When you think about old animation, the chances are you think of the light and airy cartoons that project a sense of nostalgia and happiness. Those hand-drawn movies where a princess naïvely stumbles into a situation before the hero swoops in and saves the day. But if you look a little closer, things are more terrifying than they seem. Beauty and the Beast is about a woman who goes through the most extreme Stockholm Syndrome, with a smattering of bestiality. Cinderella runs to the first man she meets to escape her life of slavery. The Lion King is a tale of revenge so brutal that if you remove the comic relief, it is one headshot away from joining the John Wick universe. For all the cuteness we remember about animated films, there’s a horrid meaning bubbling beneath the surface that teaches kids about the real world.
Why am I mentioning this? Well, the team at Little Sewing Machine has used those tense undertones and applied them to their latest game, Bye Sweet Carole. The hand-drawn, horror adventure game not only weaves a story akin to animated classics of yesteryear, but it also takes that undercutting innuendo and makes it as subtle as a brick to the face. Despite its cutesy art style, there is an unsettling demeanour about Lana’s quest to find her friend. But before we get into that, let’s start at the beginning. Are you sitting comfortably?
Bye Sweet Carole tells the tale of Lana, a sweet, innocent girl who attends Bunny Hall, an all-girls’ school in Victorian England. Waking up in the grounds of the school, we quickly find out she’s investigating the disappearance of her best friend, Carole, who has vanished from the face of the Earth. Bogged down by a dodgy memory, a feeling of isolation, and sprinkled with a touch of disdain from her teachers and classmates, Lana is, for all intents and purposes, on her own. But every story needs a hero, and Lana sets off to unwrap the mystery by solving the puzzles and clues scattered throughout Bunny Hall.
As Lana’s story unfolds, it becomes clear that her own tale is as mysterious as Carole’s disappearance, as she’s mistaken for the Princess of the Kingdom of Corolla – a land which exists in an alternative plane of existence. The world starts to twist and warp around you, and you’re suddenly thrust into a dark fairy tale where the sedate puzzle-solving gives way to creatures starting to chase Lana. The sudden onslaught of frightful, transforming beasts managed to cause a genuine fright. Coupled with the ominous music, I never felt Lana was entirely safe exploring Bunny Mansion. Often, I had to stop what I was doing and find a safe hiding place, lest Lana meet a grizzly end, and I was left staring at the title screen. These events are peppered throughout the game and were frequent enough to keep me on edge, but not tip me into a full cardiac arrest. The element of being hunted added a layer of panic and desperation to the game, causing me to make mistakes as I tried to hurry through puzzles while avoiding capture. It did lead to a few frustrating restarts as I’d run out of my hiding place too early or misjudge a jump, but thankfully, restarting was quick and painless.
Even though you’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover, the graphics for Bye Sweet Carole sell the 2-dimensional adventure brilliantly. The classic animation style of the mid-late 20th century is beautifully eye-catching and enchanting throughout. Lana’s sweet, Snow White appearance is only bolstered by the swooshing animation that transforms her into a rabbit. The magical characters, particularly Mr Baesie, whose severed head is something you’ll spend a large portion of the game looking for, could easily have come straight out of Cuphead. Even the evil ones that hunt you down, like the formidable Ms Fisherin, with her swirly eyes and violent teeth, call back to the horrors of Watership Down. Backgrounds are equally gorgeous to look at, with each scene being well-drawn and memorable. In a somewhat Scooby Doo style, the interactive objects are plonked on top of the scenery that points at where to go, but not necessarily the order you play with them.
The game’s visuals are complemented by the sound design. Each section has its own themes and motifs. Harking back to Mr Baesie, his joyful appearance is matched up with a light and breezy track that portrays a sense of whimsy and hope. Conversely, when Lana is being stalked through Bunny Hall, the music shifts into a horror-intensive violin screech that is timed with various jump scares.
The performance in Bye Sweet Carole, particularly from Chapter 5 onwards, was less than optimal. During one of the climactic chases, the baddie I was hiding from managed to get stuck in place, instantly sucking all of the tension and difficulty out of the scene. I was able to carry on puzzle-solving without a care in the world. I felt guilty about cheaply making progress, so I reloaded my save file, only for the enemy to disappear altogether.
Sadly, this wasn’t a one-off. Throughout my time with the game, I encountered a number of problems, including a sound glitch where a grinding noise was continuously running until I restarted the game. Shortly after, I hit a genuine fade to black moment that never recovered. After the second quit-to-home, a cut scene jittered so badly I missed large chunks of the action. I was saved by the voice-over as it carried on with narration, but it was still a shame to miss out on the animated goodness.
The performance in the second half of the game would have been somewhat passable if it weren’t for the totally unresponsive controls. In situations where you need to be fast, more often than not, I’d get caught waiting for the game to catch up. Ascending a staircase in a 2D world should surely be a case of pressing Up on the control stick, but Bye Sweet Carole, you have to wait for the prompt to appear before you can make your way up or down, which takes a couple of moments more than you’d think it would. Thankfully, the game saves constantly, so I always respawned at the beginning of the sequence, so it’s not a big deal, but compounded with the graphic anomalies, the slight annoyance turned quickly into frustration.
The anger experienced with the technical struggles impacted my experience with Bye Sweet Carole. There is a great story to experience that deals with mature themes sensibly, and the whimsical nature of the Kingdom of Corolla mixed with the brutality of Bunny Hall was bittersweet in the best way. The animation by Little Sewing Machine is the perfect way to present the game. It’s just a shame that a few control issues and the technical cracks in the second half disrupted and spoiled the entire flow of the overall experience.
Recommendation Score
In the interest of full disclosure, VGamingNews was provided with a copy of the game in order to conduct this review.
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