A while ago I found this game by @JamesYevon and currently has a demo out, containing about the first 3 hours of game play. As the title suggests, the game take some inspiration from undertale, mainly in how you choices matter and how you can kill or spare your enemies. But also other games like earthbound and paper Mario . (Also it’s up to four players)

Story: in the game, you play as a cat canonically named fast food (no I’m not kidding) who ends up in a land called “the land without a happy ending.” Created by the Reaper of Death, who was inspired the create this place after finding the soul of a kind, and selfless person, and only wanted to bring joy to others. This soul never had any of their own dreams come true, but insisted on bringing to life the dreams of others all the way until the day they died. This inspired the reaper to carry on their legacy by creating a world where the dreams off everyone who is invited to come…at the price of there soul of course.

And judging by the name of this place, you can probably tell the plan didn’t go very well. This brings us to you (fast food) the newest soul to be invited to this land. Why were you invited? What was your wish? What is your name fast food? And most importantly, what can’t you remember any of it? Well thats for you to find out. As you venture through this strange land, full of wacky characters, dangerous enemies, and endings that you might just be able to bring to a happy closure.

Gameplay As stated before, the game definitely has some inspiration from Undertale and deltarune, but mostly in the battle system. though the creator has apparently said there were other inspirations to, like Zelda majors mask, Pokémon mystery dungeon, earthbound, and paper mario.

On your journey you’ll come across puzzles enemies, and even some play forming. I won’t be talking to much about the puzzles, (I will say there’s a super cool puzzle element introduced around like the beginning of the final 3rd of the demo, that involves something super creative, but I don’t want to spoil that) but what I will talk about is the combat.

Once a battle has begun, you’ll enter what’s called a “silhouette showdown” where you and the enemy will take turns. You’ll have to dodge the attacks, and you can also jump in battles to.

As for what you can do, you can attack, use powers, preform an action, use an item, or show love.

Unlike in other rpg’s when you attack, you don’t just pick an attack and automatically hit the enemy, or have to time a button press. Instead you enter a shooting mini game, where you have to use your mouse to shoot the enemies core. Yes, SHOOT. Think like a light gun game. I like this since it’s a unique concept, as well as fits the games Wild West theme.

Powers are abilities you can prefer with your own core, like healing yourself. Don’t have much to say as I never really used powers myself.

Actions are how you’re able to spare your enemies. Some of them are simple conversations, while others active a mini game, and they’re pretty varied. You might have to avoid a certain amount of attacks, time a slap to hit a crazed coyote throwing dynamite at you, lick a camel, play a rhythm game, or the most challenging of all, standing completely still to play dead. Joking aside, the variety is very nice.

Items are pretty self explanatory, though when using an item you don’t just eat it, instead you actually have to shoot the food (as some healing items have multiple bits) they move slowly so unless you have terrible depth perception you won’t have to worry about missing, and once the last of the bits have passed, the ones you didn’t eat will remain in your inventory until you need to use it.

And love is basically how to fully spare an enemy. There is a bit more to this but that does kinda spoil the game a bit so I won’t say anything, other than it comes in at like the final fight in the demo, and I’m very interested to see how they expand upon it later in the game.

Writing

The writing is pretty good, I don’t really have much else to say. The game is mostly a comedy game, but it also is able to go from funny and cute, to tragic, sad, and even a like dash of existential horror. Personality I think the writing does a pretty good job of balancing this out, with it mostly just being funny, but when it starts getting dark, it’s able to transition from the two pretty well. There’s a few spot that are really good examples of this but again, spoilers and I really don’t want to ruin much of the surprise.

Art

Again, also pretty good, don’t have much else to say other than the artists did a good job.

Choices matter

Now for the final section, and the one I’m most excited to talk about, and a big reason this is the game I’m most excited for a full release off, and that’s the games focus on how your own choices matter. The most obvious one is killing or sparing, and is most likely what most casual players will focus on. But there’s also something else, and that is how you have the power to effect the life’s of other characters, or in other words, you get to decide whether to let the souls of this land suffer the fate that will inevitably be the tragic and heartbreaking end of their tale, or whether you break the chains of fate, and give everyone the dream they’ll never achieve, a happy ending.

Think of it kinda like side quests (or I guess in this case…… a side STORY) completely optional things you can do that will effect your ending (I believe the will be like 5 different ending though I could be wrong) Currently in the demo there isn’t much of this, but the lead dev has mentioned in discord that the full game will have much more of these, and I’m excited to see where it goes.

I’ve always loved games that have side objective like this that actively affect the story/ending, which in my opinion is totally under utilized in video games.

There is one big instance of it in the game, but I’m not going to say anything about it, because it’s possible my favorite moment in the game, and is when a basically became hooked on the game. Seriously it’s much better experiencing it yourself on a first play through.

In conclusion, the twelve slot saloon is looking to be a super cool game, that honestly could be the next big indie game (maybe not like the juggernaut that is fnaf and undertale, but I mean like, it’s fnaf and undertale, but probably somewhere on the level of oneshot, Celeste, omori, ect)

I give it a 9/10

again highly recommend checking the game out and playing the demo. (I do believe the demo is planned to have an update some time soon so if your rather wait for that consider following/wishlisting the game) but if I’ve peaked your interest, highly suggest playing the demo right now. It’s about 2-3 hours on a first play through.

Again it’s a real shame this game doesn’t have more attention, cause it really deserves more, so if you end up liking the game yourself, or just want to help out a promising indie game, feel free to tell your friends, make a let’s play, do your own review, follow or wishlist the game, getting to gather with some friends and play together, or just play the demo. Do whatever you want.

Have a good day everyone.

Steam link https://store.steampowered.com/app/3078500/The_Twelve_Slot_Saloon/ Gamejolt link https://gamejolt.com/games/The_Twelve_slot_saloon/730340

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