(art by OMOCAT, LLC.)

**Content warning: Though OMORI is an amazing game, not all of it may be suitable for everyone. Because I will not be diving into major spoilers of the game, I will say here that the main theme of the game deals with depression, suicide, and anxiety, and the game itself has many jump-scares.

It is an indie psychological horror game, after all.

In 2020, OMOCAT finally released their role playing game (RPG) OMORI, six years after the Kickstarter for the game.

BACKGROUND:

Originally, OMORI was supposed to be a comic book depicting the life of SUNNY, a teenager who has led the lifestyle of a “hikikomori”, hence the title “OMORI”, for the past 4 years of his life due to massive changes in his life. “Hikikomori” is the Japanese term for people who withdraw themselves from society so much that they lock themselves in their home with no interaction with others for years. OMOCAT (nobody knows her identity) began to work on the comic book, but soon after making the first few pages, she realized that this wasn’t how she wanted to convey what she was meaning with her story. Instead, she got together with some of her friends to form a company, also named “OMOCAT”. Soon, they got working on creating a video game out of her original idea.

At first glance, OMORI seems like a very simple, charming game. When you first spawn in the game, you are in an endless white area called “WHITE SPACE”, and soon, you learn the basics of how to play the game. Or so you think. 

The graphics and battle parts of the game are very referenced off of the Mother series (also known as Earthbound. Yes, this is where Ness originates from in Super Smash Bros.). The movement of the characters in a conga line when you’re going from place to place is similar, and so are the battle mechanics. You take turns based upon your speed, and your attacks do more or less damage based upon your emotion. Unlike Earthbound, OMORI actually requires you to utilize your different emotions in battle and play a major role in not just battling, but in the overall message of the game itself.

OMORI was also heavily influenced by UNDERTALE and DELTARUNE. In fact, one of the songs in-game was composed by Toby Fox! Like these other famous video games, OMORI has various different endings that are decided by what you do or do not do in the game. Sometimes, this leads to endings that are chilling, only because you didn’t press a button (spoiler alert), or it can lead to a surprise ending that you need to find out on your own. (There is also one MAJOR theme that is very similar to one of the routes of DELTARUNE, but as I said, no spoilers 🙂

However, unlike any other one of these RPG games, OMORI is truly something different.

PSYCHOLOGICAL ASPECT:

This game tackles brutal topics‒death, depression, suicidal thoughts, escapism, anxiety–all in a world that is uncannily similar to ours. This game lets you see life through the eyes of someone who has lost almost everything in their life, and they are about to lose that last remnant of hope that they had.

SUNNY is a boy who has locked himself in his home for four years after a tragedy turned his life completely dark. He does not speak. He does not show emotion. Now, he is being forced to move to a new city. He has three days left in his hometown. He hasn’t seen his friends for the time he has hidden in his home. He is all alone.

However, SUNNY doesn’t feel that way sometimes. All he does is sleep, do the chores that his mom tells him to, and go back to sleep. The only time SUNNY feels happy is when he is dreaming. That is the only place where he feels emotion. Every single time he goes to sleep, he turns into his alter ego, “OMORI,” and he sees his friends the way he remembers four years ago. Everyone is happy, everyone is there. Everything is perfect.

But in reality, well, it’s not. 

That’s up to him to realize though. Nobody else but his subconsciousness knows the truth of what has happened, for his brain has warped his sense of reality so much. Sometimes, not facing reality will end up causing something that is worse than waking up to it, no matter how bad you think the consequences will be.

Even though the game portrays it in a pretty extreme way, all of the things that SUNNY goes through are connected to how many people do feel in real life. Sometimes, we just can’t accept things the way they happened, and as much as we would like to change them, there is no way to undo things. Even if we don’t know the outcome of what will happen if we accept what has been done and tell everyone the truth, it is still worth saying. 

As much as I would LOVE to get into spoilers, I won’t. But there is another major psychological aspect of this game that surprised me on the first runthrough of the game, which does deal with spoilers and should be addressed.

Our brains are pretty irrational at times, and sometimes, they can be turned against us without us even realizing it. In SUNNY’s case, we can see that it is crucial to realize that what we perceive of everything around us may not be the way that it seems. Sometimes, comfort isn’t safe. Just because you are used to something doesn’t mean that everything will still be the same when you wake up. It has been scientifically proven that our brains are wired to resort to things that we find easier and less stressful to us1. This can lead our brains to label things that are different from what we are used to as “scary” and that you NEED to get back to your comfort zone to be safe.

Also, although it feels like all the other people around you are just “NPCs,” if you take the time to interact with all of them, you gain major insight into backstories that may tie into yours. You slowly realize that in this little town you live in, even your friends, who you think live perfect lives, are all dealing with their own issues. Heads up though–many of them are dealing with truly horrible things, and just the fact that you listen to them helps them get over their issues, even if after listening you wish you wouldn’t have asked. But the major thing though is that you have helped someone else who is as much of a human as you are. 

Who knows, maybe they will help you too someday. 

Again, in OMORI, many of the psychological ideas are warped to a point where they are quite extreme, but to me at least, I found many of the core ideas in the game true, and I felt like I could empathize with the overall theme as well.

BIAS:

Although this may not support my claim in some cases, I feel that if you feel like me then you should really try playing through this game on the good ending route at least once. 

I am someone who constantly worries about my friendships and change, and I get attached to things very easily. However, I can’t break away and accept the truth that the thing I got attached to is now changed. Every time something happened in my life that put me a step back, I would dwell in it for long periods of time and I just couldn’t get over it. Dang, even just thinking of the future made me scared and wanted to make me just quit everything. 

