Gnosia İnceleme (Vitlöksbjörn)
You might think that "Single player anime Amogus" sounds strange at best. But GNOSIA is a bit more than that. The mechanics are almost completely different, even if the scenario is the same - an impostor on a spaceship, killing the crew one by one, until the they get voted out by the survivors - or kill enough people. That is pretty much where the similarities end; and this is where the fun stuff comes in.
Because even though the main format of the game is indeed playing the social deduction game, there's a lot more to it. There's a meta plot, interesting worldbuilding, there are individual subplots of the characters... there's even romance! How can you fit all of that in an anime Amogus? Hah, told you it's a bit more than that.
How Do You Play Social Deduction Alone?
Social is in the name, so you're probably confused; I know I was. So let me explain. I'll be using Among Us as a reference of sorts, but don't worry if you haven't played that.
First of all, the game's story takes place in a time loop - every game is one loop. Every loop the roles are shuffled. Who's Gnosia and who's human this time? Well, that's your job to figure out! Or to prevent others from doing so, if you're Gnosia. But how do you figure it out? No - you can't go around and watch the characters' movements, catch them red-handed, going through vents. Everything is taking place in a specific order, kind of like in a board game.
The game's split into days. Every day goes like this: First, there's a meeting. The meeting has five rounds of discussions in which the characters point fingers, talk about their roles, use their special skills (more on that later)... and then they vote on who to put in cold sleep (hey, better than being thrown out of the airlock). After that, you get some free time, which you can use to either go follow an event if available, or to improve your relationship with a character.
After that, it's time to sleep. That's where people with roles that have actions get to act. That means Gnosia choose their target, for example - only one per day. If they managed to successfully kill their target (not always the case), you get a message who was eliminated, and the next day begins. This keeps going until either all Gnosia are in cold sleep, or half of the ship's remaining crew are Gnosia.
And That's All?
No. There are multiple roles available, most of them possible to fill only once. For example, there's the Engineer who can investigate a person once a day, just before bedtime - and they'll know if that person is Gnosia or human. Sounds sweet, right? Well, not only being an Engineer makes you a target, but also the Gnosia can lie and pretend to be Engineer as well. But that's not all - Gnosia can also have a human ally, who can ALSO lie!
So often it becomes a game of "who do I believe?". And this is where it gets fun. As you progress, you level up your abilities which for example increase your likelihood to instantly tell that someone's lying, or for others to believe your words more. You have three engineers! Which one's the real one? Which one's Gnosia? How can I tell?
You're Not Quite Yourself
In total, there are 15 characters, including you. They always have the same stats and the same personalities... but there are some minor changes in their behaviour, depending on whether they're Gnosia or not. Those changes are generally very hard to detect, so it's better if you rely on deduction instead... or on the behaviour of others.
For example, there's this character - Comet. She's not very clever and bad at lying, but her intuition is almost superhuman. She'll be able to detect lies much more easily than others. So if you notice Comet suddenly saying that someone's sus, you know that she probably detected lies. Or she's Gnosia.
Then there's Raqio, a non-binary ultra-rational jerk. They can sometimes deduct with 100% certainty that someone's human or Gnosia... but they have a bad habit of suspecting their allies as well. Do you support them? Or shut them down? You can't tell, this twatologist will say that everyone is sus anyway. Unless you have some more reason to think that Raqio's right, or lying... and Raqio's decent at lying!
You Mentioned A Plot?
Oh yeah. You're in a time loop, and one more character - Setsu - is stuck in it with you, although they're going through it in a different order than you. Nobody else is aware that this is a loop, and of course you and Setsu are trying to break it. That's the storyline. And in order to find out what you need to do, you need to keep playing the game.
I managed to reach the true ending after 131 loops, or 25 hours. So you'll need to play a lot of Anime Amogus to get there. What I'm saying is if the social deduction gameplay doesn't sound appealing to you, then skip this one.
A lot of the plot consists of smaller subplots, little events that need specific conditions to manifest, which show you another side of a character or teach you a new special skill. Some of those plots can end in romance... which is sad, considering that at the end of the game you'll loop and everything will be forgotten (although I'll never forget showering with Comet). Some characters will only end up attracted to you if you're of a specific gender, mind (there are three options: M/F/NB).
Oh, and many of those events also serve as little windows to the greater world that exists outside of the ship. There's slavery, classism, horrifying parasites, transhumanism gone wrong... but also sentient, uplifted animals and a procedure to turn yourself into a cat? No, no sexy catgirl, actual meowing cat. It's good stuff.
Conclusion
The aesthetic and the music complete the entire experience. Women suffer a little from the "same face syndrome", but less than in other anime-style works. I found all characters interesting and likeable, even when they tried to kill me. Perhaps especially when they tried to kill me? Ah, wouldn't go that far.
If my messy description of how the social deduction gameplay sounds interesting, then I think you'd like GNOSIA. I got hooked almost instantly; but if this kind of discussion and deduction based thing isn't your cup of tea, then the rest won't be worth it.
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