Nostalgia Horror
HIGH Colorful Characters.
LOW All setup, no payoff.
WTF Make your friends kiss!
Lost Records: Bloom & Rage is the latest game from developer Don’t Nod, famous for Life is Strange — a series I’ve been a fan of since its first installment. After playing through a preview chunk of Lost Records, I’m cautiously optimistic for this new work, though it left me with more questions than answers.
The preview starts with the player controlling a teenager named Swann. I was allowed to explore her room while looking at various objects that helped establish the setting as being in the ’90s. I was happy to have a protagonist who wasn’t a ‘traditionally attractive’ skinny girl (Swann is somewhat stocky compared to the average female protagonist) not to mention that Swann is somewhat socially awkward, which helps them feel grounded and real.
After poking around, changing clothes and interacting with objects, I was introduced to the central mechanic — recording footage on my camcorder. To do this, I simply bring up the camera and wait for a gauge to fill while I targeted things in the environment such as my cat, or other objects in the room. it’s also possible to edit the order in which clips I recorded occurred. It’s simple editing, but it made for an entertaining minigame of sorts.
On the other hand, I had mixed feelings when it seemed as though editing the footage had no impact on gameplay. That might be a good thing for players who might not want to fiddle with the footage. On the other hand, I felt like making this mechanic possibly optional meant that a game about recording and editing would miss an opportunity. Of course, as the content I had was in alpha, it’s entirely possible that the footage element had not yet been fully integrated into what I saw, so the jury is still out.
After the tutorial and setup, I was told (via text stills) of what transpired between segments of Lost Records that were not yet available, after which I found myself in a garage and was introduced to the cast of characters. These included new high school friends Nora, Autumn, and Kat. They were showing Swann their music and I began to record them.
Shortly after talking about a music video and interacting with them, Lost Records cut to a daytime exploration of the nearby woods where we went to shoot more footage. Here I recorded the characters at their request and occasionally directed them to do things, such as a cartwheel. I also shot additional footage the game didn’t prompt, as I was curious if it would let me integrate “B-roll” footage into the shoot.
During this session I got to know the girls more, but some of the interactions were a bit awkward. At one point Swann asks two of the girls to kiss, asking them to act as if they are a boyfriend/girlfriend couple. I wanted an option to stop it, but Lost Records only let me take her aside to talk after it happened.
While I was progressing the woods segment, Lost Records would sometimes cut to the “present day” 27 years later. In a first person view I was still Swann, but now I was in a bar across the table from an older Autumn talking about the events I was playing through in 1995. However, here the vibe felt more ominous. There was a mysterious package, and hints that the “earlier” events had ended badly, or perhaps hadn’t been talked about for the last 27 years.
When Lost Records returned to the earlier time period and we ended our shoot in the woods, events jumped ahead to when we were gathering to watch the footage. I hadn’t edited too much before but I had shot some B-roll, and to my surprise, a character emoted when they saw one of the B-roll clips I had filmed of a partial deer skull. It wasn’t much, but I appreciated the unexpected feedback. Towards the end, there were suddenly some strange lights and sounds that foreshadowed a creepy supernatural occurrence, and then the preview content ended, leaving me with more questions than answers — though not all the good kind.
From this preview content, I had hoped for a better idea as to what Lost Records was trying to do with its core mystery and gameplay, but there’s still a lot left to figure out. Will it be an emotional coming-of-age story or perhaps more of a found footage story? Will I revisit horrific events in the past? Will the filming and editing would tie into the gameplay in a more nuanced, relevant way? Does the order in which one edits or films footage matter?
Overall, I’m intrigued and Lost Records has a lot of potential, especially when taking the studio’s previous work into account. However, only time will tell what shape the final experience will take.
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Disclosures: This game is developed by Don’t Nod. It will be available on PS5, XBO, XBX/S, and PC with a planned release date of February 18, 2025. This content was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the PC.
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