The fact that the DLC explicitly makes fun of its own poor casting in the very last part is quite fitting for a game that has such poor voice acting. Does it count as self-irony or is it a cheap way to rationalize and justify the lack of quality? I guess both.

In general, 'Unheard' revolves around listening to people's conversations in person or on the phone and find out who is who and whodunnit. Self-referential plots and brain twisting scenarios abound.

Recommended, with caveats, for surveillance enthusiasts.

The game tells of a town on the edge of the steppe where a sickness takes hold and reason falters. Its people cling to rites and old faiths, they barter and gossip. The plague moves, and it moves fast. There is no hero’s work to be done here - only the long endurance of some puppet who knows, or should know at least, that survival is hard and the road is long. Time passes more quickly with each remaining day.

You play a surgeon returned from exile, a man bound by debt and bound by blood. Your hands can heal but never enough. Every decision costs something dear. To help one soul is to abandon another. Food runs out. Sleep is rare and shallow. Even the smallest kindness bears a shadow. Overall, the game’s stat systems (thirst, hunger, stamina...) are cruel but fair, as nature is 'fair'.

They do not mock you.
They only ask that you understand.

The writing is plain and deliberate, carrying a sort of mythic sorrow. Existential grief, you could call it. There are no revelations, only recognitions. Many a conversation reveals and thus, reopens wounds. Yet there is life in the town, in its superstition and in its hunger, and in the faces of those who still expect mercy. You come to know them, and when they die you carry their absence like a stone in your pocket. And as it gets heavier, you take every chance you can get to forget about your own burden, your own heavy heart, still beating in spite of everything.

What the game achieves is not pleasure but gravity. It reminds you that survival is a moral act, that knowledge cannot save anyone, and that faith is a thing both poisoned and necessary.

When it ends, there is no triumph, only the stillness of a place that outlasts its inhabitants. You put it down changed, and not entirely for the better.

Nichts für Zartbesaitete.

Elegant puzzles, clean design, zero hand-holding. Kinda like zazen but instead of staring at a white wall you catch yourself staring at two dots for ten minutes questioning your life choices.

Looks relaxing. Isn’t.
It’s like someone gift-wrapped a logic bomb in pastel colors.

Gotta admit now my brain hurts... but in a polite way.

Rubik’s Cube met a mountain and said “let’s roll.” Genius mechanics, oddly soothing, it is basically a love letter to triangles and suffering.

Hundreds of times KENNY SUN shouts his name in all caps like he’s claiming another piece of my sanity. The pyramid scheme isn’t just in the gameplay — it’s in the branding recursion too.

SOMA made me realize that identity isn’t a fixed thing — it’s more like a reflection on moving water.

Who Am I? Now that's the big question. I play as Simon. Where Am I? In an underwater research facility that's basically Rapture's depressed cousin. How did I get here? Or was I always here? Am I dreaming? Over time perceptions, values, and limitations change. And this self-awareness about my limitations could be seen as performative in its own way. It's turtles all the way down. One moment I was pretty certain of who I was, the next I was debating morality with a machine, feeling genuine guilt for unplugging ... a thing?... that couldn’t even hear me.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3536757850

The game’s beauty is in how it never tells you if you’re right, only asks if you can live with your answers. It reveals your presuppositions about what it means to be a sentient life form; is it a physical body, is it a (human) face, is it (self-)awareness/consciousness?

And so, beneath all the horror and the darkness and the ocean’s weight, there’s a subdued conversation going on about what it means to be alive, to think, to remember, to be 'real'. The environments are haunting not only because they’re abandoned, crusted with crushed shells and remains of tragic accidents, but because they feel like they’re waiting for you to answer something you don’t yet understand.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3536757810

I would like to continue this game but I find it quite hard - even on Discord - to find play buddies. Like the other parts, it's a great co-op experience solving puzzles and running around in dungeon maze with walkie talkie.