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Dull Gray is a stark visual novel with a minimalist approach to gameplay, but a depth beneath its short parts that tells a compelling story.
The visual novel genre is a medium capable of telling compelling stories through minimalist gameplay. Titles like Necrobarista proved that the form of interactive fiction is just as powerful now as it ever was, showing how parameters and themes can be stretched using the format. Developer Provodnik Games has experience with the genre and comes back with Dull gray, another intriguing entry in the studio’s catalog.
Set in the dystopian sci-fi universe of the Progress-Program – which was also the setting for the previous title from Provodnik Games Railways of love – Dull gray tells an intimate story. A mother and son embark on a journey to decide their son’s future career, in a world where personal decisions are extremely limited. The player has control only over the answer to a simple question: will the son become a street light lighter or a tallyman?
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Visually, Dull gray is quite striking. Minimalist at its core with very rare pops of color, the clear inspiration of 1920s Soviet graphic design creates a sparse and sterile world that is presented to the player in brief snapshots. It’s basic in design, and while it might not necessarily match the flowing beauty of outstanding peers like If found … it still works well for the story Provodnik Games is trying to tell.
As mentioned, Dull gray is deliberately limited from a gameplay standpoint, even more so than some other visual novels such as Dry drowning. Initially, it appears that the player only controls moving to the next page of the narrative and sometimes answering questions about the son’s career. Eventually the player will indicate that it is possible to go off-piste from these options, but even if the restrictions in place mean Dull gray will not be for everyone.
However, these gameplay shackles fit perfectly with the context of the world and the themes that Dull gray tries to convey. As the journey progresses and the player learns more about the history of the Progress program, the importance of this seemingly simple choice grows heavier and heavier. Whether it is the death of the igniter father, the pressure from society and family to take a certain job, or even the greater politics of this retro-futuristic dystopia, a feeling of pressure never ceases to mount. grow. Dull graythe short duration of execution.
This is Dull grayThe greatest achievement of the player, triumphantly increasing the impact of this binary choice thanks to the player’s growing understanding of the common history of mother and son. Just like how the weight of the decision increases Suzerain, although in a different game format, the player will end up thinking about the choice between a lamppost or a tallyman with much more tension than at the start. There’s a gadget in place that allows the player to achieve more positive endings, and while this initially gives a cathartic punch, it ends up provoking Dull gray lose some of its power.
This is in part due to the repetitive nature of Dull gray, with no real possibility of discovering different scenarios during later games. Its short runtime means players will never really have more depth in the world, and while there are multiple endings to be found, it’s all too easy to get bored after four or five runs. This is a problem similar to Ash walkers, another black-and-white game about narrative choices in a bleak future.
Dull gray overall is a thematically interesting visual novel with a lot of storytelling force. However, while it does use the limitations of its genre well to create friction for the player, the lack of depth can leave users feeling a bit hollow, especially after working out the hidden options available to them.
Dull gray releases May 5, 2021 for PS4, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, and PS Vita. Screen Rant received a Switch download code for the purposes of this review.
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