Lost Records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1 review: brimming with psychological mystery and nineties kitsch
Early stages of narrative adventure games Lost Records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1you find yourself in 1995 about the largest environment in the protagonist’s messy bedroom. After fiddling with the needle board and sneaking through a series of shiny VHS tapes, my eyes attracted to Brand Tamagotchi on Swann’s desk.
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Platform Review: Personal computer
Available in: PS5, Xbox Series X | S, PC via Steam
release date: February 18, 2024
When I admire the familiar chunky design, the screen is bright and lifelike, and new options appear on the screen: play, feed, eat. Like an archaeologist, I am amazed at the unnecessary meticulous person at this moment – no need Lost records To include a totally playable pocket pet, but I’m here, cleaning up the poop like any good teenager.
This detail level is the first two that developers should not nod Life is strange The game, cemented the studio’s reputation as the narrative’s new wave mastermind. Since then, there have been many people who haven’t nodded, and some of the lives are strange games, but so far the main ideas behind the original Diptych have not been sent to the successor.
Lost Records: Bloom & Rage It is a new IP that explores the peculiar, chaotic nature of human beings from the perspective of stylized and specific periods. So far, it has been an adventure of tactile nostalgia and spiritual mystery that evolved into the spirit of the game before. arouse Life is strangeThe plot method, Lost records: Bloom and anger It is divided into two parts, and the second tape appears in April 2025.
exist Lost records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1, When an ominous package arrives in the mail, four friends who vowed to never speak after the undisclosed incident were called home. You play Swann, an anxious fifty-something who has to face the group’s “lost summer” events, reignite their dormant relationship to understand why the parcel arrives after all the time, and internally What may happen.
To do this, you’ll be scanning through a curated Midwest diorama, jumping between 1995 and 2022, picking a fixed piece and choosing a dialogue line, the story takes shape around your active version. As the story unfolds, the decisions you made in the past and present are weaving together to ensure that every choice is burdensome, regardless of what you are doing. In Velvet Cove, appearances are being deceived, and since then, friends have covered up an extraordinary backbone waiting to be discovered.
Swann’s teenage self is also equipped with a trusted camcorder that you will use to shoot summer events as the summer unfolds, a unique mechanism that helps differentiate Lost records From peers. As you explore, you can pull out trusted devices on a whim to capture valuable moments and create trait memoirs. You will usually be prompted to shoot certain scenes as well, and these shots appear in cutscenes, allowing you to subtly immerse yourself in the fantasy of the 90s.
Kind, rewind
The basics of Lost Records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1 Reward Exploration. If you’ve worked hard enough in your reckless friend’s garage, you might find a rough placement of perfume samples designed to hide the smell of weeds. Or, if you wander around an abandoned park, you might stumble upon some sort of choice graffiti that spells out the small-town mentality and class discord that exists in Velvet Cove. Not every nook and cranny covers something shocking, and often, small clues shed light on the complexity of the town, blurring the lines between what I think is “good” or “bad” characters.
The overall mystery of Swann’s amnesia helped find such a hint that weaves the spirit of investigating the main plot. So it feels natural to comb in each room or open space, not like the game, and my attention is causing Swann’s action. Whether I search for a room or not, I don’t feel like I’ve missed something, don’t nod and always give me enough information to push.
This immersion is helped by outstanding voice performance Lost records Throw. When their younger versions of their characters chat with embarrassment, they reconnect to the older self, but are naturally soft. The lines were full of patience and intention, and I was glad to watch their tones change as summer played as they became more intimate and softer. This transition is also accompanied by an atmospheric soundtrack that blends its original score with a handful of licensed cult tracks, including Cocteau Twins.
Despite how magical and releasing Lost records It can be felt that no nodding will not avoid the stricter elements of humanity, but handle them with caution. When I was a kid, Swann Lost records. Although the guts’ performance caused me to be excited, I found Swann and the quiet teenager of their team uneasy. This is especially true for Swan’s friend Nora, whose aesthetics of courage and attitude are masks of insecurity in their troubled family life.
Firecracker Kat is probably the most engaging story in the leading group, with most of it focusing on their fellow villagers, their sister Dylan, opposite each other and her dissatisfied but strange magnetic boyfriend Cory ( Corey), they seem to bully girls and excited girls. Kat’s struggle seems simple, as punk beliefs fight traditional family values. It’s easy to solve Kat’s troubles as a one-dimensional family, but The Lost Records upended those expectations considerably and well reimagined my experience as its craziest heroes and villains.
