![]() To get players trading secrets, puzzle solutions, and guesses about the game’s lore. Hello Neighbor has been designed to spark online discussion. The game has a penchant for forcing players to build wobbly towers of cardboard boxes to reach high spots, and Act 2’s elaborate water pipe puzzle is finicky torture. When puzzles aren’t baffling, they’re just plain annoying. There are probably at least a hundred paintings scattered around the house, and the game provides only the vaguest possible hint that this particular painting is special. For example, at one point the game requires you to throw an object at a specific small painting in order to open a secret passage. That classic had tightly designed puzzles, which followed a certain recognizable logic, while Hello Neighbor leans heavily on random trial and error. You’ll also uncover plenty of cryptic hints about what might be going on in the house.īut the Maniac Mansion comparisons only go so far. Amenities include a roller coaster, a water-filled room patrolled by a robo shark, and doors placed in all sorts of illogical places. The house owes a major debt to old-school adventure games, particularly Maniac Mansion, as its various forms are packed with quirky, surreal touches. Thankfully, your neighbor’s living space is more interesting than he is. ![]() Your neighbor is either a sucker or, in this one case, an omnipresent pain in the ass – there’s no middle ground. You just have to hope he has a brain fart and decides to stare at a wall while you stroll right past him, which is how I finally got to Act 2. If he decides to stake out a choke point you need to get through, you’re pretty much screwed. The end of Act 1 plunges you into a series of narrow, mostly-linear underground corridors that the neighbor AI clearly wasn’t designed for. Only one section of Hello Neighbor really forces you to deal with the game’s supposedly-brilliant AI, and it’s a complete ordeal. Your neighbor also tends to lose track of you once you venture into the house’s upper floors, leaving you to your own devices for long stretches. You can typically get back to wherever you last were in seconds, or, at most, a couple of minutes. Again, there’s no punishment for being captured, and no version of your neighbor’s house is that big. Related Story Chris Wray Expedition Zero Review – Fatal ErrorĮven if Hello Neighbor’s AI was as clever as advertised, there’d still be no point in trying to outsmart it. You’re not going to see this guy on Jeopardy any time soon. This gives game a bit of a Dark Souls vibe, as you gradually open up the house even as you fail repeatedly, but it doesn’t speak well for your neighbor’s intelligence. If you moved a chair that was barring a door, it won’t be replaced after you’re caught. In most cases, he doesn’t even fix the damage you’ve done. Want him to stay away from a certain room? Just let him catch you a time or two in, say, the kitchen, and he’ll blindly focus on that spot as you loudly trash the rest of his house. Aside from hanging around the general area where he last nabbed you, your neighbor doesn’t adapt in any meaningful way and is easy to game. The makers of Hello Neighbor flaunt their game’s “Advanced AI,” but I can’t say I was terribly impressed. Your neighbor is even kind enough to let you keep the inventory of stuff you just stole from him. You just start back at your house or at the cellar doors at a different time of day, and can get right back to the breaking and entering. Your neighbor patrols the premises, but, luckily, there’s no real consequence for being caught. Your goal in Hello Neighbor is to infiltrate the house across the street and find a way into the basement, except in Act 2, where you start in the basement and attempt to escape the property. Who is your sinister neighbor? What’s he hiding in his basement? How did he get the building permits for that monstrosity of a house? The game hints at your neighbor’s story and your connection to him, but don’t get your hopes up for a clear-cut or particularly satisfying narrative. In Act 3, the player character, now an adult, returns to again face off against his nightmare neighbor, who has renovated his place into a ramshackle fortress. In Act 2, it’s you who has to escape from the basement. In Act 1 you play as a kid who seemingly witnesses a creepy mustachioed neighbor locking somebody in his basement. Hello Neighbor is split into three acts, set over the span of several years. ![]() The review has been updated to reflect changes in the final release version of the game. ![]() Note: Our original review of Hello Neighbor was based on a pre-release build of the game.
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