Last Stop

While hampered with disappointing technical issues, this adventure is a satisfying story with fantastic writing. Though not a dealbreaker, the most glaring issue with Last Stop's technical glitches is its animation flaws. While the environments in this fictionalized version of London are beautiful, many of the character animations break often -- ranging from minor issues with female character’s hairstyles moving unnaturally during cut-scenes to more obvious problems such as more than one non-player character completely missing a face. While normally this isn't something worth mentioning, these issues hamper the game’s pacing by being extremely distracting. In addition, while the cinematic camera angles used in Last Stop are unique and conceptually impressive, they make it difficult to understand where the character's supposed to walk next, also distracting players as the result of odd design choices.

Leaving those technical problems aside, though, Last Stop has some very funny dialogue and an engrossing dramatic character arc for each of the three protagonists. Last Stop is Westworld meets The X-Files meets Freaky Friday -- and it works together seamlessly. That isn't a small feat. Additionally, it's worth mentioning that though Last Stop gives the player control over character dialogue choices, these don't affect the final outcome of the story. Given the popularity of many recent story games in which player choices do affect characters’ fates, either in small or large ways, some may see this as a flaw even though it's a deliberate narrative choice. All in all, Last Stop is a powerful story about the impermanence of life and the relatable challenge each one of us faces to balance being a good family member and managing a separate life outside of the family structure. Players looking to games for top-notch writing, complex moral questions, and memorable characters will leave satisfied.