The Forgotten City

The problem with many time loop games is that it quickly becomes tedious doing the same actions over and over in subsequent loops. This annoying tendency usually puts me off of looping games entirely. But that's not a problem in this game. There is a guy you meet first thing in every loop that you can tell to go automatically do all the stuff you've figured out already in previous loops. This is ingenious and saves so much busy work. It means you're constantly exploring new options instead of rehashing what you've already done. This is a game with an interesting and satisfying mystery to figure out. It kept me intrigued. The only complaint I have is that the layout of the city can be confusing at first, and I don't recall there being any kind of in-game map. This is a slow paced mystery game, and there's not really any combat. So don't expect a hack and slash like Skyrim. At the time I'm writing this the game is on sale for 75% off, and it is definitely worth a playthrough.

fulfills my lifelong dream of being able to blast a Roman politician with a glock while also being a very good mystery game

A fun time loop game with an intriguing mystery at its heart. Most of the game is dialogue, so be prepared for that, but the voice acting is solid and so is the writing. the game is a little janky but given that it was developed by a team of three, it is to be expected. Overall, a good, story-focused experience.

love the game, straight 9 outta 10, not 10 because it was a bit short but honestly i don't think it could stretch more without ruining the story's quality! thank you for this

An excellent, memorable adventure. Everything it needs to get right, it gets right. Well worth the full price.

VERY GOOD story. A lot of games today have poor writing, this was definitely refreshing, the only thing I'd like to kindly request is a way to confront the Creator about his flawed plan regarding the coins and how he spread em out for his test. you can call him out on a lot of things, but this is one that bugged me the most, and ,at least from what i can tell, i couldnt say anything about it Definitely recommend

A great riddle with a deep, nicely intertwined story and some good mechanics to reduce repetitive tasks.

An intriguing puzzle game with some decent characters, good voice acting, and very inventive story. Definitely worth your time!

Came back for another playthrough after a couple of years, and it is still just as amazing as the first time. It is an awesome little timeloop story with a wonderful layer of historical exploration to immerse yourself in. As far as I am aware, this was the studio's first game based off of their older Skyrim mod. For a first game, it is extremely well made, the only real issues I encounter are small freezes as you enter a new area that needs to load, which last at most two seconds. I love the characters, they feel like real people and you find yourself becoming somewhat atattched overt the course of the story. History has always been a passion of mine, so having a story where you are somewhat rewarded/ at an advantage for having knowledge of the mythology and history was a really fun surprise. The different character types you can choose from give the gameplay just enough variation to keep it interesting enough to play through to each ending, of which there are four. It is a brilliant self contained adventure, but I would happily spend $30-40 on another game where you just go around the world continuing with the stories/lives of these characters.

[h1]You got some nice imagination there friend(s)[/h1] [i][b]>winks at Modern Storyteller[/b][/i] Considering it's AA title, this is a fricking fantastic project. I'd say, never watch someone play it, read nothing, not even reviews here, I am serious, dive in blind and have a good-ass adventure.

Another great time-loop mystery game. Got my first ending, Ending 2 in Loop 3, and True Ending in Loop 9. Missing some achievements, but dunno if I wanna go all over again after getting all the endings. Since one need to start from scratch with below 3 loops to reach true ending and then other specific achievement. OVERWHELMINGLY RECOMMENDED of course!

I played two hours and took a bit of a gamble from there that the game probably wasn't worth my time. After reading some spoilers, I was right. For all the story potential that was built up from the start of the game, this is a truly awful plot with a ludicrous ending. It's not even a fun game to play; the game does all the detective work for you and all you need to do is follow the quest markers until you eventually figure out what's going on. I'm not sure what people saw in this game that I didn't, but I can only say that I think you'll be disappointed.

