40
The beginning is interesting, the storytelling experiment works well. But technical and design flaws make this tale terrifying for the wrong reasons.
8
Very good game. I enjoyed playing this game a lot. I strongly recommend this.
0
Дрянь. Неинтересное позорище с пиксель хантингом. Избегайте эту игру
5
I really liked the story to Serena and thought it had some good twists but I really disliked the game play. It all takes place in one room and you basically find items you can click on that will reveal story details and allow you to click on other items. My issue is that after you are done all of them there will be subsequent details available from some of the other items but you never know which one so you have to go clicking on them all to see what has new info. There are no clues given nor is there any real logical reason that these items now have new info as they aren’t referenced by any of the preceding dialogue. Once you have clicked on enough of them enough times the game allows you to open certain things like an armoire and a chest. One again there is no reason why you couldn’t open them before as none of the dialogue explains why you can suddenly do these things. There are no puzzles or conversation choices or anything else at all to do except click on random items and try to progress the story. I think the game would have worked out better as a kinetic visual novel than what we got. The voice acting is alright but nothing special. The graphics are much the same. I wouldn’t call them bad but they didn’t wow me at all even taking into account the release date of the game. I played Serena on Linux. It never crashed and I didn’t notice any bugs or glitches. I was really disappointed in the game when it came to the nitty gritty. There are no options at all, not for sound or graphics or controls or anything else. In fact unlike most games where pressing the “Esc” key brings up a menu screen where you can choose various options, in Serena pressing “Esc” closes the game. This is an even bigger issue when you realize there is no save option. This is a short game but the fact that pressing a key that in any other game would be normal will now exit your game without any option to save is just plain stupid design. Alt-Tab works. Performance was fantastic but given the visual quality I wasn’t shocked. The game has built in V-sync as it respected my 144 Hz monitor. Graphics Engine: Dagon Engine Graphics API: OpenGL Disk Space Used: 367 MB GPU Usage: 0-77 % VRAM Usage: 679-846 MB CPU Usage: 7-18 % RAM Usage: 2.6-2.8 GB Frame Rate: 143-144 FPS The great story and free price tag didn’t make up for the annoying game play or the terrible design choices. Overall there are much better out there even for free games. I finished Serena in forty three minutes. My score: 5.5/10 My System: AMD FX-9590 | 16GB DDR3-2133 | MSI RX 580 8GB Gaming X | Mesa 22.1.3 | Manjaro 21.3.4 | Mate 1.26.0 | Kernel 5.18.12-3-MANJARO | AOC G2460P 1920*1080 @ 144hz
Serena
Released On:
Jan 30, 2014
Metascore
Available after 4 critic reviews
tbd
User score
Mixed or Average
6.6
My Score
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All Platforms
Feb 12, 2014
40
The beginning is interesting, the storytelling experiment works well. But technical and design flaws make this tale terrifying for the wrong reasons.
User score
Mixed or Average
38% Positive
21 Ratings
21 Ratings
47% Mixed
26 Ratings
26 Ratings
15% Negative
8 Ratings
8 Ratings
May 24, 2014
10
Serena, по сути, не игра - это коротенькая интерактивная история. Здесь нет ни паззлов, ни выбора реплик - геймплейно это такая кастрированная поинт-энд-клик адвенчура с неспешным кликаньем на все предметы по многу раз. Единственное что от вас требуется - быть достаточно внимательным, чтобы собрать отдельные кусочки мазайки в единую картину. Однако, что касается сюжета, тут нет никаких нареканий. История вышла вполне интересной и атмосферной, а неожиданная концовка лишь добавляет проекту шарма. Благодаря короткой продолжительности (прохождение займет у вас около получаса) однообразный игровой процесс не успевает надоесть, а бесплатность и низкие требования позволяют порекомендовать ее к прохождению любому владельцу ПК.
Mar 14, 2020
9
I finished this in one session just like you would rip through a great book you just can't put down. Highly recommended short but sweet game.
Aug 25, 2023
8
Very good game. I enjoyed playing this game a lot. I strongly recommend this.
