Pieced Together caught my attention for a few reasons when I first saw it. One was that it’s a game where you put together a scrapbook based on the story of two friends, which was an intriguing and creative concept. I like creative games, as well as narrative games, so this was two ticks for me already. After playing the demo, which has you trying out the first chapter, it completely sold itself to me. Now I’ve had the chance to play Pieced Together the whole way through, what are my thoughts on this title? This review will tell you.
Pieced Together is now available on Steam for $9.99.
Story – Two Girls Immortalized in a Scrapbook
Pieced Together focuses on the lives of two girls, Connie and Beth. It is told from Connie’s perspective; she is the narrator, but it also looks at Beth’s life as well. The girls are great friends, going to school together, getting up to mischief; the usual trials and adventures of kids growing up. As you work on the scrapbook, you learn about Connie and Beth more, what their interests are and their personalities. You really feel as if you’ve grown up with them, got to know them well.
Throughout Pieced Together, Connie is writing a letter to Beth, who she hasn’t seen for a while. This already gets you intrigued. Why have they not seen each other in a while? Did they fall out? Drift apart? The only way to find out is to play through the game and discover their story.
I’ll avoid spoilers for this review of Pieced Together, as I don’t want to give away too much about the story and what happens between the girls. The best way is to play and find out for yourself, as it’s truly brilliant and wonderfully told, and well worth playing.
Gameplay – Piecing Together Two Lives
The core gameplay of Pieced Together is creating a scrapbook that tells the story of two friends, primarily focusing on their childhood years. It’s easy to think that this is a simple create-your-own-story scrapbook simulator. It sort of it… but it’s much more than that. Pieced Together only takes 1 – 2 hours in total to play, but it is a good example that a game doesn’t need to be long to be good, or memorable.
Doing Things Right
In Pieced Together, you work on the scrapbook chapter-by-chapter, page-by-page. Each page offers a different scenario, a different story to tell in Connie and Beth’s life. It could be covering Connie’s first day at her new school, Connie and Beth’s first sleepover, a trip to the museum…
Pieced Together‘s story is told chronologically; you cannot skim through the scrapbook and work on whichever page you want. You have to finish the page you’re working on in order to move on.
You also cannot simply stick in whatever pictures, words, and other items you like into the scrapbook. They have to make sense in context of the event the page is focusing on. A sticky note in the top corner informs you of how many correct items need to be stuck onto the page.
If you put the wrong item down or put it in the wrong place, it gets flagged up and you have to either move it or replace it. Fortunately, it’s very easy to unstick an item; no mess is made.
You have to add the right items to the page, or they’ll be rejected.
Puzzling Over Pages
Pieced Together in a form functions as a puzzle game. As mentioned, you have to stick down the correct themed items onto the pages. You may also have to put them in the right places, helpfully marked for you. They may have to appear in a sequence or match the shapes.
It’s not just about gluing things down. You may have to clean something up, color it in, cut out from pages using scissors, or at one point use a printer to produce the stick-down items. This creates even more variety and creativity, as well as realism, with the whole art of scrapbooking.
The puzzles are wonderfully creative and unique from each other, avoiding becoming repetitive, plus they’re not too difficult to solve, so they don’t become frustrating, breaking the cozy and relaxing theme of the game.
Some items, such as images and text, have to be placed in a certain order.
Adding Fun Stickers
You also have the option of using stickers in your scrapbook. These are unlocked simply by clicking on them as they appear at the edge of the book, usually at the beginning of a new chapter. Stickers are easy to apply and can be moved around freely without creating a mess.
The only thing to keep in mind is that each sticker can only be used once. Normally this might be seen as unnecessary and annoying, but in the context of Pieced Together, which feels like a realistic scrapbook-making simulator, it makes you treasure the stickers more and reminds you to use them wisely.
Stickers provide a fun and creative optional extra.
Graphics & Audio – Beautifully Presented
The art style used for Pieced Together is just perfect. It’s cartoonish yet feels realistic at the same time. It’s all fantastically presented. It really feels as if you’re working on a real scrapbook, with real paper, glue, pens, and stickers. It just draws you into the game so much more.
The audio for Pieced Together has been done justice as well. The music that plays throughout fits in nicely, being pleasant to listen to and not at all distracting, while creating a relaxed atmosphere. The sound effects are worth mentioning too, adding further realistic touches.
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- Connie and Beth are the sweetest friends.
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- As the scrapbook is made, Connie writes to Beth.
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- Sometimes you have to cut out of pages and glue them into your scrapbook.
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- At the end of each chapter, the stickers remind you of what happened.
A key for Pieced Together was provided by Glowfrog Games.
