Since childhood, we’re all conditioned to believe that love is one of the most powerful forces in the world. It conquers all, it makes the world go round; however, in reality, it can be a fickle mistress. The indie title Always Sometimes Monsters by developers Vagabond Dog gives you a simple backstory: you are broke, being evicted from your home, unemployed, and the love of your life is getting married to someone else on the other side of the country. With absolutely nothing left to lose, you decide to hit the open road cross-country to win back the one person you care about most in the world.
Doesn’t that just sound romantic? You’d think so, at face value. But Always Sometimes Monsters tests you. Did you think the journey would be easy? You will be homeless. You will be so desperate for cash that you will do things that you are not proud of. You might even have to do something terrible in order to make it to the wedding on time. Above all, this game asks you: what would you do for love?
Always Sometimes Monsters is an indie RPG where the story that unfolds is based on your decisions. The characters that you play and the character that acts as your primary love interest are both chosen by you at the start of the game, allowing you to create an extremely personalized experience. The game places no boundaries on your sexuality, so the immersive experience isn’t ruined for those in the LGBTQ+ community. Some dialogue is actually altered to accommodate; just like in real life (unfortunately), not everyone agrees with your lifestyle.
As you make your way across the country, Always Sometimes Monsters will throw numerous difficult challenges your way. The game gives you a time limit: 30 in-game days, with three time sections (Morning, Evening, and Night) and each in-game event taking up one section of time. Sometimes, you have to cut corners with the relationships of other people in order to, say, work at the temp agency because you don’t have enough money for food for the next day. The game is designed to mirror poverty, and while personally I believe that they could have dialed the urgency and survival mechanics with this theme way higher, it works well enough to get the point across. You have a stamina bar that refills when you eat food: if it is empty before you go to sleep each night, you run the risk of starving to death. Since this is the only consequence of being hungry, in order to save money I was constantly at very low stamina; however, since I never went to sleep completely empty, the stamina bar didn’t really affect my gameplay at all, besides the mandatory daily monetary upkeep.
In order to buy food, though, I had to work a job to make money. One of the more polarizing aspects of Always Sometimes Monsters that I really liked about the game was the fact that all of the jobs were tedious and extremely boring. It involved quite a bit of grinding to make the cash that I needed from the temp agency, since it also took a criminal 50% of your earnings away as its own cut of the profits. But, you know what, that’s the point. You are working at a dead-end job at whatever place that’s desperate enough to take you and all you are trying to do is make ends meet day by day and eventually save up for the ticket to your next destination. It’s supposed to be boring and grind-y. Again, Always Sometimes Monsters attempts to mirror poverty, and well, poverty sucks.
Along with this, Always Sometimes Monsters will often present you with a moral dilemma, usually presenting you with two options: a morally-questionable option that will likely save you a lot of time and money on your journey, and a moral high ground option which forces you to find some other way to get around the obstacle the game throws at you, which is probably going to cost you. No matter how good of a person you are, it is very likely that you will not be able to get out of this game clear of conscience. That’s another very important theme in this game: not everyone can be perfect all the time. The key to our happiness might be the downfall of someone else’s. We all make decisions at the expense of others for the purpose of our own survival, and we are all always sometimes monsters.
Finally, you make it all the way across the country, and after your difficult journey the love of your life takes you back and you live happily ever after… or do you? No one ever said there was a happy ending. Just like I stated previously, Always Sometimes Monsters has a story that changes based on your decisions. You won’t always succeed in your playthrough. Sometimes you will travel all the way across the country for absolutely nothing. Maybe you’ll end up worse off than you were before. Like I said in the beginning, love is a fickle mistress, and Always Sometimes Monsters is rooted firmly in realistic expectations and themes, not in fantasy and idealism. I think this was one of the things that impressed me most about the game: it doesn’t shy away from disappointing the player, if that makes sense. It’s not a bad thing; sometimes life just sucks, and the game isn’t afraid to show you that. If you aren’t happy with your outcome, you can play it again. The game has multiple different endings based on your choices throughout the game, so maybe you’ll do better the next time.
In terms of the art and music, I think everything is quite solid considering it’s just another RPGMaker game. The sprites are just fine, and the character portraits have their own sort of quirky style to them that doesn’t add or subtract anything from the experience. The music, however, really shines. It’s a very urban soundtrack, with many electronic influences and its own brand of grit. There are a multitude of different tracks that fit perfectly into the setting and atmosphere of the game, and I was very impressed with it as a player.
Always Sometimes Monsters isn’t a game for everyone. It can be repetitive. It can be disappointing. However, for those who want a narrative-driven experience that’s not afraid to surprise you, shock you, and leave you with a new understanding of what you would actually do for the sake of love, then I can’t recommend Always Sometimes Monsters enough. It’s a different kind of game: a game that’s not afraid to take risks, and tackle numerous different subjects that make the player think. Furthermore, Vagabond Dog is actually planning to release a sequel, named Sometimes Always Monsters (yeah, I had to reread it too), which reverses the premise of the game: you are now a wealthy, happily-married individual whose life starts taking a downhill turn. It has been announced that it also supports save-importing from the first game, so you can start from where your characters left off, wherever that may be. However, in the meantime, you can pick up Always Sometimes Monsters on Steam and iOS/Android for $9.99 and $4.99, respectively. Of course, Always Sometimes Monsters is also a part of this year’s Steam Sale, so if you’re reading this while that is still going on, it’s a steal at $1.99.
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