Harold Halibut offers a visually stunning and deeply atmospheric experience, but struggles to stay afloat under the weight of its narrative and pacing.
Harold Halibut is an ambitious stop-motion adventure game that promises to deliver a narrative-driven experience like no other.
Set aboard a massive spaceship submerged on a distant alien ocean planet, the game blends a unique visual style with a story that explores themes of isolation, survival, and human relationships.
While the craftsmanship behind its visuals is undeniable, Harold Halibut ultimately struggles to maintain a compelling gameplay experience, often becoming bogged down by pacing issues and an overly complex narrative.
Let’s take a closer look at what works, what doesn’t, and how the game’s depth, while intriguing, can sometimes lead to a drowning experience.
A Visual Masterpiece
The first thing that will grab your attention about Harold Halibut is its stunning art direction. The game is brought to life using hand-made, stop-motion animation—a rarity in the video game world.
Each character, object, and environment has been meticulously crafted using real-world materials, giving the game an aesthetic that feels both familiar and otherworldly.
The level of detail in the environments, from the rusty corners of the ship to the strange underwater landscapes, is nothing short of breathtaking.
This stop-motion world feels tactile, as if you could reach into the screen and touch the handcrafted models. The ship itself feels alive, a relic of the past yet filled with futuristic technology.
Every room and corridor tells a story, filled with small details that immerse you in this underwater sci-fi world. From the quirky, retro-futuristic gadgets scattered around to the subtle wear and tear of the ship, the environment truly shines as one of the game’s strongest points.
However, as beautiful as the world of Harold Halibut is, the visual excellence can only take the game so far. Once you’ve gotten past the visual novelty, the cracks in the game’s foundation start to show.
Narrative Depth That Struggles to Stay Afloat
The story of Harold Halibut follows its titular character, a young janitor living aboard a sunken spaceship that was meant to colonize a new planet. After a failed mission, the ship and its inhabitants remain stranded under the sea, leading to years of waiting, hoping, and despair.
As Harold, players navigate the mundane routines of life aboard the ship, interacting with the quirky cast of characters and uncovering secrets about the mission and the ship’s inhabitants.
At its heart, Harold Halibut explores heavy themes of existentialism, loneliness, and the longing for escape.
The game’s dialogue is filled with philosophical musings, and the characters themselves often reflect on their situation with a mix of hope and resignation. These elements contribute to a narrative that feels introspective and deeply human.
Unfortunately, while the themes are rich and the world is ripe for exploration, the pacing of the story becomes a major issue. The game’s slow burn approach can feel more like a drag at times, especially when paired with dialogue-heavy sequences that sometimes overstay their welcome.
Conversations between characters often meander, and while some are genuinely thought-provoking, others feel like filler that bogs down the experience.
It’s a shame, as the characters themselves are well-written and interesting, but their interactions lack the punch needed to keep the story moving forward at a satisfying pace.
Gameplay: A Slow Slog Through a Stunning World
Harold Halibut by LiGames.net offers an adventure game experience that feels heavily rooted in exploration and dialogue. The gameplay largely revolves around walking through the ship, engaging in conversations, solving simple puzzles, and performing mundane tasks.
While this may appeal to fans of slower-paced, narrative-driven games, others may find the lack of engaging gameplay mechanics to be a major drawback.
The puzzles are simplistic and rarely offer much challenge. They feel more like tasks you’re completing to move the story along rather than meaningful gameplay moments.
This wouldn’t be such an issue if the narrative was able to maintain momentum, but the combination of slow gameplay and slow pacing creates a repetitive loop that may lose players’ interest after a while.
That’s not to say there aren’t moments of brilliance. Certain sections of the game, where you delve deeper into the mystery of the ship and its past, offer some truly engaging storytelling.
But these moments are often buried under layers of slow-moving gameplay that make it difficult to maintain a sense of urgency or excitement.
Atmosphere and Sound Design: Immersive, Yet Claustrophobic
Despite the gameplay flaws, the atmosphere of Harold Halibut is undeniably impressive. The ship feels claustrophobic, as it should, given that it’s been submerged underwater for decades.
The confined spaces, dim lighting, and constant sounds of creaking metal and water create a sense of isolation that permeates the entire game.
The sound design is subtle yet effective, with background noises that help immerse players in the ship’s eerie and lonely environment.
The game’s music is minimal, often fading into the background, which works well for the introspective nature of the story. When the music does kick in, it complements the emotional beats of the narrative, adding to the overall atmosphere.
The Emotional Weight of Choice
One of the most intriguing aspects of Harold Halibut is its focus on player choice. While the choices you make don’t always lead to drastic changes in the story, they do affect your relationships with other characters aboard the ship.
These relationships evolve based on your decisions, and the game excels in making you feel the weight of your actions, even if the consequences aren’t immediately apparent.
However, the choices often feel more about dialogue than action, which can sometimes make them feel inconsequential in the grander scheme of things.
The emotional impact is there, but it lacks the urgency and intensity that other narrative-driven games have managed to achieve with similar systems.
Conclusion: An Ambitious Dive That Loses Its Way
Harold Halibut is an undeniably beautiful game with a unique visual style and a deeply philosophical narrative. It has moments of brilliance, especially in its atmosphere and world-building.
However, the game is hampered by its slow pacing, overly simplistic gameplay, and dialogue-heavy sequences that don’t always justify their length.
While fans of introspective, slow-burn adventures may appreciate the depth of the story, others may find themselves struggling to stay engaged.
Ultimately, Harold Halibut is a game that, much like its sunken ship, struggles to surface under the weight of its own ambition.
