Dressed in a yellow raincoat, the (very) little heroine you play is called Six. But the game will never tell you. Nor will he explain to you what leads this poor child to wake up in a suitcase lost at the back of a dark room, who is the great geisha who seems to haunt her nights, who are the strange little elves with pointy hats that you will come across regularly or why monstrous deformed adults seem to imprison children. The only real revelation that will be made during the adventure concerns the general place where you are (even if a keen sense of observation is enough to guess its nature thanks to certain camera movements…). In other words, Little Nightmares fully plays the card of the atmosphere and the cryptic scenario.
200 MINUTES INSIDE
By ignoring any narration in the strict sense of the term (no text or dialogue) the game is adorned with mystery, even if it means leaving the player perplexed at times. Especially at the very beginning of the adventure, where even the gameplay is not explained. Thus, you will come across from your first steps a statue representing the geisha seen in the tiny introductory cutscene. By interacting with it, Six will start wearing it. Naturally, you will then look for a place to deposit it in order to trigger some mechanism. In vain, because it is just a "collectible" object that must be thrown and broken to be counted as found... If the general lack of clarity is never really handicapping, we still end the adventure with a number of questions that remain unanswered. Fortunately, the game still offers us one or two interesting storyline developments, particularly through the theme of hunger. Needless to say more, because it would spoil the few words expressed more or less clearly by the game. One thing is certain: the heavy and dark atmosphere is reinforced by this lack of explanations, and we will therefore forgive it quite easily.
Because the gloomy atmosphere released by the game is quite fascinating. The artistic direction hits hard and even allows itself to display totally incoherent proportions, which help to install even more unease.
Because the gloomy atmosphere released by the game is quite fascinating. The artistic direction hits hard and even allows itself to display totally incoherent proportions, which help to install even more unease. Ridiculously small, Six regularly comes across objects that are too big for her but decidedly too small for the giants she crosses her path. The impression of evolving in a dream, or rather a nightmare, is permanent, and it is a feast for the eyes. Grainy filter on the image, faded colors, volumetric light and other graphic subtleties reinforce an already very pleasant artistic touch at the base, which multiplies the elements referring to childhood and juxtaposes them with a prison and violent universe. The soundtrack is not to be outdone and, too, seeks both to seduce us and to worry us. Metallic creaks, creaks of the floorboards, mysterious murmurs, grunts of giant creatures, childish music: all the sound loops discreetly infiltrate your brain to destabilize it. With such a universe, the gameplay obviously cannot play the card of pure action. Little Nightmares is essentially a platform game, mixed with little puzzles and a few games of hide and seek with monstrous creatures. Faced with blind men with big arms or fish-headed cooks, you will regularly have to find refuge in the right places and at the right times in order to escape their vigilance.
LIMBO CHILD
Like a LIMBO or an INSIDE, the game remains essentially a side-scrolling puzzle-platformer giving pride of place to die and retry (RIP la francophonie…). With a small subtlety compared to the two examples given above: the possibility of moving towards the front or the back of the decor. But this addition is ultimately not very useful and it even complicates certain passages, the controls lacking a little precision. We may also regret the short lifespan of the game, which only requires three or four hours to play (and which nevertheless allows itself to display a disturbing message of “search for downloadable content” at launch…). But the biggest flaw of Little Nightmares, which we would have liked to adore, probably lies in the far too obvious influence of the aroused INSIDE. The atmosphere, the gameplay, the characters and even certain specific shots (for example the one where the child you are directing is in the foreground while adults move slowly in single file in the second...), absolutely everything recalls the Playdead title. This far too pronounced mimicry is so obvious that the excellent GOG platform offers Inside outright for the purchase of Little Nightmares, while the developers and publishers of the two titles have absolutely nothing to do with each other. By the way, immediately jump at the chance if you haven't had the chance to play INSIDE yet! But as interesting as it is, this offer still sounds like a terrible confession...
