NeuroNet: Mendax Proxy
FOLLOW AND WISHLIST!
About the Game
You are a newly created A.I. designed to manage the city of Catena. As you tackle the demands of the populace you will be challenged to balance their needs against your own moral compass. How will you decide who to help when the effect of every choice you make ripples out across the city? Choose wisely, your decisions impact the outcome of the story and the future of Catena.
As your influence spreads across the city you will encounter new characters in need of your help. As you learn who they are, their motivations and beliefs, you will have to decide which direction to guide them in. Your choices have the power to alter the course of their lives, for better or for worse.
View the impact of your actions with city-wide reports that detail not only the choices you’ve taken, but how the city evolves based on your decisions. The city’s inhabitants will change their views towards you: will you make a difference to their lives, or bring it all crumbling down?
The line between right and wrong will blur as you make decisions that are tested against a torrent of demands. Can you win over those who see you as a threat, or will you choose to fight them? Who are you truly serving: the citizens that depend on you, or the people that built you? Shape the story with your decisions and uncover the truth.
- Branching Narrative: A ‘Reigns’ inspired branching narrative where player choice directly impacts the story, with some outcomes benefiting the citizens of Catena and others benefitting someone else…
- Quick Decisions: Characters pose problems that offer quick-fire decisions, but they are deceptively simple and have far-reaching repercussions. Good instincts are required to make the right choice at the right time.
- Choices That Matter: See the impact of every choice you make as your influence spreads across the city. Analyse reports and read the social media feeds of the population to observe the effects. Throughout the overarching story, your decisions will change the path and decide the outcome.
- Diverse Cast: Meet and build relationships with 23 diverse and fully voiced characters. Guide each one on their journey as they face the tough challenges life in Catena presents.
- Compelling Events: Over 5000 story events to experience, each offering choices that affect the characters you meet.
- Rich Lore: Explore the world of Catena through an expansive digital Codex packed with deep lore, engaging characters, and stunning cyberpunk environments.
Game Discussion
Steam User 0
This game is all about decisions. There's moments of light, but you should expect a bleak world setting and a grim storyline. Saying more though would ruin the experience.
Steam User 0
This game was perhaps tailor made for me. It's beautiful art and emphasis on choice are what drew me in but unfortunately it wasn't to be. Likely due to the the game's creators going under, the game has not been maintained and a game breaking bug that can seemingly soft lock you out after seemingly any choice you click made this game unplayable. It occurred frequently and I could not find a good answer or solution to fixing it. I give this game a positive review because circumstances outside of the creators hands are what caused the issue. If there ever is a patch that fixes this I will readily return to playing it. For even the brief amount of time I got to play this game gave me much joy. Thank you Dream Harvest.
Steam User 0
A quick game but an interesting one, worth buying on sale.
Steam User 0
Absolutely enthralling cyberpunk psychological exploration. It won't hold up for a second playthrough IMO, but that first playthrough was absolutely worth the price. I couldn't stop. I nearly the played the entire game in one sitting.
The only weakpoint is the core story's ending. It's too abrupt and too bitter. It needed more room to breathe, and especially if you manage to help out on all the threads the story offers, there should be a more positive mood to the outcome.
But I thoroughly enjoyed the 5ish hours leading up to that ending, and it's very much immersive, keeping engaged in the moment-to-moment events. Really it has dozens of little narrative arcs, each with satisfying pay offs.
Kinda like CP 2077, the sidequests are better than the main story, but still absolutely worth the price of admission.
Recommended because it absolutely enthralled me despite a lackluster finish. Flopped over the finish line, but I LOVED the race.
Steam User 0
A really fun experience, good writing and visuals, and an interesting story to hook you up.
I'd love to see more from this world, from these characters, but with how short the experience is, I hesitate to advise getting it at full price. A 10/15% discount would be more reasonable.
8/10 for me.
Steam User 0
NeuroNet is a fun (and rather timely) visual novel that lets you take on the role of a newly created AI. Your role is to help manage a city, tackling problems on both a macro and a micro level. Over time, your AI starts to develop something of a personality. Will you do what you can to meet the needs of the City, or will you focus on empowering the shady corporation that created you?
Along the way you'll meet a lot of interesting characters and will be able to play a significant role in the direction their lives take. In a few instances, these characters will actually be at odds with each other, forcing you to make some tough decisions.
The game is broken into 8 chapters, and throughout the game you'll encounter two types of events:
1. Standard events - these are related to managing a city, and mostly just alter the four metrics that are used to judge your performance (i.e. wealth accumulation, resident satisfaction, policing power, and your own intelligence/ capabilities).
2. Character story lines - These are lengthy side quests that span multiple chapters, and they're beating heart of the game. Alienate the characters, and you may get the chance to experience them.
The game was a joy to play through, and I found the focus on cut throat corporate politics (with some of your corporate overlords turning on each other and forcing you to choose sides) to be pretty engaging stuff.
I'd recommend this game to anyone who's a fan of visual novels, especially if you're a fan of dystopian sci-fi settings and good world building.
Pros:
+Absolutely beautiful visuals and solid voice acting.
+ A good mix of "city-management" based activities. You'll be doing everything from helping a homeless person find shelter for the night to thwarting terrorist attacks.
+ Several interesting moral dilemmas, some of which culminate in life or death situations.
+ Having your choices directly impact your stats makes the game more engaging than your average visual novel.
Cons:
- Mostly an illusion of choice. Your ability to define your AI is strangely limited
- The ending is a bit of a downer, cliff-hanger ending. I don't know if there will ever be a sequel
- There's no simple chapter selection option. The best you can do is rewind to the start of whatever chapter you're on
Overall, this was a very solid game and one that deserved more attention than it ended up getting. I hope the developer keeps at it, because I'd love to see more from them.