Top Games of 2022: No. 8 - OMORI

8. OMORI, dev. OMOcat LLC

OMORI originally released in late 2020, but only for PC, the one place I could not get to back then. Luckily, I have a rule for just these occasions. If you release on consoles in 'Current Year' then you are a 'Current Year Game'. OMORI absolutely would have made the Top Games of 2020 List so this is just delayed justice. I have been anticipating this game since back in 2014, when I first saw the original trailer. That was promising an extremely cute pixel-art RPG with horror overtones representing themes of loneliness and depression? There is not a single part of that sentence I don't like! So only eight years of patience later, the final OMORI delivered.

Of course, there is an elephant in this room. And while I do love elephants, they're great people, they are big problems if they are in a room. The elephant is: Why do we need OMORI when we have Undertale and Deltarune? I do try hard to never add a game to these lists if all I can say positively about them is "Game is like Other Game that I already like'. (Spoilers: Bayonetta 3 is not making this list, for example.) The room elephant is creeping ever closer as I tell you that OMORI's plot is extremely similar to Deltarune, actually. They're both stories about isolated kids escaping an Earthbound-style suburban childhood into silly fantasy realms, while simultaneously escaping from a deep darkness within their psyche. Since Deltarune is unfinished, it is impossible to know where that game is going. But I do think I can satiate the scary elephant by saying that OMORI plays nothing like Toby Fox's franchise. It also has its own original emotional affect in mind, separate from any of its influences.

OMORI is a struggle about with nostalgia and facing reality. Our character first is entirely lost in a white empty universe, before they awaken inside a magical forest full of adorable little guys. Some of these cartoon figures are NPCs, some are monsters to fight. Most importantly, we have our friend group who are utterly supportive of us without question, and the world is vast and colorful. We then discover all this is pure fantasy, we're actually a teenager who has hidden inside his room for years. (The game uses the term 'hikikomori', which I am hesitant to use, personally.) Most of the cute little guys turn out to be the toys in our room from when we were little. And in the real world, our friend group has all but disappeared. One of the kids in core RPG party, Kel, has lived next door to us, but we have not spoken in years.

The juxtaposition between the 'Headspace' and the real world is one of OMORI's best tricks. Even while aware of the in-game unreality of this place, the Headspace draws you in. It is where you fight planets come to life or deal with the relationship troubles of anime boys. That world is all silliness, all comedy. Then in the real world, everybody has come to hate each other. Everything is more difficult, even the RPG combat options, which are extremely limited. The party has all grown distant thanks to a terrible event that has torn them apart. You get the sense they all wish to speak but have somehow forgotten the language they once shared. You just can't rewind back to being the people you once were.

Personally, I think OMORI makes a massive mistake in its storyline. There is moment in this game that should have been the natural conclusion yet is not. It is one of the most touching and beautiful moments of 2022 in gaming for me. You and your friends in the real world gather together and look through a photo book that you have not seen in years. You are reminded of all these memories from when you were younger and the group was complete. The associated minigame is just a simple task of arranging the pictures in the right order. But just working that out feels like processing these memories in a healthy way for once. You're not escaping to magical lands with actually pretty well-made RPG battles. Nor are you escaping away by growing distant in the real world and pretending none of this ever happened. You're finally dealing with these emotions, mourning what was, and appreciating that you had these times together. OMORI should have ended right there. This scene is one of the few moments in video games to actually bring me to tears.

Instead we get an unnecessarily dark twist and a frankly horrible final boss. (I get what you're going for here, OMORI, but it's really annoying to have to fight a difficult enemy without any access to my skills or customization.) If OMORI was an hour shorter, it would be in my Top 5. It also sucks that half the content in this game is inaccessible unless you replay and pick the Bad Routes where your characters loses themselves in fantasy forever. I am just not going to do that.

But back to positives, OMORI is a unique and interesting take on RPGs. I love the Omocat style to the faces. There's a sketchy texture to all the drawings, like it was made with pen on paper, so a lot of the coloring has gaps between the pen strokes. The music is great - Toby Fox contributed a song, speaking of Undertale. A lot of OMORI is legitimately delightful, including the battle system with a rock-paper-scissors system based on emotions. There are also horror moments are legitimately terrifying, there's a 10/10 jump scare. 

Most importantly, I liked the people in this game and liked being around them. Aubrey, Kel, and Hero were good friends to have while happily ignoring my own real world.