentacle boss towards the end and I think the difficulty could do with lowering on that. I only made it past the first part and decided to skip it. I encountered a single bug with one of the assets not showing, so I couldn't complete that puzzle which was a shame. The menu could do with a translated language button on the start page as the options are in Chinese by default, so I had to go through and guess where to change it. A minor detail but could put off us lazy westerners.

6/10

Easier than the Paper Brides, but still enjoyable !
A couple of puzzles didn't really make sense to me, but globally it was nice !
Definitely doesn't deserve the 'mixed' score.
If you like Paper Bride, give it a go !