[h2]“The point is... that you are under a misconception that Forgotten City is a time-loop puzzle game. It is not. What it is really, is a fetch-quest game.”[/h2] The first half of my review is spoiler-free, after which I will leave behind a detailed account of the flaws in Forgotten City and its plot. Some of the names might be wrong because they weren’t memorable enough to remember. To start, I was attracted to Forgotten City because I wanted to fill the void left behind by Outer Wilds, an exceptional video game with a time-looping mystery at its core that requires thought and attention, and leaves you pondering on solutions to the numerous micro-puzzles that each contribute towards the final element that will let you solve the final puzzle. Needless to say, Outer Wilds was a phenomenal experience. Forgotten City however was not. On the contrary I walked away from the experience puzzled as to how the game can maintain such a high score AND be compared to other excellent time-looping stories like Outer Wilds. To me, it doesn’t even stand on the pedestal astride these excellent games. Starting at the beginning, Forgotten City is a polished, visually stunning game that takes place in a small Roman town frozen in time. Its citizenry are diverse and represent the cultural and racial diversity of the Roman Empire. Upon starting a fresh save, you are presented with an intriguing mystery, and numerous pathways are presented to you to find a way to open the puzzle at the game’s core. There’s the intrapersonal relationships you must build with the townfolk, then the political element of an impending election to swear in a new town magistrate which has polarized the town into two opposing camps; and even that of the religious, in which numerous religions are struggling to co-exist peacefully. However as you dive deep into this world you quickly realize many of these points become irrelevant and the towns people are nothing more than levers designed to open the numerous story gates present throughout the game. Your relationships with them do not matter. The political element is a joke as well but I can’t say too much without spoiling. At its core, Forgotten City is really just a fetch-quest game layered in pretty graphics and writing inspired by Roman and Greek philosophy. There are things I liked about it, but I can’t really diverge without spoiling. ++SPOILERS BELOW++ [spoiler] The moment my enthusiasm for Forgotten City died was after the “underworld” reveal in the bath-house. That singular moment sparked an epiphany that made me realize many of the plot-points I mentioned above are completely and utterly irrelevant. As I said, the townsfolk do not matter at all. They are buttons you need to press to get access to prompts to open other buttons elsewhere. On my final run to open the temple, I stopped caring completely about the people and their fates because it didn’t matter one bit. The political intrigue!? This was the single most disappointing element and I need to break it down into two parts. First, after Servius reveals he retains his memories with each wipe, the game set the stage for an epic metaphysical showdown between you and a virtual opponent who was in layman’s terms, aware you were a video game player. You could start and restart the game at will, pump him full of arrows or bullets, sway the votes against him, but the Golden Rule simply allowed him to undo it all and cling onto power. After this reveal, I was left stunned. How could I possibly defeat an enemy like this? Somebody who negated my overwhelming advantage by abusing the rule of the very prison that kept everyone locked away!? This was a phenomenal reveal, almost as epic as realizing Vivec in Morrowind didn’t want to fight the player because he knew you could reload the game and fight until he died. And what happens after that? Nothing. His contribution to the story completely fizzles after that because by then, the game shifts its attention on the 4 McGuffins you need to finish the game, and that leads me to my second point. Second, once you unlock the main “story gates,” Galerius, who is a game mechanic originally designed to help save you time in doing the tedious fluffwork to open the story gates, is like a small marble you flick to activate a very intricate Rube Goldberg machine that finishes with him getting elected as magistrate. The only physical thing you need to do thereafter is to start the election. The only reason the election substory exists is so you can fetch McGuffin #2 of 4 required to open the temple. You don’t even need to leverage your relationships with the townfolk to build a political coalition to support Galerius, they just automatically fall in line behind him. So to sum up, Servius doesn’t matter. Malleus (he has heterochromia cause he’s bad mkay) doesn’t matter. The gladiator guy doesn’t matter. Your favors and relationships with the townfolk don’t matter. To achieve the canon ending, you only need to open 2 story gates: 1. Successfully elect Galerius once and free the village idiot, opening up McGuffin 2. 2. Receive the underworld reveal from the priestess (to do this you just need to ask 3 NPCs about their origin stories and report back to the priestess.) After this, the remaining 3 McGuffins can be achieved freely. McGuffin #1 can be found in the Christian cave which if you’re not careful like I was and jump in like a commando, triggers the Golden Rule because you violated Octavia’s NAP. McGuffin #3 and 4 are in the hands of a soyboy Egypt nationalist who is happy to criticize Rome and Greece for stealing Egyptian gods and culture, but gets butthurt when you make the point his gods and culture were stolen from the Sumerians. Credit where it’s due, the catacombs that migrate through the four different architectural time periods was phenomenal, showcasing how each culture evolved and changed over time. Clearly the map, environment and settings were created by someone with passion for history. Also the beautifully designed world does promote exploration, and I was able to find most of the final areas in the game relatively easily. After that, all that’s left is to open the Temple which reveals one of the funniest, laziest endings I’ve ever seen. I could not take the situation seriously at all, and "God" feebly explaining to a mortal that in all his omniscient, alien might, he was forced to babysit a small town of primitives because his girlfriend gave up her powers to be among them. In my first run I tried hard to find a way to reason with “God” on moral or philosophical grounds, but instead the game shoehorned me into initiating a silly fight, pointed me into taking Persephone's crown (when at no point was her crown EVER mentioned in the game beforehand,) restarted the loop, came back to his throne room and Dr Strange’d him into being my time prisoner, AND THEN HE JUST ACCEPTS IT AND LEAVES. Replayability is also a joke because 2 of the 4 endings are variations of the same. The only difference is talking to Galerius first. Ending 1 can be achieved within the first 30 seconds of a save by simply shooting Galerius, and then Servius when he comes running past. The different “class” options at the start are dumb. I picked the historian trait thinking it would come in handy by opening some secret areas, dialogue options and pathways when all it did was add some useless prompts. “Do you know what this place is?” “Um yes it’s a duat! *nerd emoji*” “Ok. Moving on.” When I saw the game gave me the option to bring a literal GLOCK with me, I automatically assumed the other options would be just as strong in other elements of the game. I was wrong on that. The religious element was also a huge let down. I was initially excited to see early Christians in the game, but in the theme of Forgotten City they... didn't matter. The most it comes up is curing Rufius' homophobia by treating his arthritis. That's literally it.[/spoiler]