What’s in the box?
Maybe my favorite aspect Lost recordsThere are a variety of choices you can make and how they can boost your mood, though. Different from the previous work of the team Life is strangeHere, the story-changing decision does not appear with the daunting screen chyron.
It is fair to think that the impact of my behavior will not be fully revealed until Tape 2. However, in many cases, I saw my movements work immediately. For example, during the opening moments, Swan talks to his mom on the phone and recalls their old cats: from the past, from feeding them to hugging, that’s the name of your pet. No matter how big the choice feels, no matter how big the choice, the fine-tuning balance of the player’s influence with the main linear story makes me feel necessary for the plot, even though it is abandoned in a confident overall narrative.
The best bit
You won’t find any collections throughout the process Lost Records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1. Instead, Swann can pull out their trusted grocery store at any time to shoot seemingly random sets of seasonings to create nostalgic video memories, complete with Snowy’s 90s filters. Public graffiti, birds and shabby playground equipment are dotted around Velvet Bay, waiting to transform from the town’s Bric-a-brac into a stylized retro memoir. But, most impressively, the tidbits of the tape you shot continue to play in cutscenes, giving your game a unique and dreamy feel.
Lost records But, not always the hazy sunset, some scenes twist the horror. In a special case, Swan fell through the window into an abandoned house, an exit guarded by a mysterious padlock. Wandering in the darkness, only my camera lights guide me, I feel real fear as I solve the puzzle. most Lost records Around the conversation, these surprising deviations turn into exciting puzzles and weird tricks, which moves me on my toes, which continues with sinister magical realism.
An excellent feature is complex model characters and a visual identity that has been orchestrated in the past and present. Despite jumping for twenty-seven years, Velvet Cove felt trapped in the past, with its water tower decorated with gorgeous wooden antlers and lattice regulars in local bars. The rusty chain fence, cracked cement and abandoned space create a strong feeling that leaves the town behind, a feeling that contrasts with the free-learning aesthetic of the group of women who are keen to leave it behind.
During my game time, I encountered a lot of technical errors, examples of how to load the scene and crash in one instance. These issues are small in the grand scheme of the game and I hope they will be resolved before they are released. Thankfully, a forgiving checkpoint system means that I have never lost so much progress when I have problems.
Lost Records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1 It might be just the first half of the story, but even though I gained credibility and tears flowed down my cheeks, I was satisfied and very curious about the chaos of its cliff-blocking ending. I’m eager to dig out and unlock Swann and Co.’s missing works in the past, at one time a distorted camcorder clip.
Should I play the missing record: Bloom & Rage Tape 1?
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Accessibility
When you start Lost Records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1you can select the interface text size (small, medium and large) and then switch on subtitles. On this screen, you can also select the size of the subtitles (small, medium, large). Lost records: Bloom and angeryou can also choose to turn on the trigger warning.
These warnings include topics such as drugs, tobacco and alcohol. On this screen, you can also adjust the audio dynamic range, choosing between narrow ranges (small differences between loud and quiet moments, suitable for low-quality sound systems or noisy playback spaces) (medium difference between most loud and quiet moments) speakers), and wide (there is a big difference between loud and quiet moments, perfect for high-quality sound quality systems or quiet gaming space)
From the Pause menu, under the controls, you can switch and turn off vibrations and how the camcorder performs in the game. There are also options for reducing motion diseases such as switching of the cut-off head bob, camera motion control, and transferring the sense of the camera in a conventional, light, very light, no situation. You can also turn the camera and action invert and restart the entire keyboard from this menu.
In the case of visual effects, you can switch motion blur, camera smoothing and camera shaking. From the interface menu, you can also switch speaker prompts for whom you speak and toggle persistent reticles in first and third persons.
How I review lost records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1
I’m done Lost Records: Bloom & Rage Tape 1My computer has about nine and a half hours of story. At that time, I searched every environment and completed most mini montages that Swann could shoot throughout the process, as well as tested photo modes.
I used an AOC 27-inch QHD VA 144Hz monitor, one Logitech MX Master 3s Mouse and a Logitech G915 TKL keyboard. For sound, I used my external creative pebbles V2 speakers and Audio Technology ATH-MX50X The headset is plugged into the Scarlett 2i2 port. My GPU is RTX 3080My CPU is AMD Ryzen 9 3950x.
First reviewed February 2025
