Until Then Preview: An Engaging Narrative Adventure (PC)

Until Then is set to be a promising narrative adventure game with gorgeous pixel graphics, a beautiful soundtrack, engaging characters, and a compelling story. The demo gives you a very generous portion to play. It took me just over an hour to complete the demo, partly because I didn’t want to rush it. What I liked about Until Then was how it persuaded me to pace myself and not rush anything. In fact, there were a lot of things about Until Then that I really liked – and I’ll tell you why you should check it out.

The demo of Until Then is available on Steam for free. Until Then will be officially released on June 25th for PC as well as PS5. Currently, I do not know how much the game will cost.

Story – High School Life

The beginning of the demo is very intriguing. It talks about a character who is missing, presented very creativity with the words written on the screen. I wasn’t expecting this, but it got me intrigued and hooked right away. Then we jump into the game itself, specifically into a teen’s bedroom, and off we go.

The story of Until Then is played through the main character called Mark. He’s a high schooler and a bit of a slacker, as we quickly discover. He’s neglected his class presentation thanks to choosing a night of gaming instead. What follows is him scrambling to finish the slides with his group partner and friend Ryan, whilst pretending to his other group partner and crush Louise that they’ve done it. This was only the first part of the demo and I was sucked right into the action.

Until Then revolves around a cast of high schoolers, with the setting inspired by the Philippines.

I’m honestly impressed at how much I got to know Mark’s character in this demo, and one of the reasons why I was happy it was made longer. You don’t just learn about Mark either, but his friends that you get to meet. They all seem so real and alive.

I thought the demo of Until Then would end after the class presentation was done. I was wrong. It went on for much longer. You get to visit a chess match, hang out with friends, and help Mark chat with his friends on his phone.

Until Then‘s demo leaves you with so much to think about after it’s over. I’m interested to see where the rest of the story will go. The summary for the game’s story is certainly intriguing, involving mysteries and missing people and memories.

Gameplay – More Than a Visual Novel

Initially, I thought Until Then was a visual novel, where you choose what your character should do or say. Until Then does incorporate that – but it is too interactive to be considered a visual novel. It’s more of a side-scrolling narrative game with the odd mini-game to mix it up.

Until Then has a heavy focus on narrative, with lots of dialogue – but it does a lot more than that. Another element is thrown in through the form of in-game social media. When I first saw this, I was intrigued as to how it worked. Essentially, you wait for other characters’ messages to come through until it’s your/Mark’s turn, and you get to respond. You just hold down the spacebar and Mark will automatically type in the message. To add realism, he’ll sometimes start tapping out a message then backtrack and put something else. Sometimes, you get to choose how to respond to a person’s message, which is where the choose-your-own-adventure element comes in. Your responses influences the story and how characters respond to you. For example, do you lie to Louise about the slides for the presentation, or tell her the truth?

I have to admit, I was a bit worried that the social media mechanic wouldn’t work very well – not due to being buggy, but just by being confusing or overcomplicated. It wasn’t at all. I honestly thought it enhanced the story, and it worked well with the characters mainly being high schoolers.

Social media in Until Then is used to tell more of the story.

Until Then also features mini games. In the demo, one stuck out for me, and that was spearing fish balls on a stick. It was quite good fun. I’d love to see what other mini games the full release will offer.

Until Then is very easy to play. This allows you to enjoy the game and focus on the story. There was the odd moment where I wasn’t sure what I was meant to do. Namely, the first time I had to “type” on social media, I didn’t realise you had to hold down the spacebar until I figured it out. Then, oddly, afterwards the memo appeared telling me what to do, but by then I’d worked it out anyway. It’s no biggie though.

The controls for Until Then was very easy. All you have – and need – is A and D to go left and right, the spacebar to interact, and occasionally the mouse to click on something. Numbers 1 to 3 on the keyboard were also used when selecting multi-choice dialogue. The simple controls mean you can easily focus on the story.

Graphics & Audio – Gorgeous All Around

One word for the graphics: wow! Seriously, the graphics for Until Then are amazing. They’re so incredible to look at. Everything looks gorgeous, nothing looks off. The setting especially has been beautifully put together. I just love all the detail that went into it. The characters have a stylized-pixelated look as well, but it works so well. The animation is fluid, everything seems so alive. The graphics are just on point!

The audio for Until Then does it justice as well. I especially enjoyed listening to the piano pieces throughout as I read through the story. The music really helped to keep me hooked. Never did it come off as unpleasant to listen to. The sound effects throughout were right on the money as well. 

There is one thing I did want to mention about the demo for Until Then. I don’t know if this will apply in the full release, but when playing the demo, it was shown in windowed mode instead of full screen – and full screen isn’t an option. This was greyed out. This might be an issue for some people, but it honestly didn’t bother me after I started playing. I was so drawn into the demo, I almost forgot I was only playing in windowed mode.

The preview of Until Then was played via Steam.