It's a very well made game that aims to deliver a very specific experience to players. It is a solid 9/10 from me. I think my only complaint is that it is a bit short but it aims to give quality over quantity. It is for people who enjoy puzzles, talking to people and figuring things out. It helps if you like time travel but I don't think that is necessary. I strongly suggest not watching someone play or watching the visual of a review (listen instead), the experience I think is easily ruined with knowledge of the contents. Suffice to say that if you enjoy games about mystery and uncovering secrets and history then this is definitely for you.

Amazing game, glad i spent 6 or 7 hours playing it. I'm not sure how much it cost but it was the same entertainment of a good movie, so for 7 hours I think that is eeesaily worth $20 or $30. Make sure to go for all endings!

Excellent and unique game; The cannon ending is a nice touch.

It`s one of the games you stumble upon... a friend tells you to play it.... and unfortunatly it`s one of the games you want to delete your memories afterwards so you can play it again. As a mythology lover all around the past cultures i had so much fun playing this one. Awesome story, great soundtrack. Couldn`t ask for more.

'The Forgotten City' is an amazing detective game on puzzle-solving and morality that has sent me into a contemplative spiral more than once. It does get a bit spooky (the golden statues turn their heads to look at you when you're not looking at them), but it is doable for even the most skittish of players. The twists and turns are well done, and the game handles the time-loop style very well. The 'true' ending was immensely satisfying to me, and I enjoyed every bit of it. 10/10. A highly-recommended game for puzzle-lovers and history nerds alike.

Solving the puzzles is rewarding. The story is good but not the best. The dialogues are a little bit corny but still interesting. I just love the [spoiler]time loop[/spoiler] mechanic and hope to see more of that.

Engaging story, attention to historical details, multiple endings

Свои 200 рублей по скидке стоит, НО - 2 и 3 концовка отличаются одной фразой и, в целом, плохо сделаны - Элемент детектива ощущается куда хуже чем в оригинальном моде. Может быть, просто у меня больше нет чувства новизны, хз - Все финальные диалоги пропитаны эпиком и имеют кучу фраз на выбор, при этом все они ведут к одному и тому же Вывод: Попытались улучшить и расширить оригинальный мод в виде полноценной игры. Вышло так себе. Для тех, кто в банке - игра основана на одноименном моде для Скайрима от тех же авторов.

