Description: Cellphones. Social Media. Millennial Social Issues. Teenagers. Young Adults. Cyber issues. Indie Music. Abusive Relationships. Slice of Life. Nostalgic. Puzzle Oriented. Text Based. Short Length (about 30 minutes to an hour).
Engine: Unity
Commercial or Non-Commercial: Commercial
Can be purchased on Steam or Itch.io
Rated PG -13 (Contains Abuse and mentions of sex consensual and not consensual)
The Lost Phone series was introduced to me on Steam and I bought it when it was on sale due to the cell phone concept and the stylish UI. The game series explains itself with its title, it’s about a lost phone and we live in a society where cell phones are means of survival. I’m going to try hard to keep the plot as vague as possible but I feel like it’s impossible to do with this kind of game.
The Main Gist
The Writing
The text message interfaces.
As you can tell, the Lost Phone series tell its story through text messages and your imagination. It doesn’t get anymore intimate than that. Imagine, it’s your dream come true, you get to be the nosiest person ever, play detective, and look through someone’s text messages. I’m sure most people probably think, “Damn, if I look through my friend Jessica’s cell phone, Imma find something scandalous!” But Lost Phone is honest and tries to be as close to reality as much as possible. So no, this isn’t going to be as spicy as looking through your ex boyfriend’s phone, it’s going to be as normal as looking at your mother’s text messages.
A Normal Lost Phone is about a high school kid so the text messages are of course what you would expect. “Do you wanna hang out?” “Do you wanna go to this club?” “Happy Birthday!” “Here’s this homework assignment!” It can’t get anymore normal and delightfully boring as that. And I mean delightfully boring because I wouldn’t want my teen (or really anyone regardless of age) to be going through some of the issues that you will read about in Another Lost Phone.
However, everything isn’t always dandy. When you start getting deeper, you will find out that Sam has some pretty shitty friends and starts coming to terms with the reality that surrounds them and it becomes life changing along with other realizations. When you dig further and begin unlocking social media accounts, you will find out why has Sam becomes distant from friends and family.
There are many games that are centered around this issue so this didn’t come off as a huge plot twist. But I was still warmed by it, because I know there are teens out there that would relate to this experience. At first, I was kind of ambivalent because the topic of coming out is used often as a plot twist written by people who are usually not part of that marginalized demographic but then I realized my assumption was kind of ignorant. Especially when the emotions of the game really struck me when the credits started rolling. My assumption was ignorant because A Normal Lost Phone is one of the few games that is positive about this social topic or at least mostly positive, it doesn’t turn it into a tragedy porn. Coming of Age stories centered around hard to talk about topics need to be more common these days especially ones like these.
About the game mechanics, A Normal Lost Phone is executed well and it doesn’t try to be unrealistic with the phone puzzles.
Another Lost Phone is similar and is centered around a woman who’s ambitious and newly graduated. But she’s also in a new relationship and totally in love. She also manages to find a job she loves. It seems like her life’s going good so far until someone leaks out her nude videos. In this phone game you must look through her text messages, unlock apps, and gather pictures to find out who leaked these videos and why. Laura’s life falls apart when she comes to terms that the people she loves and trusts aren’t who she thinks they are. Much like in A Normal Lost Phone, Laura’s story is a coming of age story and is also a educational tale about abusive relationships. The game is not much different in puzzle mechanics. I felt like there could have been some changes but at the same time, you can’t really do anything too wild with a cell phone. It would make the game unrealistic and force the developer to stretch the concept to a point where it won’t be a game about a phone.
I enjoyed Normal Phone more than Another Lost Phone. I didn’t really feel much emotional impact with Another Lost Phone for some reason. I guess it’s because I expected more, the 2nd game is a lot shorter than the first. I feel like I can’t comment much on the writing or plot because I’ve already explained what I had happened in the paragraphs above since they’re like normal life events that don’t really need much explaining. The main point of this game series is to play detective and investigate the private lives of individuals through their personal phones. You hope they’re safe, you root for their well being and that’s it really. It’s charming for its simplicity and honesty, for being just what it is. It reflects our realities in an interactive manner.
The Artwork
The cellphone photo rolls, usually you find pictures of the family members and friends of the phone owner.
These games had really nice color schemes, especially the first one. The character art was also really charming but I found it better looking in A Normal Lost Phone. The character art for the first phone was charming, colorful and melded well with the main character’s age group and personality. While for Another Lost Phone, I felt like the character art kind of clashed with the super, polished high tech UI but I can’t really think of any better style. I felt like Laura’s character art melded in while the other characters looked kind of weird? I’m not exactly a great artist but something about it rubbed me wrong. I think what it is is the coloring style and how the shading was done? But I feel like it wouldn’t match if it was in a warmer tone like the first game? I guess my feelings are morea personal taste rather than the art itself. I have mixed feelings about it. But I don’t know how to express it right.
Soundtrack
The music players in both phones.
I adored the soundtrack for both games, listening to the phones’ music was a favorite feature of mine. I liked the music mostly in A Normal Lost Phone and even consider buying some tracks. The songs, for both of the games altogether, were a mixed bunch but I remain mostly positive. I think out of both games I found only 3 songs that I felt like skipping and there was one that took awhile to grow on me. Most of the songs were indie pop tunes or folk, which is what you would expect on a teen’s or a young college student’s phone.
Conclusion
This is a good series worth supporting if you’re an indie game fan and like the phone concept. It’s a fun time killer if you got an hour to waste. I recommend it if you like narrative games and or exploration games. And if you don’t mind games centered around real life issues.
Rating: 4/5
ACROSS FROM HERE 