I mean that in the nicest way possible--this genre is inherently easy to like and simple to make (hence why there's so goddamn many of them). Its greatest strength is its atmosphere: the catwalks overlooking the magenta-soaked skylines, the phosphor-tinged air of the ruins. And between taking in the sights, the characters are charming and the puzzles are fun.

I have no notes on what it does right. But I have much more to say about the rest.

Usually, fourth wall breaks in games are small jokes or gimmicks done for shock value. But the more meta a game gets, the more it raises the bar for what I expect it to do. OneShot establishes early on that you and your computer are part of the setting. It plays its hand early, but a game program only has permission to do so much, and it quickly runs out of ideas. (That said, I like the puzzles involving multiple applications and windows. I think there's a lot of potential here for future games to explore.)

OneShot tries to do that "verisimilitude" thing where it feels lifelike and responsive to everything you do. Which only makes the plot holes and contrivances that much more frustrating. Thoughts like "why can't I use this object instead of the other one?" or "why don't I get hurt when I touch something I was warned about?" really break the sense of immersion it tries to create. I even toggled off autorun for a while, until I realized that Niko wouldn't actually trip and shatter the sun, then turned it back on for the rest of the game.

The central relationship in OneShot is between Niko and the player. This is another tradeoff--it's fun to talk to Niko, but the remaining characters just sort of come and go in the background. I wish we had more time to explore the lives of the NPCs and their interactions with one another. That would have really made the world more cohesive and come alive.

Sometimes OneShot tries to appear scary and foreboding. Picture a small animal raising its paws and standing on its hind legs. Nothing in this game will fail you or challenge you in any way, despite what the marketing suggests. (It even handholds you through your own operating system.) The only major choice you have to make comes at the very end, and even that just serves as a setup for the true ending, which makes the antagonist an even bigger paper tiger than before. Still, the game overall is so lighthearted that I can almost forgive it.

Play OneShot if you get the chance. It's short, sweet, and cozy to a fault. Emphasis on the fault.