Really great short form mystery. Great writing and research, I feel like I learned a lot about Roman history and life in ancient times. Wonderful environments and ambience too. Strong recommend if you like dialogue and discovery over action.

Very interesting story about history. The movements a little janky, but the complexity of the time loop makes up for it.

Enjoyed this game quite a bit and would recommend for time loop story enthusiests!

Very good game. Wish more games like this came out in recent times, alas, more live service slop it is.

The forgotten city has a nice mystery that kept me hooked during the whole experience. Each revelation felt fair and satisfying. I highly recommend going in blind and not looking up any guide or information. The ending is adequate but the weakest part of the whole experience. I think the game was perfectly spaced out and ultimately didn't overstay it's welcome.

Cool concept. Love games that introduce story through talking with people and don't deliver the broad picture so fast. Also a huge fan of thought provoking, mystery games that like to make you question what is even going on. Need more games like this, I am so glad the indie scene is catching on to what the people actually want. Double thumbs up

I put off playing this for a long time because I don't typically get into mystery and/or story-driven games. I also assumed there might not be any action in this one. Turns out, I loved it. The story was fantastic (particularly the final 1/3 or so) and the gameplay was quite enjoyable also. I would recommend this to almost anybody.

I very nearly gave up on this one like five minutes in because the opening didn't hook me, and I always get annoyed when I have to name a character and there's no default name. I'm glad I didn't though because it got a lot more interesting very quickly after that. The real strong point is probably the characters and their writing/performances. Their different backgrounds and perspectives on the situation are the main thing driving the story forward, so it's important that they're well done, and luckily they actually are. The way the mystery unfolds is pretty satisfying too, and it's definitely one of the better time loops I've seen recently. Huge bonus points for being able to get someone else to do all the repetitive stuff for you on subsequent loops instead of having to do it all yourself, and a few more bonus points for even managing to work that into the narrative too. That one feature solved my biggest problem with stuff like Majora's Mask or Outer Wilds, where I inevitably get sick of having to repeat stuff before I finish the game. The final true ending was my least favorite part of the whole thing, but it was still ok, and this can go next to other games where I liked the journey more than the destination, like 13 Sentinels.

A perfectly paced detective-type game in the vein of Outer Wilds. For something that was written about morality and different time periods, thankfully, it almost entirely avoids being preachy and woke, treating the past with a good deal of respect. One of the cooler things about the game is that the first few endings, while saving your own life, only give you half the story. Full recommend and I'm eager to see what games these fellows produce in the future.

I got this game for $6 first ending took me 6 hours, this game is well worth it with it's grand story about time looping. highly recommend 8.5/10

It isn't The Outer Wilds, but it definitely scratches the itch. Check it out

I really enjoyed this game, it's like Majora's Mask meets ancient Rome, something I think we've all been waiting for. The story and design is very good, though the writing I think can let it down at times. In many areas it really strives to be authentic but in others the writers put too much of their own opinions into the dialogue options or they impose a modern slightly political slant on these ancient characters which broke my immersion a few times. I think given the nature of this game, it would have been better with a rigid, almost brutal attention to accuracy in the characters. That's my only gripe though, all in all it's very well designed and produced.

Surprisingly interesting plot that was very fun to unravel. I was very surprised by how fun this game actually was, there were no boring segments that you needed to grind through, it was just 10 hours of really interesting story. Perfect amount of time for a video game. Most of the gameplay is talking to NPC's which can be overwhelming in the beginning because some NPC's really have a lot to say. Some are fun to side with and some are clear targets for you to prank. I'm not a fan of history, let alone Greek/Roman history but this game still really felt great to play all the way through. It reminded me a lot of how old school TES: Oblivion felt to me with how some of the side-quests played out. Similarities end there, as its not open world and is strictly a time loop based game similar to Outer Wilds with a few key differences that make it feel very unique. 9/10 - Just a solid and very fun puzzle/time loop game.

