Game: Synergia
Genre: Adventure, Role-Playing, Visual Novel
System: Nintendo Switch
Developers | Publishers: Top Hat Studios, Radi Art | eastasiasoft
Price: US $14.99 | UK £13.29 | EU €14,99
Age Rating: US M| UK/EU 16+
Release Date: March 18th, 2021
Review code used, with many thanks to Top Hat Studios
I believe I’ve mentioned it here before, but I love a good noir story. The sort of noir featured in films like Blade Runner can be a bit hit or miss for me (I prefer an old school Humphrey Bogart movie) so I was cautiously intrigued when I took on the game Synergia. Am I glad I did!
Story
You play as Cila, a woman who works for a shady organization handling androids that have gone off in their programming. She comes home to her own android and just seems to be skating along in life. When her companion android breaks down, she acquires Mara, an android unlike anything Cila has encountered before. Who and what is Mara? Will she break through Cila’s shell? And what exactly happened in Cila’s past anyway?
Gameplay
I don’t understand why so many of the titles I play fail to state this in the Nintendo store, but this is a visual novel. There are a handful of selections to be made, and screens to interact with to get information or advance, but this game is almost exclusively reading. If that’s not your jam, don’t play.
I had a little trouble with the save screen for some reason. Unlike almost every game ever, the saves are just a black box instead of a screen cap of where you were. So prepare to dig through your saves to find the latest date/time stamp. I kept losing my latest save in the shuffle, but the skip feature is so fast it’s no bother at all.
The touch screen is used in this game and I found that very handy.
Content
Synergia is Yuri. The women herein like other women. Again, don’t like, don’t play. It has some nudity.
This is very noir/cyberpunk. If you like this type of story, you likely already know it. It features people living their lives in desperate circumstances, so some of the themes are dark and the decisions questionable. However, compared to some titles I’ve played, I found this one to be fairly mild in content for a title of this genre.
Visuals, Music, and Worldbuilding
All of it is astonishing. The art in Synergia is just gorgeous, leaning heavily on reds, purples, and other darker tones to build Cila and Mara’s world. A lot of it reminded me of Blade Runner. Since many Phillip K. Dick quotes were included in the game, I am sure this is intentional. Either way, there is rarely a scene change that doesn’t take my breath away.
The score was composed by Andy Andi Han. I am not familiar with him, but rarely has a video game score caught my attention like this one. I never once got tired of the music. In fact, far from turning the sound down, I turned it UP. I want the album, it’s just that atmospheric and excellent.
The worldbuilding is a little weaker than the above two components, but not by much. I found this world fascinating, and want to know more. I need a novel, manga, anime, fan fiction, epic poem. Anything!
Drawbacks?
Unfortunately, the text is small. I didn’t have too much trouble reading it, but it is going to be a problem on the Switch Lite screen for some people. There are a few scenes where the background makes the text even more difficult to read. However, this is the only major drawback I found in Synergia.
Conclusion
I love Synergia. It is a wonderful addition to my personal collection of noir and Yuri tales. If either of these are your style, then I suggest you check it out as well. You just may need some reading glasses to make it work.
Final Verdict: I Like It A Lot
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