Brief Thoughts on My 2022 Game Of The Year: Neon White

What if you took the vibes and aesthetics from the innovative and strange PS1/Dreamcast era and created a game using modern tech.  I’ve generally tired of the modern western game design tactic of dropping you into a big open map  with a bunch of tasks to complete, and am far more interested in innovative, well-tuned design. This is  a frenetic game that pushed me into a trance as I raced through levels to try and hit a perfect time,  aided by an equivalently frenetic banger of a soundtrack by the drum and bass artist, “Machinegirl.” The extent to which this soundtrack transported me can’t be overstated enough, and I wish that more game developers tapped top tier electronic music developers like this for their games. It’s a match made in heaven and solidifies the artistic vision of the entire project.

You will surprise yourself at  the speed with which you start processing inputs and executing actions in this game. The few times I  played it in front of people it looked like I had spent years mastering a highly technical performance,  and not many games can ramp you into that zone in such a relatively short period. The story is  childish and far too verbose for what’s on offer, but some of the visual novel interactions remain  charming until the end of the game. I’m not going to knock the game for being so  obscenely sexual, but your mileage may vary. Neon White provides a perfect synthesis between  aesthetic, design, and music that wasn’t matched by anything else I played this year.