An excellent adventure game full of mystery and intrigue marred by a lack luster penultimate ending.

I rarely leave reviews, but this was a stellar sub-10-hour game. Easy to recommend to any of my friends who want something fresh to play with satisfying solutions to various problems.

I have not beaten this game YET as of the time of me writing this review. This is a wonderful storyteller with a captivating game play loop and a well done time loop mechanic and a feature to help you get right back to where you left off, no going back to repeat everything you've already done each time. I came here from the Skyrim Mod and I'm glad to say I've experienced both versions of this. If you're not sure whether or not to buy this game after playing through that mod do it! Otherwise buy it anyways... 10/10 Recommend. You will be thinking about this game for a long time.

The Forgotten City is a bite-sized gem of a game that reminded me very much of old point and click adventure games of the 1990s. But unlike games like Broken Sword 5 which slavishly attempt to recreate the exact experience of those older games, Forgotten City takes the concept and overlays it in an interface similar to games like Skyrim. It'd be good to think of it like a "Choose Your Own Adventure" book with a graphical overlay. Now, the game isn't perfect. There is quite a lot of jank and the graphics look like something from circa 2006, but the story is compelling and the characters are just realistic enough to make you enjoy talking to them. I was able to complete the story in about 8 hours, unlocking half of the achievements, so I imagine if you were a 100% completionist, you might be able to double that time. I bought the game on a Steam sale for about $5, and I'd say it was well worth it. I hope the developers make some more games with a similar kind of feel and gameplay loop. Not all games need to be 140 hour long super immersive slogs. This is the perfect game for someone to pick up for a few hours after work without feeling the need to commit to a long term engagement.

Reminiscent of outer wilds - fun, mysterious, and deeply introspective. Had a great time playing this and really made me think in more than just game mechanics!

Inspiring ! Great game to finish on a weekend, but don't stop think about for weeks !

I've played this game on another platform. Bought it on steam to help support the devs because of how good it is. This game is truely a gem. It's worth full price. It's also one of those games that you don't want to know anything about when you start it. So that's all I'll say. Just play it.

A nice historical time loop game, good graphics, good story with twists and fun options to do things differently after knowing what happens.

The Forgotten City és una experiència fascinant que et manté enganxat des del primer minut. La seva trama, plena de girs inesperats i misteris, et fa sentir com un detectiu en una antiga ciutat romana. Els personatges són memorables i les decisions realment tenen pes. Visualment, el joc aconsegueix transportar-te a un altre temps amb una ambientació cuidada fins al detall. Si t’agrada pensar i tens ganes de posar a prova la teva moral, aquest joc és per a tu. I alerta: potser descobriràs que el teu millor amic és una estàtua d’or! The Forgotten City is a captivating experience that grabs you from the very start. Its story, packed with twists and mysteries, makes you feel like a detective in an ancient Roman city. The characters are memorable, and your choices truly matter. Visually, the game transports you to another era with its detailed setting. If you enjoy thinking and want to test your morals, this game is for you. And beware: you might just find your best friend is a golden statue!

Excellent game, made great use of the time looping mechanic without making things feel stale by allowing new ways to apply what you learned the last time. I was also impressed with the story, I found that there were a couple of discoveries where I thought to myself "Woah, cool, so that's the big reveal!" and then another one would happen later building off the previous discovery. I'm not a combat/action gamer, and I appreciated that the game gave me a choice when we were about to head into an action sequence. I chose to do it anyway and found it pretty thrilling and not too difficult (although a lot of saving happened at each stage in that sequence). My only complaint is that the facial animations were quite weak and stagnant and I wished they matched the wonderful vocal performances better.

