The Bad Kids

Don't Let Intrusive Thoughts Win!
This game is quite interesting. Disclaimer it has some disturbing content with violence, psychological abuse, bullying and some deep topics. I intitally thought it was a bit simillar to the game "Chinese Parents" but this is the dev's representation of a very popular drama called "Hidden Corners" with an IMDB rating of 8.1. So it is completely different. This is also by far one of the most underrated games of all times in it's genres.
Story: Depressing
You follow the life of a 6 year old boy where the mom is very controlling, he is studious and get good grades. But his family life is in jeopardy,he gets accidentally involved in an incident with his friends which changes his life forever. The story spans into 4 or 5 different chapters, each reflecting into the boy's psyche and psychology of his life and relationships with his peers and family. It's a battle between his subconcious and how he navigates trauma and earns his freedom or demise. It seemed very linear with the story having several easter eggs to other franchises here and there, but this is a promising game about child psychology. There are horror elements too, suspense and thriller with very good narration technique. There are 3 endings to achieve but the story still ends vaguely for me no matter which ending I got. I do suspect watching the drama would make me piece things together which I hope to do within 2025.
Characters: The baddies
Main character is resigned from the start, his life messy, it gets even more messier with an incident regarding a murder happens. Good character development which you direct it or otherwise you destroy it. His subconcious is personified as an animal which is an interesting development. This animal also reveals it to the main chara. His friends; Pupu and Liang are orphans, contrary to his situation but they still appreciate him as a friend. The mother is very controlling but can be seen in typical asian moms where the marriage does not go well. The father, well.. is a debatable character. The serial killer also has a huge background, huge development going on which is rare. I have watched many serial kiler documentaries but the plot twist in here made me feel awe, it does give that percept out that people are born as a blank slate and can be dyed white or black.
Gameplay
This is a horizontal walking simulator type of game where you can collect objects and use, combine aka; the basic adventure puzzle game mechanics. The puzzles itself can be a bit difficult but I was able to crack all of them except the last maze puzzle without help. I enjoyed the puzzles, i feel like I played more tougher ones in HOG games to be honest. Nevertheless, I enjoyed solving and cracking these ones! There are some VN like elements of choosing dialogue and going straight to a bad ending. There are also "boss fights" and some insane skippable mini games. I thought the game play was okay. The menu will be presented in Chinese but it is possible to change the menu to English. The game should have chapter selection which would be useful in getting achievements but was not there.
Art and Music
I loved the art, i did notice that some areas can be super dark and I had turn on brightness to the maximum in certain mini games. The music is okay. The voice acting was pretty good.
Achievements
Achievements can be pretty straight forward, just exploring every corner and being observant would trigger most. Choosing all dialogue options would help also. They are not that relatively hard, not having a chapter selection would make some achievements harder. For the endings, the devs gives you a reset option where you can choose the triggers for each different type of ending this saves you the time from doing the game all over again.
Overall
This is a very deep psychological thriller about a 6 year old Chinese boy's mindset impacted by trauma, restrictions and other unfortunate events. There is some societal representation of the competition between students in studies and insights into people who are orphans. A comparision of sorts. You do wonder sometimes what is real and what is not. We look at his life and trauma from his POV and it's such an interesting yet a sad tale weaved carefully by the developers on their take on the story.

A great game with a great and engrossing storyline. This game deserves more recognition.

Pretty good game and story. The puzzles are not very difficult.

For a simple puzzle horror game, this game does last longer than I thought, but not too long. Somehow it is just right and has a system to change most important choices to get you all of the different endings (of which there are 3).
The game itself is a little confusing at first but, like in true horror mystery fashion, you will find out the more you go.
The puzzles are typical for the genre, but I did struggle with quite a few of them and had to check a guide because the info was not really clear what to do.
The ambience is very good, but I did have a few sound bugs regarding the TV working in the background. It was too loud during those moments.
The characters are alright but the MC is a little dumb for someone being presented as an A-class student ... and even the top of the school.
Still, the story was interesting, the endings are solid and the ambience is well made. The QTEs could be skipped and the bugs are minimal. I only got locked with a bug once and had to kill the game. Autosaves work as well. Had a solid time.

Amazing game that kept me on edge and in awe for the great majority of it while I played.

The story kept me engaged and the puzzles, although simple, were interesting. Recommended

i felt really sad while playing this which is a good sign... sigh... i guess the ending got to me...