Don’t get me wrong, I still feel this way a lot, even after playing OMORI. Some people just are not as good at letting go. This game helped me see that even people who are in worse situations than me can get out of this sense of hopelessness, but that they need to persevere and not let their emotions and brain get the best of them.

Fair warning however–if you get attached to characters too easily, this is NOT the game for you. OMOCAT loves to rip the characters everyone loves away from us quite forcefully…

Also, if you aren’t necessarily dealing with this kind of emotion but love a good psychological horror game, go ahead and try out the neutral end or the bad ending of the game. Let’s just say that you’ll see why it is “psychological” horror.

CRITICISM (GOOD AND BAD):

Although I really do love this game, as you can tell, there are some aspects of the game that I am quite sad about.

Originally, OMORI was supposed to have way more description, storyline, characters, and plot. There are many unused assets in the hidden game files that hint at a deeper plot. In interviews with OMOCAT, she says many things about how they wanted to expand the backstories of the characters even more and maybe even provide dialogue for our completely mute protagonist.

The reason why OMOCAT didn’t finish it to the extent they wanted to was because of outside pressure from the people who donated to the kickstarter of the game. After not getting any updates from the OMOCAT group, who were busy working on making the game at that time, they began to think that they had been scammed and started to demand that they get their money back.

Because this was one of the first big games that OMOCAT was getting a lot of clout for, even though the game hadn’t been released yet, they decided to scrap parts of the plot that weren’t crucial to the overall plot and didn’t have time to add to the game. 

Although I see their motives for doing so and respect them for that, I am a little sad that their true and complete version of the game will never truly be known to any of us.

However, there is one major criticism I have that I feel many other reviewers of the game have as well. The dream world parts of the game are so long that the real-world segments are very short compared to the many HEADSPACE (dream world) parts. 

Even though dream time seems longer than our real “time”, the fact that the game takes 20 hours for the first runthrough and that much of it is all in HEADSPACE rather than the actual “story” of the game makes us think whether it was worth it or not.

To clarify, the HEADSPACE part of the game does actually add a lot of information and hints to the truth that we don’t receive from the real world parts of the game, but we only realize that at the very end of the game. 

It’s a common criticism of the game, but the fact that we only get a concrete answer at the end makes some of the people who play it angry. It is a valid point though, and I suggest that if you do not like games that make you observe tiny, obscure, repetitive details to glean the true meaning of the game, this may not be the game for you.

Yet there is one large unanswered question that isn’t answered, even at the end of OMORI. Why is it unanswered? Well, you decide what happens next.

The biggest critique I have of the game is the good ending. Yes. You heard me. The ending that OMOCAT wanted us to get. In the game files, it is labeled as the “true” ending. Although all of the endings end in a cliffhanger, the good ending (and secret good ending) are also cliffhangers, but not in the way that the other many endings are.

While the neutral and bad endings are cliffhangers, they feel right to be cliffhangers. The consequences of SUNNY’s actions in those routes make sense to turn out that way. After all the turmoil you have gone through to reach this ending, you are well, given what seems to be nothing. But what OMOCAT wants you to do is move on and trust. That is the main driving force of the game, after all. The good endings of OMORI also have a cliffhanger, but one that will make you cry. I cried at the end of this game, and I think you will too.

You decide how to interpret the ending.

IN SUMMARY…

OMORI is a masterpiece, even with its flaws. It tackles many modern day issues in a way that makes us aware that even the quietest, most unnoticed people are humans and deal with things that you don’t know about. 

Though it is dark, if you keep pushing to see the brighter side of things, you will be rewarded greatly.

If you do not wish to read any spoilers, please do not read the rest of this article.

If you do decide to play the game, however, and have any more questions about it, feel free to contact me via my email or my Discord (Internally Damaged Lemon#8418)! I’d be more than happy to explain OMORI lore or help guide you through the game.

RANDOM THINGS (SPOILERS AHEAD!!!):

I always like to end things on a funnier note, so if you have already played the game, see if you can notice these things. Or if you want more reasons to play the game and don’t care about spoilers, go ahead. Read these at your own risk…

• WTF Value

That’s right. Every time you start a new game, a random number is generated from 1-13 that determines the number of random jump-scares and events that happen in-game. The higher the WTF value, the more random, scary things will happen. The WTF value is set after you leave NEIGHBOR’S ROOM in HEADSPACE for the first time. To change the value, you must make a new file.

• KEL Ending

Though this bug was patched, if you are still unsatisfied with all the other endings, I 

suggest searching this up on YouTube. There was a bug that if you loaded a save file of KEL and HERO while on a file of the neutral moving day ending, it will seem as if on moving day, KEL and HERO have broken into your house during the night. If that isn’t funny enough for you, then walk out of your house. When you hop in your car to go drive off to your new home, KEL will follow you into the car and leave his brother behind, standing in front of your old driveway, never to see him again.

• References to Other Media

As always, what good is a game if there aren’t any hidden references to pop culture? Many different references are made throughout the game, including some hidden allusions to Pokémon, Earthbound, the Donkey Kong Rap (did you catch that in Sweetheart’s little rhymey introduction?), Metal Gear Solid, Yume Nikki, Mario Paint, and many many others.

(It’s not just video games, but anime [JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure], manga, and even famous writers [Victor Hugo and Oscar Wilde])

Many of these references require you to interact with obscure elements on screen though, so good luck trying to find all the references!