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Last Stop Review friv game - Atmospheric mystical adventure

Publisher Friv2Online Studio has once again demonstrated its ability to find masterpieces in the indie games segment. Last Stop is a fun interactive movie with a truly compelling story. However, this friv game also has disadvantages: all the details are in our review.

Last Stop tells the story of three Londoners, completely different people, whose fates will intertwine in an amazing mystical adventure connected with mysterious portals and aliens from out of this world.

The first character is John Smith, a single father in his fifties who has to work hard to support himself and his daughter. By chance, the hero and his young neighbor Jack switch bodies, and now they have to find a way out of their predicament together.

The friv game focuses on the main characters, leaving the extras faceless
Mina Hughes is a woman with a troubled past who works for a secret organization. Her marriage is cracking at the seams, but instead of paying more attention to her husband and son, she plunges headlong into her career, not forgetting, however, from time to time to look at an attractive family doctor with whom she has an affair.

Donna Adeleke is a schoolgirl who just has fun with her friends. One day, they sneak into an abandoned pool following a suspicious stranger, and when he finds them, they stun and tie him up. But this man turns out to be...not quite human, which sets off a chain of frightening events.

There are enough mystics here, and the truth will not be revealed immediately
The friv game is built according to the serial structure, divided into chapters, which are divided into episodes of twenty minutes each. You can choose the order of viewing / passing episodes, constantly switching between characters. And this does not let you get bored, because each of them has their own mood: a comedy about a body swap turns into a spy thriller, and then gives way to a mystical horror. The plot keeps the intrigue to the very end, and I wanted to rush to the finale to find out the denouement.

The atmosphere is perfectly maintained, the developers skillfully mix elements of the supernatural and everyday life, dilute dramatic moments with humor and do not delay the story on one hero, paying equal attention to each of the participants in the story. The John/Jack couple got the most jokes: the “you programmer” dialogue with a video game developer made me crawl under the table with laughter, and the episode with getting used to living in a strange body masterfully beat the preparation scenes in robbery films.

Last stopSometimes Last Stop makes it possible to take a break from history and enjoy a walk to pleasant music or go through a simple mini-game
The only pity is that the player is not involved in this. Last Stop is a walking simulator / interactive movie with all the trappings of the genre: a lot of cutscenes, an imaginary choice variability and a small variety of game mechanics. All you can do is go in the only right direction, answer in dialogues (moreover, the consequences of the answers are not always obvious, and by clicking on the cue, you can start a completely different conversation), and also perform simple QTE. There is not even an opportunity to wander around the locations and interact with interactive objects - take a book, look at the sign, turn on the TV, and so on.

Yes, this is normal for interactive cinema, but still I would like more control, some optional scenes and influence on the development of events. The choice of answers in the dialogues is necessary only to obtain some achievements, and you will make fateful decisions only at the end of the story, literally before the final credits. Yes, and they will be dualistic, the level of "accept the offer or refuse."

Most often, choosing an option in a dialogue will give your answer only one or another emotional color - there is no nonlinearity here
The game has other problems as well. For example, animations that clearly lack polish. You can't look at the running characters without laughing. The hero models are also embarrassing: joints and seams are noticeable on them, as if they are assembled, sewn from different parts.

However, that didn't stop me from diving into the Last Stop story. Of course, the friv game does not divide life into "before" and "after", but thanks to the format of the series, a charming British accent, a delightful soundtrack and an interesting, intriguing story with an atmosphere of fairy tale and fantasy, it is addictive.

It’s like a movie on a Sunday evening, which seems to have a low rating, and the trailer didn’t catch on, but you turn it on because there is nothing to do - and you remain delighted when you get acquainted with an unexpected masterpiece. Last Stop may be a little short of the gems of the genre from Telltale Games and Quantic Dream, but the friv game is definitely worth a look. You just need to ignore the technical flaws.