[h1]Beautiful and Mysterious but Dumb[/h1] The game starts with the line: [quote]This is a mystery adventure with multiple endings. It rewards thoughtful conversation and exploration, not brute force. [/quote] The reason I don’t recommend this game is because it’s the exact opposite of the intention - brute force: explore everything in the city, talk to everyone, exhaust all dialog options. As you do that, new dialog options with other characters appear (or some other items become interactable) - run around the map to find those, exhaust those as well. Repeat. There are only a few clever puzzles. [h2]Dialog[/h2] At times the game tries to pull off “let’s do a clever debate” type of thing: the “correct” sequence of answers leads to progression. At the same time it’s really not clear what the game expects as the said “correct” sequence and in case of an “incorrect” input the corresponding character “blocks” (refuses to talk to you) until the rest of the day, so you either need to wait until the next loop or (as I did) quick-save quick-load. Sometimes this “debate” has a workaround. In case of Rufius, I think it doesn’t, so I needed to reload numerous times. [h2]World setting[/h2] doesn’t make sense. There will likely be social division even in the society of just 23 people, but I don’t think it’s possible to have division to the extent shown in the game (I am not an expert in this regard, so don’t quote me on that). Furthermore, our world only recently came to the state where only a tiny fraction of the population work in agriculture. At the time of the game events most people worked in agriculture. Soldier, bodyguard, servant, merchant, vestal priestess, etc. There is only a single person in the game who produces food! What?! Most people here should be fishin! “5000 denarii” from the outside wouldn’t mean anything in a city where food is the bottleneck. [h2]Pseudo time-loop[/h2] is [spoiler]mostly[/spoiler] fake. It (mostly) makes sense story-wise, but it bears almost [b]zero influence on the gameplay[/b]. The only notable exception: it took me some time to realize that [spoiler]unlike other time-loop games, the items carry on to the next cycle and it’s completely ok to “fail” the loop to get the item(s) for the next cycle[/spoiler], but this aside the entire game could have a normal time flow. I initially wanted to call it “[i]mostly[/i] fake”, but then I realized that in one important case (when you discover [spoiler]Sentilla[/spoiler]) some unrelated events ([spoiler]the magistrate Sentius coming in[/spoiler]) happen just right after your discovery … or don’t happen at all if you don’t initiate the “trigger”. This kind of “progression with coincidences” are common in normal (non time-loopy) games, but are very cheap in what is supposed to be a time loop. And there is no excuse in circumstances for this specific case: the game could make the aforementioned discovery different depending on what time of the loop you discover it in (similar to “Outer Wilds” - top-notch implementation of a time-loop game). [h2]Ending[/h2] came so abrupt. I wasn’t ready for it. As soon as you stumble on something, you get ending #2 and get revealed the main culprit(s). For me it happened before I even met all game NPCs. Then it immediately becomes clear how to get ending #1 and by the “power” of a new dialog option simply appearing for one of the characters, without any extra thought, you get ending #3. Ending #4 requires finishing the game tasks (of which there aren’t many) and then you are rewarded with a 40+ minute end dialog - what?! It’s good that it explains stuff and connects everything, but it should have been more evenly distributed across the game and it would be nice if it also required some thought to put everything together. Instead, everything’s just explained to you in one big dump at the end. Then you get a “postgame”. Game tells you about the grim fate of “the main culprit(s)”, but also shows you how all the other characters (many - really shitty culprits themselves) do well. Am I supposed to sympathize for those pieces of shit? Do I need to be glad for the killer [spoiler]Khabash[/spoiler]? [h2]Good[/h2] [list] [*]Everything is voice acted [*]Atmosphere, the city art and layout [/list] [h1]Conclusion[/h1] It shows that this game is not big-studio quality in various aspects (poor face animations, mediocre walking animation, etc.). Still it’s impressive that it was made by a core team of just three people. The game starts promising, but in fact falls very short in its most fundamental aspects (world-building, detective puzzles, real time-loop interactions). Around ≈11-13 hours (Steam seemed to remove ≈2 hours of play time) to complete and get all endings.

11/10, Best Skyrim mod of all time. Seriously though this is epic, you can pretty much play as time-traveller Lara Croft :)

Worth every penny. Worth every second. Note: my playtime reflects the fact I didn't use "markers" an instead just explored everywhere pursuing the plot points

Beautiful game with a captivating story

Good Puzzles, Enemies arent too spooky, nice lil chat about town

It is a masterpiece, I want every good and kind person I know to play this game.