Just Ignore Them Brea's Story Tape 1 Review

Just Ignore Them Brea’s Story Tape 1 is a story driven pixel art adventure game. It’s a throwback to classic text adventures after graphics were added; this game tries to emulate the feeling of playing on a very old console. As a story driven adventure game, it means that certain actions have to take place before the game progresses, like finding a telephone number or talking to a specific character. Once the needed action is done, it effectively ‘opens the door’ to the next part of the story. Unfortunately, it isn’t always clear what the next action to be completed is, and this will lead to shot-gunning – trying everything possible. Usually this will end up finding the trigger to the next part of the adventure, but at some point, it probably won’t work, leaving the player frustrated.

The controls for Just Ignore Them are fixed with the WASD or arrow keys for movement and a few other keys for selection/deselection. This is a pixel art game and the graphics pretty much look like an old console game from the late 80’s. There are no graphics options; the game is played in a small window that can be maximized if the player would like to blow the pixels up to maximum size. The ambient sounds are fairly well done, although a bit too modern for a game trying to emulate an old console. The background music doesn’t sound like a console at all and feels a bit too loud at the lowest setting. Saving the game progress is always done by interacting with a phone.

Brea’s Story is a prelude adventure to a previous title called Just Ignore Them. Brea is a journalist with a sophomoric sense of humor and has a boyfriend, Jason, who also has a sophomoric sense of humor. Together they set off to uncover the real story behind a murder that occurred 20 years ago in a small town. There are 23 Steam achievements and within an hour the player will unlock 15 or so just going through the motions of playing the story out. The story is on rails, but trying everything that isn’t necessary will lead to several of the achievements. The story writing is sophomoric most of the time, there are plenty of innuendos and the word ‘babe’ is way over-used. Brea’s Story is screaming for a hint system, because it is too easy to get stuck and not have any good idea what to do next to progress the story. There also isn’t a way to look back at a log of the text to see if some clue was missed.

Most players will likely end up doing a lot of shot-gunning to try to get to the next part of Brea’s Story. There don’t appear to be any major bugs, and the game never crashed. It will probably run on any computer made in the last 20 years. It’s a campy little adventure with a cheesy sense of humor. The writing isn’t anything spectacular, but for players that like the retro look and feel of an old console adventure, Brea’s Story is worth a play through at the price of a few dollars.

Purchase Just Ignore Them Brea’s Story Tape 1 on Steam!