To Be or Not To Be

Genre: Visual Novel

Players: 1

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Review:

To Be or Not To Be is a Visual Novel released on PC and mobile devices in 2015 and ported to Nintendo Switch in 2022. This game is a “Choose Your Own Adventure”-style retelling of the story of Hamlet, delivered in a modern tone and with a tongue-in-cheek sense of humor.

The tone and humor here are thanks to a combination of some witty writing and some excellent line delivery by this game’s voiced narrator Ryan North (of Dinosaur Comics fame), as well as some fun directions players can opt to take the story. In my first playthrough, the story starred Hamlet’s girlfriend Ophelia, who responded to Hamlet’s declarations of seeing his father’s ghost by gently convincing Hamlet that ghosts aren’t real, ending with Ophelia and Hamlet living comfortably together after turning a tidy profit when Ophelia invents indoor heating. In my second playthrough, Ophelia has a conversation with Hamlet and the ghost and convinces them that killing Claudius to avenge the king’s murder would be counter-productive, and everyone’s interests would be much better-served if Claudius was properly indicted in Denmark’s legal system.

Purists who prefer to simply hear a retelling of the actual tale of Hamlet have that option, and in fact the narrative choices William Shakespheare took are marked for easy reference, so not a bit of originality is needed. The game’s interpretation of Hamlet is still amusing, questioning Shakespheare’s narrative choices (because of course after Ophelia’s brother Laertes calls her a slut, the natural thing to do is invite him into your bedroom for a nice chat) and trying to present them in a way that makes sense in a modern context (“Hamlet only likes you because you’re smokin’ hot”). And when you, as Ophelia, opt to do as Shakespheare did and make Ophelia meekly agree with her brother and father and deprive herself of any agency whatsoever, the narrator frustratedly tells you that you’re not allowed to be Ophelia for a while. Yeah, this game’s creator is definitely not impressed with the way the playwright wrote women.

The game’s excellent writing is accompanied by a few sketchy portraits of the characters, and backed by a fitting but unmemorable Classical-style instrumental soundtrack. While not bad, it’s pretty clear that this game is all about the writing and narration, and about the narrative choices players can make.

Players can opt to use the L & R buttons to rewind to the previous choice and choose a different option, or to speed ahead through writing they’ve already read. Beyond that and the branching choices the story gives you here, there’s not much else to it.

Well… there is one other thing though. Frustratingly, this game’s narration does not properly sync up with the text you’re reading. Sometimes, the two pair together well, with new text boxes appearing as the narration gets to them, but at other times the text doesn’t properly continue until you press a button, by which point the narrator is already getting ahead of you, or perhaps you press the button once too many times and now you’re ahead of the narrator. It doesn’t kill the game, but it seems sloppy, and definitely could have been handled better.

Still, despite this little hiccup, To Be or Not To Be is a delightful Visual Novel with funny writing, good narration, and meaningful player choices. Each play-through of the game is pretty short, but of course the nature of a “Choose Your Own Adventure”-style game is replaying it, and this game provides enough fun different directions to take the classic story of Hamlet that I believe this will be an enjoyable romp regardless of whether or not you’re a fan of The Bard’s works.

tl;dr – To Be or Not To Be is a Visual Novel that retells the classic story of Hamlet with modern sensibilities and a “Choose Your Own Adventure” style of gameplay. The writing is funny and irreverent, and the choices make for some fun and meaningful departures from the original work (or a delightful interpretation of the original work if you make the same narrative choices Shakespheare did). Either way, this is a fun take on a timeless story, well worth checking out for Shakes-fans and non-fans alike.

Grade: B

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This game has been nominated for one or more of eShopperReviews 2022 Game Awards:

Runner-Up: Most Overlooked

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