Lost Connections Review

A visual novel about love and loss, Amber Pearl and Nofar Evyoni’s Lost Connections tells a story of one’s inward journey inward to find themselves. Should players take the steps needed to connect in this world?

Lost Connections Review

Los is lost. Recently coming out as non-binary, they feel like they can’t quite find their place in the world. Although they like fashion, they feel like they do not fit in with the way things currently operate. They have let a number of things like their plants and the garbage on the floor fall by the wayside.

Looking to form a connection, they end up joining a support group that focuses on confidence building that will allow them to meet others. Three months later, the class wraps up and Los feels like they haven’t made any sort of meaningful progress. To overcome this, Lost Connections will then have players talking with others to better themselves and overcome the social anxiety that has a firm grasp on everything going on in their troubled lives.

Dialog with others in Lost Connections has players navigating different scenarios and working up the courage to trade phone numbers and forming a connection. Gameplay follows the typical visual novel formatting, with stills set to swaths of dialog and the occasional choice. There’s a “courage meter” that can be filled, with success or failure hinging on how far it is filled.

It’s just a shame that Lost Connections doesn’t quite have the depth to carry its message. There are different routes with different endings, but the average playthrough clocks in at around a little less than 10 minutes each go around. Choices can be pretty vague too, with simple one-word choices playing a major role in each path.

As a result, it’s hard to make a connection in Lost Connections. You can see the pain Los is in, that much is certain. However, there’s little backing to actually get a chance to know them throughout each playthrough. There is the chance to zone out and interact with items, but there’s little worldbuilding to actually form that connection.

Even when players do get an ending and form a connection, it just ends up fizzling out with a brief conclusion. There are different people to meet, but they do tend to blend together simply because we do not know who they really are. There are achievements for getting to each ending, but figuring out each route isn’t terribly hard to figure out. As a result, this ends up being more of a one-and-done type of title than anything else.

Lost Connections has a powerful message about overcoming social anxiety, but there just isn’t enough substance to really drive its messaging home. As a result, this visual novel fails to make a lasting connection.

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This review of Lost Connections was done on the PC via Steam. The game was freely downloaded.

Posted Jul 24, 2023 by casey-scheld
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