An Alien Encounter
Quarantine circular is the spiritual successor to Mike Bithell Games previous title, Subsurface Circular.
The game takes place on a research base ship on Earth, in the midst of the worst plague humanity has ever seen and it is the players job to mediate the first encounter with an alien entity - a towering creature in a high-tech suit which has been detained on the ship.
The game is entirely narrative, allowing players to choose responses as the conversation unfolds as well as ask your questions about topics as the arise. The narrative is fortunately therefore very strong, with many possible endings which all felt like logical and reasonable outcomes from the situation, determined by your previous decisions. The interface is the same as was used in Subsurface circular (a game about AI robots interacting with one another in a subway transport, if you haven't played it) and although there is explanation as to why humans would be using similar communication technology, it doesn't feel quite natural to apply it to human interactions. This is by and large my only criticism, however.
All the characters are engaging and have their own personalities, defined during the conversations as well as in character notes, and littered throughout interactions are some fun puzzles (nothing majorly challenging, but a pleasant change of pace). The different endings provide replayability, and an unlockable developer commentary provides an insight into the progress the game made during the 8 month development. All the text scenes have lightly animated backgrounds depicting the characters, which have a clean and appropriate art style, and the light animation adds to the characters personalities effectively. Alongside this is a fairly minimalist soundtrack built in layers, allowing you to progress the story at your own pace and still have music that builds up and down at the right time, punctuating key moments.
Overall, it's a solid instalment in the "Circular" games from the studio and I look forwards to seeing future projects - the only letdown is the somewhat robotic feeling of the human interactions through this interface.