Never Alone hasa wonderful concept. Its the first I of Upper One's planned series of World Carnes, which interactively explore different cultures of our planet. Never Alone focuses on the culture of the Inupiat tribe. Based on a tribal fable, it tells the story of a young girl who is separated from her village during a harsh blizzard. Wandering through the snow, she encojnters a friendly arctic fox who guides her through the storm, and helps her search for home.
The game is beautifully presented. The story is narrated in the Inupiaq language (allegedly by a 'master storyteller'), and sees the player encounter all sorts of strange creatures from the culture's myths and legends. A mysterious owl-man gives the girl a bola, which she uses to break barriers, while the fox can contact and manipulate spirits that the girl can ride as mobile plahorms.
In addition, the levels eke an impressive amount of variety from the arctic setting. One level sees you chased by a polar bear across a series of unstable icebergs, while another one involves traversing an abandoned village beneath the glow of the aurora borealis that, it you're not careful, can swoop down and sweep you into oblivion. It's always great to see a game that has a distinctive setting and art style, and Never Alone nails both perfectly.
Unfortunately, Never Alone is considerably less impressive when it comes to game design. It's a platform puzzler, and an extremely simplistic one too. The idea of controlling two characters (or one each if you play it cooperatively) who aid each other through the levels is neat, but their abilities are basic and the puzzles are simple, often involvirg the fox lowering a conveniently placed rope or dragging a spirit-platform towards the girl Despite only lasting a few hours. Never Alone required several sittings to complete because it failed to hold our attention for very long at all. It's possible that it's designed primarily for children, but its dark style suggests otherwise.
There are a few otherissues too, such as the imprecise controls. The idea of using the analogue stick to throw the bola is good in principle, but in practice, it's difficult to aim, and there are times when you must throw it accurately under pressure. In addition, there currently doesn't appear to be any keyboard and mouse support, so you're stuffed if you don’t own a gamepad.
Framing a neat theme around a basic jumping game has been done utterly to death, and Never Alone could have approached the gameplay mechanics a whole tot better. Nevertheless, Never Alone's charm and devotion to its subject matter just about outweigh its systemic limitations.