Oct 17, 2014
7
Such mixed feelings about this game. Teasing out the story is interesting and engaging, and the voice acting and visuals are solid, but sometimes the "click on all the things until dialog is exhausted, then click on all the things again" gameplay sometimes felt like a bit of a drag. And I was caught by the utter lack of a menu or saving system: I stupidly hit the escape key and got dumped out of the game, losing 63 minutes of progress (I was very close to the end, too). Irritating. Plus I found out from LP's that it's possible to trigger the ending without having experienced the entire story: disapprove. So, conditional recommend?
Feb 17, 2014
7
Serena é um jogo com um conceito muito básico, és um homem que esta numa cabana numa floresta e não te lembras da Serena, a tua mulher. Tropecei neste jogo por estar à procura de algo gratuito para jogar na steam e decidi experimentar, nunca tinha ouvido falar, não sabia do que se tratava, fiz download e joguei. É um jogo pequeno que demorei cerca de uma hora a terminar, onde andamos por uma pequena cabana de madeira à procura de pistas para nos relembrarmos de Serena. Visualmente não é nada do outro mundo, é tudo muito estático e bonito com umas partículas a flutuar no ar e basicamente a única coisa que se move é o relógio, mas mesmo assim consegue criar um ambiente intimo e reservado para contar a sua historia, que é narrada cada vez que interagimos com um objecto sempre dando mais detalhes sobre o que se passou e quem era a Serena. É uma historia que muda de direcção algumas vezes durante a nossa estadia na cabana e que acaba de uma forma inesperada. Apesar de no principio andar perdido numa cabana com duas divisões e sem saber o que fazer, depois de começar a interagir com os objectos e a historia se começar a desenrolar não consegui resistir de jogar até ao fim. Aconselho a quem tenha uma horinha livre a ir passa-la para esta cabana e descobrir o que se passou com Serena. Esta Review também se encontra em ****/2014/02/review-serena.html
Aug 23, 2014
4
Extremely modern and pretentious. It borders on ****. Even the genre on Metacritic begs my loathing "Modern". Yeah, alright. I'm the first to step up and say that video games need to start breaching more serious territory if they wish to be considered "art", but the main point of the medium should not be forgotten: to be a game. This game follows a trend of "artsy fartsy" games on Steam that, frankly, would only entice the imagination of the clueless. The game is hardly a game at all, and what of its architecture that -IS- a game is horribly boring and dull. You cannot sacrifice your narrative for gameplay, a faux pas Blizzard constantly makes, but likewise, you cannot sacrifice your gameplay for narrative, especially when the narrative isn't a very good one. The voice acting of the main character is sometimes painfully awkward and feels artificial, like the actor is not really identifying with his scene. In the end the game tries way too hard and fails. The storytelling is boring, the graphics are offensively ugly, and the controls are pretty poor for a release on M/Kb in 2014. What potential the story could have had, and what level of "art" the game could have achieved is all but lost in a poor foundation for a game. Sorry, Serena!
Mar 2, 2014
4
First off: I think the concept of Serena is a good one. The graphics are suitable for a game like this and the fact that you can play the game for free is yet another reason to try it out for sure. Doing so I tried my best to enjoy playing Serena, or at least find it sufficiently entertaining. Alas, I found out pretty soon that I wouldn't make it to the end, even if that ending was just a small hour away. Why did I detach that quickly? Well, for starters because the voice acting was unbearable. Over acted in every sense of the word. The fact that you had to listen to the same lines over and over again didn't help either. Some voice recordings were not even filtered correctly, the mic buzz was noticeable. Much of the progress in the game was achieved without being notified about it in any way. This made the game feel very slow and stubborn. I've watched a walk-through on YouTube to see where the game would have taken me had I played it till the end: Good story, originally made up ending with a very nice surprise to it. Had the voice acting been (way) better, had the coding excluded the possibility of hearing the same spoken lines over and over again, then this would have been a great little horror experience. Good idea, bad implementation.
SummaryHow long has it been? A man sits in a distant getaway cabin waiting for his wife Serena. Where is she? Things in the cabin evoke memories, and the husband comes to a disturbing realization... This short point-and-click adventure is the result of a massive collaborative effort between dozens of fans and designers of adventure games.
