In a rare ‘one for me’, I managed to squeeze in some time to commit to Mindlock – The Apartment, from Roof Cut Media – a point and click adventure I purchased last year, having played the demo and enjoyed the art style and concept. That opinion naturally evolved through gameplay, and I found myself losing interest immediately after buying it. Now I’ve finished it, what are my thoughts?
It’s a little too clever. Conceptually, it’s very interesting. You play Colin Walker, a forgettable employee for a toaster company – a position that his father secured for him. This relationship with his father is key to the story, as finding out he’s essentially a prisoner in his own apartment, he takes a deep dive into his current status in life through metaphors and cute animations.
You can tell that Colin has given up based on the way he presents himself. Somewhat miserable, poor posture, untidy home, lack of a significant other, status in society – the list goes on. Your first task is to get him ready for the day, and Mindlock – The Apartment begins like Pants Quest in that you need to get him dressed. It also has fairly limited scenes.
By the time you’re ready to walk out the door, the door decides to take a walk, and then you’re trapped literally and figuratively. What now transpires is a mental breakdown that was left in the slow cooker for too long, and now Colin needs to do something about his life, as he’s seemingly not doing anything with it. Hallicicnations, puppets, inflatable bosses, and clear daddy issues terrorise Colin’s thoughts, and only he can make a change.
With Mindlock – The Apartment being restricted to the apartment, you soon become familiar with its four rooms and a hallway rapidly, wondering how this will pan out. What sets this apart from most point and click games is that it’s a very linear process. For each minor event that occurs, a subtle change may take place, with a new item appearing or the option to interact with an object that was previously inaccessible. This can prove to be quite testing.
In a room you know like your own living space, you now find something that wasn’t there before. While it’s nothing like Exit 8, there are lots of backtracking and repeated clicks. Unlike other games of mixing up the inventory, it won’t always work until a story even kicks in – and, as is common with the genre, there are no clear objectives or indicators on what you should be doing. In other words, there’s a lot of aimless wandering until something literally clicks.
Thematically, Mindlock – The Apartment is very relatable due to the consensus we all face in adult life, like not being good enough. Not being good enough for our parents, work, or ourselves. Fortunately, Colin neither has a partner nor kids to care for, and instead must visit his own childhood to change the present. Many of the ideas are pretty good and often work when you’re maintaining the pace, though there’s a lot of starting and stopping – as if kangarooing a car on the clutch. Frequent breaks helped alleviate the boredom/frustration.
Thankfully, the visuals are really good to look at, so even when nothing seems to be happening, you can admire the illustrations. The dialogue doesn’t have multiple paths, and like the story, on a forward trajectory. Conversations are typically exhausted through three or four options and then repeated. Colin, on the other hand, gives good monologues, and while you aren’t really rooting for him big time, being able to positively impact his life is a good motivation. Unlike his daddy issues, which are a little over the top. His father’s attitude to the potato is appalling.
