Teen Game Review: “Event[0]” PC

Daaaaaaang Clayton, back at it again with a new review! What have I done to stoop to such an old trend? *sigh* Ladies and gentlemen: We’ve got Event[0] on the block today. Created by Ocelot Society and released on September 14th, 6 days ago, Event[0] is a single-player adventure game that takes place in space. The game itself was inspired by 2001: A Space Odyssey and takes place in an entirely different universe than the one we know today. You’re far past stranded: Alone and millions, 390 million miles give or take a lot, and your only way to return is through the help of your computer friend, Kaizen. Of course, you yourself must be up to the task as well. You couldn’t simply return to Earth by asking it nicely .(Boy wouldn’t that be a great game. 2 minute game of you asking, “Pretty please,” and it sending you back, title screen with like 2 names on it.)

To say the ship that you are on is mysterious is an understatement, it’s no joke. Your main goal is to communicate and to learn how Kaizen, the AI himself/herself/itself, behaves. That seems like a simple task, but could be a difficult one when you start jumping into the game. It’s almost, this’ll sound silly to everyone as it sounds silly to me, but it’s almost like a dating simulator of sorts. Obviously I realize, this isn’t a romantic game nor would there be a game where you date a computer (I think. Don’t quote me on that!). It has that sort of feel though. Sometimes Kaizen is in a nice mood, sometimes it handles things rashly, harshly even, sometimes it’s really peaceful and sounds like a normal person even. It’s quite, interesting your interactions with Kaizen. I did say, it, literally IS the main point of the game. Not to say that is the entirety of the gameplay, but that is a MAJOR staple on it, and it’s a pretty curious concept to say the least. I do believe when I say that Event[0] did it quite well. It’s not something I can recall seeing, I find myself saying that a lot but, bear with me, I literally only played about 5 genres of games at the maximum for about 13 years or so. Didn’t really expand my horizon until the past couple of years too. I say this as well so that, if you were like myself in the past, then you should enjoy the game as I did. Kaizen is one interesting thing, that’s all I know.

Like I said, Kaizen (no, I’ve said it previously, I don’t get paid if I say a certain word a certain number of times.) IS the main gameplay, but what’s the point now? If you were asking yourself this question, THAN OBVIOUSLY YOU DIDN’T REA….oh wait I didn’t discuss it. Pardon me. Your MAIN if not, SECONDARY gameplay, would be that of trying to understand the ship itself, and the entirety of your situation at hand. Previously stated: It’s a fairly large task to bestow upon one sole person, but hey, you can do it! I believe in you! (This includes me talking to myself by the way.) The ship and Kaizen are interconnected in that, they share feelings. No the ship doesn’t have feelings, that sounds preposterous. How should I word it…..since they’re connected, they’re connected. Honestly with me saying the ship has “feelings,” it’s not that far off honestly. It sounds like I’m crazy, but that genuinely IS what it IS. Discovering the ship’s history and mingling with your newly found best bud in the entire world, Event[0] can actually be sort of scary. All alone, out in space, no one can hear you scream. Wait, that’s been used before, hasn’t it? Uh let’s see…..nah I’ve got nothing, nothing worth noting at least. Good grief, I’ve let you all down. I need to point out before moving on to me rambling about other stuff, that the visuals are for sure the most outstanding of the things that I could point out right off the bat. It’s a very appealing game to look at, which is a BIG, BIG plus in my eyes (literally and figuratively), and it is something you should be VERY well aware of. That is all.

Of course, your main goal is to return to Earth. (Isn’t it always? Who wouldn’t want to return to Earth when you’re so far gone?) You cannot do this without the help of the ship (no duh) and Kaizen, who is the ship as well. It’s a bit deeper than me saying, “Here’s Kaizen, a computer lad, and he controls the ship and stuff yo,” but summarized, yes, that is correct, just in wording that I would not particularly choose myself. Sound and music wise, I cannot say it’s incredible nor bad. There really isn’t much of music and honestly, it kind of adds on to the scary-esque atmosphere that the game was leaning towards. It’s not so much that it’s entirely scary, it’s just, being alone alone doesn’t help much, and then you practically just have space noises (because we all know what space noises are) all around you, and a PC. Yeahhhhhh, it’s uh, it’s a bit concerning to say the least. In no way though is it, are there gonna be some Star Trek villains coming after you or anything, trust me. (Get on some DLC, that’d be sick)

All in all, although I couldn’t entirely say much about it, it’s a very intriguing game. On the outside looking in, there isn’t much to do. “How on Earth (see what I did there?) would it be fun to talk to a computer thing all the time?” Could I tell you why that is? No. Well that sounded stupid after I typed it out. I seriously can’t really portray that as well as I hoped. It has a certain charm to it that I think would appeal to most people. The game itself has got to be one of the stranger ones I’ve played. This isn’t me being rude about it, nor saying I didn’t enjoy it, because I did, for sure, it was just….odd. Without sounding mean it was odd to me. I didn’t know entirely what it was coming into it, and I don’t know what it entirely was coming out of it. Obviously you, the viewer, would have a different experience than I would (or at least I would assume), but that’s what I got from it. Again, no complaints there, just a different concept entirely, to which I HAVE to point out: Event[0] did an ABSOLUTELY outstanding job at it!