Hypnospace Outlaw Review – Saving The Internet One Report at a Time

Hypnospace Outlaw Review

In this day and age, the thing that many people have in common is their access and use of the internet. In Hypnospace Outlaw, the introduction of Hypnospace brings the internet back into its early beginnings with user profiles and old GIFS with the twist that it is accessed while you are sleeping. It is an ingenious thought and serves as a possible premise in this clever ‘90s inspired web browsing puzzle game.

When you first log into the game, you are introduced as a Moderator of sorts where the entire purpose is to flag content deemed illegal on use pages. Throughout your playthrough you will stumble upon different user pages with various different subjects in which you must sift through in order to do your job and get paid. Your missions will be coming in the form of cases in which you can complete at your own pace with the premise that the more content you flag for a certain case, the more money you will receive as a bonus that can be used towards a multitude of features reminiscent of the early stages of the internet like antivirus.

Unique Puzzles and ’90s Jokes

Hypnospace Outlaw is only a single-player game and while I found some parts of the game amusing, there are some challenges that are incredibly confusing which halted my progress. Additionally a large portion of the jokes that were presented in the game seemed to fly over my head since I was born in the mid ‘90s. What stood out the most from my experience was how unique the puzzles were with the concept of using an internet browser as the base of your gameplay. When it comes to a target audience that would be interested in playing this, the demographics would revolve around people born before the ‘90s that were able to experience this type of stuff beforehand. When looking at the controls it is extremely simple to use like how you use any sort of internet browser: You just click onto the search bar and type what you want.

The A.I. you are given at the beginning of the game acts like a cyber assistant telling you when you have mail or when the file you download is finished, but what had caught me off-guard is that the A.I. can tell when you are alt-tabbed or AFK and will send a voice prompt asking if you are still there. The sounds that come out of the game is quite diversified where each page is given its own music background while you’re scrolling through not to mention the catchy songs like “Granny Cream’s Hot Butter Ice Cream” and “I am The Chowderman”.

The game itself can be played for a very long time depending on whether you want to search Hypnospace for extra things to flag or just complete the minimal amount and hand it in. It is completely up to the player on how they want to approach the game and watch as Hypnospace slowly morphs into something different due to your actions. The game is capable of satisfying you for hours on end but it is not a game that will have the player hooked on wanting to come back if left alone for a couple days. The only issue that I can think of would be the ability to maintain the interest in the cases, where I just ended up going to the user pages for the sole purpose of viewing them, rather than doing the job the game intended me to do.

Hypnospace Outlaw is a witty, retro-styled point and click puzzle game that brings you into the depths of the ‘90s internet while testing your solving skills. While it can be suitable for all ages, it would be better catered to an older audience with its jokes that only someone who has lived through that time would understand. It may take a few sittings in order to complete the game but just make sure you remember about it in order to play it. If you are looking for a puzzle game riddled with an assortment of jokes and retro nostalgia look no further!

*** PC code provided by the publisher ***