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I don't recall precisely why I stopped playing Oxenfree the first time I tried to play it back in 2016, but if I were to hazard a guess, it would be that I stopped for the exact same reason I'm stopping this time, too, after only 10 minutes or so. And that is because A) the music is too fucking loud and B) there are no volume settings whatsoever. I turned the volume down for the game as a whole using the Windows Volume Mixer, but... then you can't hear the voiced dialogue. Because the music is still too fucking loud, even after I reduced the volume by half of what I normally keep it at. It's not even bad music. It's just too. Fucking. Loud.
Seriously, this seems like it would be a cool game, but if the audio mixing is that annoying with no way to correct it all the way through the game, I see no reason to continue.
Another thing is that this is another one of those games where dialogue can and will cut off other, already playing dialogue. Like, for example, just in the first scene, on the boat, there are some points of interest that you can click on. If you do, the protagonist immediately starts talking about it and anything the other two characters might have been saying just gets instantly shit-canned. And there's never a point where the other two characters stop talking, so that you get a chance to explore. It's either listen to their conversation, and possibly even participate it, or else ignore it and do your own thing, which ends up interrupting the conversation anyway, if you click on anything.
A third thing is that the dialogue system makes me antsy in the first place. In the middle of the conversations, someone will casually ask you a question, at which point two or three or more dialogue choices will appear, but then they just keep on talking. If you try to listen to what they're saying, the dialogue choices will start to fade away. For me, there was never not a moment of mild panic every time a dialogue choice was presented. I don't care if it's "not realistic" or whatever, I'd rather be able to take my time and consider what I want to say, rather than being put on the spot. That's why I don't like to talk to people in real life all that much, either, whether in person or on the phone or whatever. ¬_¬ I don't care for that sort of stress, so... that's another reason I don't think I'll ever really get into this game.
I mean, I really wanted to get into this game, because I've heard a lot of good things about it, but I don't think either time I've tried to play it I managed to get even as far the top of the hill after you get off the boat.
Seriously, this seems like it would be a cool game, but if the audio mixing is that annoying with no way to correct it all the way through the game, I see no reason to continue.
Another thing is that this is another one of those games where dialogue can and will cut off other, already playing dialogue. Like, for example, just in the first scene, on the boat, there are some points of interest that you can click on. If you do, the protagonist immediately starts talking about it and anything the other two characters might have been saying just gets instantly shit-canned. And there's never a point where the other two characters stop talking, so that you get a chance to explore. It's either listen to their conversation, and possibly even participate it, or else ignore it and do your own thing, which ends up interrupting the conversation anyway, if you click on anything.
A third thing is that the dialogue system makes me antsy in the first place. In the middle of the conversations, someone will casually ask you a question, at which point two or three or more dialogue choices will appear, but then they just keep on talking. If you try to listen to what they're saying, the dialogue choices will start to fade away. For me, there was never not a moment of mild panic every time a dialogue choice was presented. I don't care if it's "not realistic" or whatever, I'd rather be able to take my time and consider what I want to say, rather than being put on the spot. That's why I don't like to talk to people in real life all that much, either, whether in person or on the phone or whatever. ¬_¬ I don't care for that sort of stress, so... that's another reason I don't think I'll ever really get into this game.
I mean, I really wanted to get into this game, because I've heard a lot of good things about it, but I don't think either time I've tried to play it I managed to get even as far the top of the hill after you get off the boat.
