Serial Experiments Lain

I'll start this review by getting the main drawback of this game out of the way: the interface is confusing. Extremely confusing. I feel like it was designed to feel like that, but going in without at least some direction would be a horrible experience. While playing the game, it feels like the interface is actively stopping you from listening to the nodes in chronological order. So, if you want to experience the story in order, good luck. However, you can just look through the clips that interest you at the time too. It's up to the player to decide on which order works for them.

In my opinion, this game can't truly be labelled as such anyway. It's a collection of audio clips and videos compiled together to tell a story. More of a visual novel. Also, the story is completely different from the anime that it's connected to. Don't come into this expecting the same story retold in another format.

With those out of the way, I'll discuss more of what really makes the game shine.

Serial Experiments Lain's story is haunting. It sticks with you for a long while after you've played it. Its portrayal of mental illness is actually quite accurate for a game that had no real need to make it as such. As a game with a focus on mental health, making mental illness the main cause for the ending with no real explanation would have been easy, but Serial Experiments Lain doesn't do that. Maybe that's why the game feels so real.

Because yes, the game feels realistic, a great feat for a game like it. The characters feel like they are actual people, entities with personalities, goals and feelings. Which is why the ending is even more heartwrenching. The format only assists with this. Without many visuals, the story exists on its own, free from any help. Almost like a book.

Now for the ending. The ending of this game is truly what stays with you. If you are thinking of playing the game, I can't recommend it to you if you don't have a rough idea of the ending, because it takes you by surprise. You know that something's going to happen, that Lain and Touko have to break at some point, but it's still quite a shock because of how it's executed. It's a rollercoaster of emotion, one that ends in a stunned silence and a feeling of numbness washing over you.

One last thing, The post-game content is quite tedious. I wouldn't bother with it if i were you.

All in all, Serial Experiments Lain is something that can only be truly described when played for yourself. It's a storytelling masterpiece, and always knows how to make you feel. The game really lives up to its tagline, "Make me sad."

Serial Experiments Lain is not really a game, it's more of a Visual Novel, but even calling it that is not accurate, it's mostly a series of audio logs and video files that you can listen to and watch in pretty much any order you'd like and they tell the story.

The story is significantly different from the show as it is more about mental illness than it is about the internet, there are parallels to the show and there are connections between the stories, but for the most part both are two unrelated stories that can be experienced independently.

The story here is truly unique in its presentation and premise and the writing and performances are brilliant.

The "gameplay" experience however, is not very good, the menu in the game is quite slow and clunky, it's annoying, but it's not bad enough to hurt the game, the menu is only a means to an end, and what truly shines here is the story, which is every bit as Brilliant as the the one in the show.